This worked somewhat for me, at least once. I had a serious, long-term girlfriend break up with me (right around Christmas, as a matter of fact), and it was devastating, more so than I would have thought possible. I wasn't ready to jump off a bridge or stick my head into an oven, but it shook me to my core. When we were going together, it always seemed as if the relationship was more important to her than it was to me (which may have been part of the problem, I guess). When she abruptly broke it off with me, that illusion was emphatically dispelled.
Another lady I was acquainted with (we had both been in the same wedding party; the groom was my friend, the bride was hers), taking note of the break-up, made her heretefore unknown interest in me known, and we started going out. If nothing else, the new relationship assuaged my wounded ego. I can remember being dressed up for a date with her, walking out to my car with some flowers in hand, and noticing my ex-girlfriend watching me from her window (she lived nearby, which made the break-up even worse--- I had to see her all the time). I'm pretty sure she knew the flowers weren't for my mother, and, petty though it may have been, it made me feel good. I remember thinking, "Hey, sweetheart, I don't need you--- we haven't been broken up a month yet, but I've moved on. Stew up there in your room. Me? I'm going out on a date." There were other fish in the sea, as they say.
Unfortunately, the new lady, while very nice, was more into me than I was into her, and the relationship didn't last long (this seems to be a pattern in my life, sad to say). Maybe it wasn't fair of me to go out with her so soon after my break-up with my long-term girlfriend, which obviously was very much on my mind. Maybe it could have worked out if I had waited longer before dating her.
Still, if nothing else, the new relationship, as short-lived as it was, did make the break-up with my old girlfriend a little less painful, the blow to my ego (and my heart) a little less crushing.
