Girl… stop.
“I need closure” is often code for “I’d like to try and work things out, so maybe keeping the conversation going can help” or “I can’t let him go, so I’ll do whatever it takes to keep him around.” And so the break-up of the already broken thing continues much longer than it needs to. Y’all out here taking a month to break up a relationship that didn’t yield a child, a joint lease or even a puppy. Totally unnecessary.
If someone has explained to you why they want to stop being in your wonderful company, then you can only ask but so many questions before you are going to start talking and listening in circles. He says “I don’t feel like you’re the woman I want to be with” and tells you why… explaining why you do, in fact, possess these qualities that he claims are not going to make him say, “Hey, maybe you are the woman of my dreams. I take everything I said back, let’s go to the Olive Garden.”
Someone walking away from you does not mean that you’ve done something wrong or that you are a failure at relationships. It may be something that has changed in him, or even something about you that may work fantastically with a different partner or that works fine for you… but it isn’t a quality this particular man can deal with. We have to stop looking at the demise of our relationships as an indicator of our worth or the end of our lives, but instead, a sign that what we may have believed to be solid simply was not. You have to believe that something better (or at least something equally fulfilling) is out there.
Alas, our concern for what we may need to work on can also force us to push the closure talk on an unwilling, non-cooperative ex. We want to know what we may have done wrong so that we may repeat it. If he’s cool with giving you some feedback about things that bothered him, then that’s fantastic. If he shuts off or tells you that it wasn’t anything that you did, then you have to accept that and move forward. Pushing the issue isn’t likely to yield the answer you want or need.
Yes, you should absolutely ask for answers from someone who is breaking up with you, especially if caught off-guard. But at some point you have to get up and be able to walk away with dignity and your head held high… regardless of whether you aren’t 100 percent sure why your ex chose to end things. Even if he provided every single thought that motivated his choice, closure can only truly come from within.
Your ability to accept that what once was is no more and to find peace and comfort in this new stage of your life… that, sis, is closure. And you absolutely deserve it, so don’t get in your own way by looking for it in all the wrong places!