What the hell is closure anyway?
I guess I’m a little bit immature in my break ups, I’ve only really been through two. The first one, with my ex-husband of 19 years, was more of an explosion that I’ve mostly wrapped my head around. The second one, my first lesbian relationship, was casual, short, sensual, sweet and confusing. I like to think I’ve moved on. I started dating someone else, filled my life with hobbies, friends, and work. It’s been well over a year since the break up. But every now then, the memory of the relationship makes it back into my life, and I can’t help but wonder, what went wrong?
I wish I had some sort of understanding of what happened in the relationship. Reflecting back, I can figure out why I needed to leave, for reasons that were about me, and I know my decision was the right one based off of my knowledge of myself.
However, I’m forever confused around the feelings of her, my first girlfriend. There’s a piece missing to this breakup, her, and I wish I understood her perspective. Her point of view and insight, is something I value, and something I trust as she saw the other half of things. I wish I could wrap my head around what our relationship actually was, and I know I can’t fully understanding what it was, until I know what it was to her.
I wish I could just ask her these questions myself, but she made it very clear near the end of things, and after the break up she needed space from me. I respect this, but it did shut down our communication, so Im left wondering.
So, here are 5 questions I wish I could ask her.
How did you feel when I broke up with you?
All of our tough discussions happened through text. I didn’t really want this. I preferred to put off hard talks until we were in person, but she often kept texting until we had reached some sort of agreement. When I needed to break up with her, our schedules didn’t really match, and anyway she make it clear she didn’t want to see me in person those days (she was taking space from me). But breaking up through text left me to wonder, how she felt about me ending it?
Part of me wonders if she was relieved. A few weeks earlier, she had asked me for space. Asking for space can mean just about anything, from leave me alone for a couple of hours, to unofficially breaking up with someone. She had made it clear she wanted to see less of me, but wasn’t clear on what that would be like or what she wanted. Still, she had texted me once or twice since then, and even commented on one of my social media posts. She also had a history of not being honest with me when she didn’t want my company, her communication could have been polite courtesy. Was she giving me the slow fade and I simply did something she already wanted? I knew I couldn’t handle that. It would frustrate and further confuse me.
Was she sad when I broke up with her? Did she have hope our relationship would continue? Did she value what we had, and felt some sort of loss, or was I just annoying her? Did she look back at some our good times, and let them go with a sigh?
Was she angry? Did I offend her in my breakup?
After I explained, rather politely, I needed to end things, she mostly confirmed she understood, then gave me a thumbs up emoji, and texted a “Fine with me.”
Why don’t you want to be friends with me?
It was an open relationship, poly. One day, she explained that she had broken up with one of her other partners.
“Oh wow, I’m so sorry” I said to her. “Are you sad, will you miss her?”
Her: “Oh no, it’s fine. Unlike monogamous people, I actually like being friends with my exes. When I say I want to stay friends, I actually mean it, and I plan on being her friend.” She did stay that woman’s friend. Further more, she referenced interacting with a pervious ex girlfriend that I know she cared a lot about. So naturally, when I broke up with her, I asked her if we could remain friends, and her response was positive.
I reached out to her several times post breakup to be friends, but she pretty much didn’t respond to me. She told me she needed space after breakups (something that didn’t happen with the previous partners I mentioned above) and pretty much went no-contact with me. This confused me even more. Did she miss me and couldn’t handle having contact with me? Or perhaps she had just had enough of me and doesn’t enjoy my company anymore? Somehow these two scenarios seem totally opposite, and I wish I understood which was it.
What was our relationship to you? Was I just sex, was I an experience that you lost interest in, was I someone you cared about?
When we were discussing our boundaries around polyamory, I told her the most important thing was for me was to feel special, to have our relationship felt special despite multiple partners. That I wasn’t just a stand in for someone else, or a replacement, that I needed what we had to be it’s own special thing between us. I figured that’s how she’d feel about her other lovers as well. The next day, I got a text, that I treasured during our relationship.
Her: “It broke my heart when you asked if you were special to me at all, you are very special to me.”
I loved that. I felt special.
At the same time, later on her behavior showed something else. I recall a date where she spent most of the time texting someone else, and sharing/laughing about the texts of her friend, something we both agreed to not do while we were together (be on our phones talking to others). Her eyes were lite up, and she smiled big when talking about her friend. I was fine with this, I liked seeing her happy, but that was the only thing she smiled about the entire date, her friend. She didn’t seem interested in engaging with me, or me at all. I recalled holding her and seeing a bored, disengaged look at her face, and then she would pick up her phone again and start texting. I wondered if she was counting the minutes until our time together was over and she could be free of my presence. I asked her if everything was okay, she would respond with a distant “Yeah, sure, everything’s great.” But I knew something wasn’t.
Later, when I sat her down and asked her again, she told me she didn’t really feel like spending time with me, but felt guilty about it, so would agree to see me when she really wasn’t into it. That’s when she told me she needed space from me. She never set up another date to see me again after that.
There were memories where she did seem happy with my company, and then there were times where it felt like she was bored and annoyed with me. Which brings me to my next question.
Why (if ever) did you lose interest in me?
This is a rather complex question, as perhaps she never did lose interest in me. I guessed that part, based off of the above observations. Did our relationship start with the instant attraction/chemistry, and then that faded for her only to reveal that she really wasn’t that into me? For her did the relationship just run it’s course of 5 1/2 months and then just come to it’s natural end? Did something happen that made her not into me? Did I say or do something that offended her? Did she just need something different that what I offered her in a partner? Did she fall in love with someone else? Or was she interested in me the whole time, and just needed some time to herself? I honestly can’t tell.
How did she feel about me?
Early on in our relationship, I found myself blurting out those vulnerable worlds.
“I think I’m falling in love with you.” I told her after we were recovering from sex.
“I can tell, it’s really obvious.” She told me. “Now’s a good time to talk about boundaries…” which we did. She talked about not wanting a primary partner, commitment, etc. All of this sounded good to me, I was fresh out of a divorce. We talked around other boundaries which felt good. But something else didn’t feel good.
I remember during our relationship telling her I missed her, she would reference we would see each other soon, but, never said if she missed me back. She never said she loved me back. She did tell me once I was special to her, and at one point acted like she enjoyed my company, but not towards the end. I didn’t feel special then. In the 5 1/2 months we were together, she never gave me a gift, neither on valentines day, nor on my birthday, did she give me even a card or a note. It’s not that I wanted one or expected one, but it would have been nice to have proof that I knew her or she cared. I have no proof I even met her except some photos we took together.
“Gifts aren’t my love language” she told me once. “I hope that doesn’t lead to miss communications.” Her love languages were touch, and quality time. Mine are words of affirmation, and quality time. I recall her explaining that words of affirmation were hard for her, and wasn’t something that came natural. Maybe this was a break down of our love languages and we just didn’t understand each other. But overall, I don’t know what her feelings were for me.
I wish I could just ask her these things, but just as before the breakup, she has asked me for space. I do respect people needing space and advocating for it, but such acts close off communication. When a partner in a relationship asks for space, they have cut off you expressing your needs, you attempting to have quality communication with them, you coming to them for help when you need it. My attempts to talk to her post-break up, lead to me feeling like I was a creepy partner who was bothering her and not accepting her indirect no, (or at least what I think was a no).
When she confessed she had been spending time with me out of guilt and obligation, and needed space, I felt like such a pity date, a creepy, needy lover, and that’s not me. I’m not here to force myself onto anyone, I’m not desperate. Yes, I fell in love with her, and craved her company because I had grown used to it, but I felt pushed into a box of some sort of obsessive, annoying, desperate partner she pitied, and that’s not what I am. No one need hang out with me unless they enjoy my company.
Perhaps she liked me at one point, and then moved on. Perhaps I was just a fun, sexy time for her. Perhaps I broke her heart. Who knows?
These days I have someone else, someone who has made it clear they enjoy my company as much as I enjoy theirs. Someone who also brings me flowers, (and not just accepts them from me), someone who got me a card on my birthday, who makes it clear verbally how she feels about me. When I’m having a rough time, I can text her, and within 24 hours I know she will offer an ear. I don’t feel like a needy, desperate girlfriend, and I no longer wonder if I have an “insecure” attachment style. I think that was just the feeling I got when I liked someone, who wasn’t clear to me, if she liked me back.
I do understand that my ex’s feelings are about her not me, and I know I need to let her and her feelings be and stop trying to understand it. Letting go is a process, and maybe I’ll never understand. So I’ll just continue to move on.
Thanks for listening, please comet below.
