Getting Closure

[Starlight925]

I was broken up with 5 years ago, after a 2.5 year relationship, with no explanation, and no closure. It was torture, and it honestly took me over a year to get over.

 

OTOH, I was divorced by someone who inadvertently gave me closure when I discovered hotel bills and an affair.

 

I've been through both: endings with closure, and endings without.

 

Closure is the way to go. To heal. To move on much more quickly.

 

No, it's not always about a nice, civilized discussion. Sometimes it's just about finding out the reason they left.

 

Saying that "closure comes from within" is a nice platitude. For me? Didn't happen. I honestly don't even care what the reason is, just give me a reason. Let me heal.

[milly007]

I was broken up with 5 years ago, after a 2.5 year relationship, with no explanation, and no closure. It was torture, and it honestly took me over a year to get over.

 

OTOH, I was divorced by someone who inadvertently gave me closure when I discovered hotel bills and an affair.

 

I've been through both: endings with closure, and endings without.

 

Closure is the way to go. To heal. To move on much more quickly.

 

No, it's not always about a nice, civilized discussion. Sometimes it's just about finding out the reason they left.

 

Saying that "closure comes from within" is a nice platitude. For me? Didn't happen. I honestly don't even care what the reason is, just give me a reason. Let me heal.

 

I'm sorry you had to go through this.

 

Do you feel that you have healed now? If so, what did you do that helped you heal and move on?

[katrina1980]

I assume with that answer you've never been in a abusive relationship. Even if there are more kind and less kind ways of breaking up, we are not owed an explanation and an explanation is very often unhelpful in healing. The reason we have to heal ourselves after break ups is because as individuals we are responsible for our own emotional welfare. And asking anyone else to take that on is at very least co-dependent. When we break up with people we are dropping our emotional responsibility to them. It sounds like the op's friend's ex who left her was reaching out to heal himself. And that can be super helpful but not a common curtesy.

 

Interesting POV. And agree, we are all ultimately responsible for our own emotional welfare, healing, etc.

 

Also agree my friend's ex returned to heal himself, nothing to do with her.

 

I'm pretty open minded (relatively speaking) and so will be thinking more about this post, appreciate your thoughts Rose.

 

To LHGirl, I am so sorry, and this is precisely what I am talking about.

 

2.5 years, have a discussion for heavens sake.

[Hollyj]

I assume with that answer you've never been in a abusive relationship. Even if there are more kind and less kind ways of breaking up, we are not owed an explanation and an explanation is very often unhelpful in healing. The reason we have to heal ourselves after break ups is because as individuals we are responsible for our own emotional welfare. And asking anyone else to take that on is at very least co-dependent. When we break up with people we are dropping our emotional responsibility to them. It sounds like the op's friend's ex who left her was reaching out to heal himself. And that can be super helpful but not a common curtesy.

 

This has nothing to do with abusive relationships.

[Hollyj]

I'm sure he did, but mostly she thinks, and I agree, he simply wanted to alleviate his OWN guilt.

 

Whats funny is that after three years, he told her he wanted to reconnect for HER! To give HER closure.

 

I thought that was pretty arrogant quite frankly.

 

 

I mean, why would he assume she even needed closure after all that time? It had been three years! lol

 

And she has remained no contact the entire time.

 

He did it for himself, to alleviate his own guilt so HE could finally move on.

 

Good for her.

[rosephase]

This has nothing to do with abusive relationships.

 

The OP was generalizing about closure. That it's a good thing. And something that we should all be able to do. You went as far to say that closure is a common curtesy. I disagree. Abusive relationships is part of why I disagree. That is why I brought it up.

 

I feel it is unhealthy to relie on an ex romantic partner to help you move on from the break up with them.

[Batya33]

I wanted to add that people define closure differently. Like the poster whose girlfriend ended things nad e planned why as best she could butvje called her after they broke up to meet again and discuss it more to get "closure "? On the other hand I cannot relate to why one would blame someone who she met a handful of times or less who implyvstopped asking her out as not giving "closure". To me in those situations that is not "ghosting" - silence =lack of interest in another date. Move on. And the "why" is mostly irrelevant given the short amount of time.

Many years ago I dated someone for about two months until on New Year's Eve we wnet out with his parents, he acted like a jerk, walked out of my house shortly after midnight despite having planned to stay over and take me to his parents for brunch the next day, then left me a message the next afternoon with a bland apology and ending to talk. No I dodntot call him and no I didn't consider that a"ghosting". If he couldn't figure out why I wouldn't want to speak to him after he behaved tjetvwayc(a180 from how he'd treated me up until then - then he had a lot more Erin with him than even I knew.

So yes there are exceptions nad yes I think you must give yourself closure especially in a situation of "just not that into you" which even the person doing the breaking up might not be able to fully explain.

[Hollyj]

The OP was generalizing about closure. That it's a good thing. And something that we should all be able to do. You went as far to say that closure is a common curtesy. I disagree. Abusive relationships is part of why I disagree. That is why I brought it up.

 

I feel it is unhealthy to relie on an ex romantic partner to help you move on from the break up with them.

 

This has nothing to do with abusive relationships. I would never advocate reaching out to an abuser.

[katrina1980]

@ Batya, I didn't understand your entire post (auto correct glitch?) but my friend didn't end it, her fiancé walked out and ghosted after several years together and returned after three years apparently to give her closure, but really only retuned to alleviate his own guilt.

 

Agree that after only a few dates, or short term or casual relationships, while it would be nice and respectful, explanations are not always necessary.

 

I think I may have stated this in an earlier post.

[j.man]

What varies is how much an ***hole the ghoster is between ghosting after three dates or ghosting after three years. What doesn't vary is the principle of closure needing to indeed come from within. Now saying that isn't stating that it's easy or that, especially with a fiance who drops off the grid, it's not going to be excruciatingly difficult, but achieving closure within yourself and for yourself still needs to be the prime objective. It's not without sympathy that I say that, but, ultimately, if it's taking years to get over something-- anything-- that's when it's time to go the route of therapy.

 

Personally, in an age you can literally text someone "Sorry, I'm outtie" and block their number within 10 seconds, I don't see much of an excuse to simply ghost. I don't ghost, I don't defend ghosting. I don't necessarily think it's sheering the moral fabric of our society, but it's definitely not cool.

 

The outspoken notion of "closure comes from within" suffers from the stigma most practical advice does. It doesn't necessarily speak to the step-by-step process as it does what the objective in mind needs to be, leaving it to the individual to tailor the process as they need to. It's not easy, but it is what it is. Both unfortunately and fortunately, we can only control ourselves. Simply speaking, we can't bank on our partners or ex-partners providing closure and thus need to equip ourselves with the emotional toolkit to do so ourselves should the need arise.

[Hollyj]

The OP was generalizing about closure. That it's a good thing. And something that we should all be able to do. You went as far to say that closure is a common curtesy. I disagree. Abusive relationships is part of why I disagree. That is why I brought it up.

 

I feel it is unhealthy to relie on an ex romantic partner to help you move on from the break up with them.

 

Sorry, I just assumed that would be a given : not give closure to an abuser. Glad you brought it out.

[boltnrun]

Where I think people often run into trouble is when they insist they cannot possibly move forward with their lives unless their ex meets up with them for "closure". Oftentimes this proposed meet up is not about closure at all, but rather the person who was broken up with's last ditch attempt to reconcile. They're hoping if their ex sees them in person one more time (looking fantastic of course!), they'll realize they made a terrible mistake and ask for them back. OR, they use "but I NEED closure!" as an excuse to hold on to their ex and won't even consider accepting the breakup until said ex "gives" them this purported closure.

 

In those cases I say closure is a misnomer...what they really want is the exact opposite of closure.

[milly007]

Where I think people often run into trouble is when they insist they cannot possibly move forward with their lives unless their ex meets up with them for "closure". Oftentimes this proposed meet up is not about closure at all, but rather the person who was broken up with's last ditch attempt to reconcile. They're hoping if their ex sees them in person one more time (looking fantastic of course!), they'll realize they made a terrible mistake and ask for them back. OR, they use "but I NEED closure!" as an excuse to hold on to their ex and won't even consider accepting the breakup until said ex "gives" them this purported closure.

 

In those cases I say closure is a misnomer...what they really want is the exact opposite of closure.

.

 

This is so true. I can think of a few people (myself included) who have avoided face-to-face meets following a break-up out of fear of reconciling with someone we know wasn't right for us. In a situation like this, we'd talk over the phone and discuss our reasons re the break-up (and even then, it would be difficult).

[katrina1980]

.

 

This is so true. I can think of a few people (myself included) who have avoided face-to-face meets following a break-up out of fear of reconciling with someone we know wasn't right for us. In a situation like this, we'd talk over the phone and discuss our reasons re the break-up (and even then, it would be difficult).

 

Even a short simple text is better than ghosting.

 

I certainly don't claim to be some perfect person who always does the right thing, far from it actually, but even with the recent guy I only had 6-7 dates with, I explained why I no longer wanted to pursue things in a short text message.

 

Then blocked so as to avoid him responding wanting to discuss further or whatever. A few men have gotten nasty so blocking avoids this too.

 

I admit I have ghosted though on a few occasions and have regretted it and felt like crap. Still do in one particular situation.

 

I told myself they didn't give a * which I learned later was just not true.

[milly007]

Even a short simple text is better than ghosting.

 

I certainly don't claim to be some perfect person who always does the right thing, far from it actually, but even with the recent guy I only had 6-7 dates with, I explained why I no longer wanted to pursue things in a short text message.

 

Then blocked so as to avoid him responding wanting to discuss further or whatever. A few men have gotten nasty so blocking avoids this too.

 

I admit I have ghosted though on a few occasions and have regretted it and felt like crap. Still do in one particular situation.

 

I told myself they didn't give a * which I learned later was just not true.

 

We're all learning as we go. No one has this all figured out, that's for sure.

[katrina1980]

We're all learning as we go. No one has this all figured out, that's for sure.

 

You got that right!

[milly007]

Although I'm learning tons from ENA. Lol

[Tygerlyly53]

When I was ghosted on a few months ago, the majority of advice I was given was to "give myself the closure I needed." I could not do that. Mainly because I didn't know how. Being ghosted on by someone you talked to almost everyday for 5 months, went on dates and were intimate with is awful. I still hurt months later. The unanswered questions still remain about what happened. I agree that in this day and age of quick and easy communication, that even a simple text and then blocked would have hurt less than him just disappearing with no explanation.

 

I am not sure I wil ever have true closure from this but I will have to learn to live with and accept what happend.

[pippy longstocking]

I encourage people to find their own closure because mostly , they haven't got much choice and encouraging them to get closure means I am encouraging someone to contact their ex knowing they will be seen as one almighty pain in the ass ........ So I personally say it in the hope that the odd person will find some inner peace and acceptance .

 

However , it is a totally sh1t thing to do to a person and I have suffered horrendously because of someone doing that to me . My ex that I came here for 6 years ago , found me on here ..joined , called himself a name I would recognise , quoted me to get my attention , this lead us to emailing , but at that time my mam was dying and I was going from the city I live , back to my hometown for weeks ...hanging on a thread waiting for that phone call that meant she was going to die ....it was the darkest days of my life and that little bit of light was him . The day of her funeral I asked him to light a candle between 3-4 for me and he sent me a lovely kind email back to say he would etc etc ............................I never and have never heard another word off him since .

 

I came back to the city I live completely broken , watching my mam die was feckin horrendous ..I remember getting in , dumping my bags to call my mam to tell her me and my daughter where back ...I picked up the phone and it all hit me in the face that she had gone , that no one actually gave a sh1t if we where home or not .

 

So I emailed my ex to let him know and how things where etc etc ..not realising the low life had just stayed emailing with me I presume out of guilt because I was going through a bad time , I obviously got no reply cos he had stuck it out till she was dead and then cut himself free of me , but didn't bother to pass that information on to me ..so I thought something had happened to him and for weeks and I mean weeks I was checking the obituaries online and accidents and things like that .... There was no need to put me through that hell ,he should have had the balls to say he had realised he didn't want to contact me ...

 

Closure , the truth , having the balls to be honest saves people a hell of a lot of heart ache and worry .

[Batya33]

@ Batya, I didn't understand your entire post (auto correct glitch?) but my friend didn't end it, her fiancé walked out and ghosted after several years together and returned after three years apparently to give her closure, but really only retuned to alleviate his own guilt.

 

Agree that after only a few dates, or short term or casual relationships, while it would be nice and respectful, explanations are not always necessary.

 

I think I may have stated this in an earlier post.

 

Sorry about the glitches!!

[catfeeder]

What we need to do, the healthy thing to do, is to talk it out with the person with whom we were involved in an effort to give *each other* the necessary closure we "both" need in order to move on properly.[...]

 

Thoughts?

 

There's nothing 'healthy' about presuming that we own control over the desire or 'need' for closure of anyone else.

 

Given that we can only adopt prescriptions for ourselves and nobody else, it doesn't make any sense to prescribe a behavior that is dependent on anyone else's cooperation.

[katrina1980]

There's nothing 'healthy' about presuming that we own control over the desire or 'need' for closure of anyone else.

 

Given that we can only adopt prescriptions for ourselves and nobody else, it doesn't make any sense to prescribe a behavior that is dependent on anyone else's cooperation.

 

Good point and after reading all these responses, my thoughts on the subject have evolved a bit from those expressed in my original post.

 

I am now leaning towards what I have always believed (prior to over-thinking all this that closure does come from within.

 

Thanks catfeeder.

[figureitout23]

I encourage people to find their own closure because mostly , they haven't got much choice and encouraging them to get closure means I am encouraging someone to contact their ex knowing they will be seen as one almighty pain in the ass ........ So I personally say it in the hope that the odd person will find some inner peace and acceptance .

 

However , it is a totally sh1t thing to do to a person and I have suffered horrendously because of someone doing that to me . My ex that I came here for 6 years ago , found me on here ..joined , called himself a name I would recognise , quoted me to get my attention , this lead us to emailing , but at that time my mam was dying and I was going from the city I live , back to my hometown for weeks ...hanging on a thread waiting for that phone call that meant she was going to die ....it was the darkest days of my life and that little bit of light was him . The day of her funeral I asked him to light a candle between 3-4 for me and he sent me a lovely kind email back to say he would etc etc ............................I never and have never heard another word off him since .

 

I came back to the city I live completely broken , watching my mam die was feckin horrendous ..I remember getting in , dumping my bags to call my mam to tell her me and my daughter where back ...I picked up the phone and it all hit me in the face that she had gone , that no one actually gave a sh1t if we where home or not .

 

So I emailed my ex to let him know and how things where etc etc ..not realising the low life had just stayed emailing with me I presume out of guilt because I was going through a bad time , I obviously got no reply cos he had stuck it out till she was dead and then cut himself free of me , but didn't bother to pass that information on to me ..so I thought something had happened to him and for weeks and I mean weeks I was checking the obituaries online and accidents and things like that .... There was no need to put me through that hell ,he should have had the balls to say he had realised he didn't want to contact me ...

 

Closure , the truth , having the balls to be honest saves people a hell of a lot of heart ache and worry .

 

I agree with others who say closure should come from within but I think with this huge increase in ghosting, its changing the definition of closure.

 

I agree with Bolt who said for many, closure isn't about getting answers but rather to have that final chance to convince them to change their mind or counter their argument. I think its different if someone broke up with me and I insisted I know the reason why. I think that's unnecessary. No matter the reason, they chose to walk away, closure should come from within.

 

But with ghosting you're never actually left, in fact, for many it takes a bit to even realize whats going on so for days you're in agony wondering if something happened to them or thinking they will respond eventually. You don't let go for a while. Some don't let go of that hope for a very long while, because although they cut off contact they never actually ended things so that hope is still there. Its one thing to be blindsided with a 'this isnt working', its another to be blindsided with radio silence.

 

When one of the guys who ghosted me came back around and finally apologized, he seriously thought I was going to go back to him and act as if nothing happened. Its kinda a chicken and egg situation,did I move on because I got closure? I cant really say. While I am glad he reached out and apologized, I think I had already began to move on at that point and the 'I'm sorry' just helped close the door. Did i need it? I don't know, but I do know that it was harder to move on than a regular breakup.

[katrina1980]

@figureitout, your post above caused me to consider another possibility for ghosting.

 

At least in some cases.

 

They ghost because they don't want to shut that door permanently, and burn bridges, instead preferring to leave it open in case they change their mind and wish to return later.

 

While they can't commit to staying and giving the relationship their best shot, they can't commit to ending it either.

 

They're conflicted, so they ghost leaving everything open.

 

Just as your ex did!

 

This may also explain why soooooo many ghosters return later.

 

Not to get closure or even to alleviate their guilt, but to reunite with the ghostee!

 

Again just like your ex did.

 

And maybe even why my friend's ex returned after three years no contact too.

 

Has nothing to do with alleviating guilt and getting closure as I originally thought.

 

Interesting.

[Ganamede]

Closure , the truth , having the balls to be honest saves people a hell of a lot of heart ache and worry .

 

100% right on !!!