English Vocabulary — Antonym (choose the word opposite in meaning to the highlighted word). Sentence: I thought about her a lot during the following months.

Introduction / Context:
Antonym questions test your control over word relations in real sentences. Here, the key word is “following,” used in a time expression: “the following months.” You need the option that most naturally reverses this temporal idea. Understanding such pairs improves comprehension of reports, histories, and project timelines where time references are frequent.

Given Data / Assumptions:

• Target word in context: “following” (as in months that come after a given point).
• We want the opposite meaning within the same temporal domain.
• Options: succeeding, proceeding, preceding, receding.

Concept / Approach:
“Following” in time means “subsequent” or “coming after.” The precise opposite is “preceding,” meaning “coming before.” While several distractors look similar, only one reverses the timeline relative to a reference point. Focus on standard collocations: “the following month(s)” versus “the preceding month(s).”

Step-by-Step Solution:

Verification / Alternative check:
Substitute into the sentence: “I thought about her a lot during the preceding months.” This flips the time reference while staying idiomatic. Compare with “succeeding months,” which keeps the original meaning and thus cannot be an antonym.

Why Other Options Are Wrong:

• succeeding: Synonym of “following,” not its opposite.
• proceeding: Either a verb (to proceed) or a noun (legal proceeding), not an antonym of a temporal adjective here.
• receding: Spatial/visual retreat; not the standard temporal opposite.

Common Pitfalls:
Choosing by surface form (suffix “-ing”) or phonetic similarity. Always match the semantic category—here, calendar-time reference. Remember common textbook pairs: “subsequent/following” ↔ “previous/preceding.”

Final Answer:
preceding