How to Limit Your Need for Closure After a Relationship
Recognizing when enough is enough, and when you’re not being truthful to yourself.
First things first: I understand how meaningful closure can be for people, and I would never dismiss its importance and value.
Closure describes a person’s desire for a clear answer to a question they have, for reasons to explain why something happened to them, or why someone treated them some way.
Lack of closure (in this case, after a breakup) leaves room for ambiguity. It leaves you spinning and wondering, trying to interpret a situation as objectively as possible. Yet, because you are aware that these are your interpretations, your analysis of the situation, you never believe yourself. For that, you need confirmation from the other person. You tell yourself that once you understand what happened, and why they acted the way they did, you will be able to let go and move on.
If you ever find yourself in this tiresome phase, take a moment to assess the situation, and wonder if your quest for closure is worth it and if it is indeed healthy for you.
Then take the time to ask yourself the following questions:
1. Is it closure that you’re looking for?
Is it an explanation you are looking for, or are you just hoping for one more talk? Are you hoping for this talk to lead to a change in the course of events, modify the ending, or even prevent the ending?
I believe that life is too short for you to stop yourself from saying what’s on your mind, from expressing your honest feelings and opinions. But some people will use your emotions against you. Even if they don’t, the rejection may hurt you even more. It may lead to an additional phase for you to go through. Whatever they respond, it may not live up to your expectations, and send you through yet another endless loop.
What about when the person went as far as blocking you? Will it not hurt you even more if you reach out to them regardless of that, and still be disappointed?
Consider all the possible aftermath scenarios of the steps you may take in your quest for closure. Will you likely end up more hurt?
Be truthful to yourself when you prepare an answer to the following question: are there certain things you need to hear to get closure, or do you just want to talk to this person again?
2. Did you become obsessed with closure?
Do you find yourself constantly making up scenarios in your head? Do you imagine fights and arguments with that person, to the point that you get genuinely angry, even though the scenario never happened (and likely will never happen)?
Notice the patterns in your day, and evaluate whether your quest for closure is taking up so much of your time and energy. It may be influencing your performance on the rest of your tasks. It is a slippery slope that leads from a simple, natural need for closure, toward a relentless — almost aimless — obsession with closure. Try to identify the fine line between the human need for closure and the ego boost you may be seeking, an eraser of sorts that will you help you deny the truth of what happened.
3. Did you already get your closure?
It’s hard to accept, but you might have already gotten your closure. However, you could be seeking a different one: an explanation that suits you better, that changes the meaning behind the experience. Maybe you just learned a lesson that you are not yet ready to accept.
I remember when I refused to accept that my ex-boyfriend cheated. I had all the evidence in front of me, including a semi-confession (very unfair, by the way). But I went to sleep every night hoping that I was wrong, that there was a different truth behind what happened. That somehow, I was delusional, imagining all the objective evidence and all the things they said to me, that tomorrow, we will talk again and it would turn out to, somehow, be a different truth.
When I finally accepted it, I was still in a lot of pain, but I struggled less: I now had to deal with one thing only, the fact that my ex-boyfriend cheated on me. I no longer needed to look for a different truth that I was never going to find because it didn’t exist. It brings us to the next question:
4. Will closure be enough for you?
Say my ex-boyfriend explained why he cheated, told me that he liked me more than his new partner, that I was special. I don’t think it would have made me feel better. This small change to the narrative of the situation wouldn’t have helped me. The facts were there: I got cheated on by a person I trusted. I now had to deal with pictures of them together, with the feeling of betrayal, and the futile attempt to find some alternate reality. That dreadful thing did happen to me, and I am now experiencing the emotions associated with it.
Remember to ask yourself if the closure will be enough for you to move on, or to feel better. If the answer is “no,” ask yourself what you can do to feel better, take care of yourself, to move on without resorting to a conversation with the person who caused you to be in this terrible situation in the first place.
5. Is your quest for closure simply taking too long?
How long has it been since you started looking for closure? All this time you spent, you spent hurting. You spent dealing with the aftermath of the thing that happened to you, you are already going through it. Closure or not, you are already in the process of moving on and going through the pain and emotions that you think closure may prevent, or reduce. You go on a long, terrorizing quest for closure so that you run away from emotions and feelings that are already within you. It is too late to deny or repress them. You can try to change the way you express these feelings, you can try to mask them with anger, or by making plans and strategies that may get you your closure. But if you take a moment, you’ll realize you were never able to avoid them.
Now that so much time has passed, ask yourself: is any closure going to take back any of the pain you already experienced? I always found this thought to be sad, but comforting. It may sound controversial or surprising, but feeling your pain is easier than avoiding it. It reduces cognitive dissonance, it reduces the emotional dysregulation you experience when you try to downregulate or upregulate a certain emotion, and it takes one element out of the fight you are going through: pain + fighting the pain.
This brings us to the next point:
6. Can’t your closure come from within?
After all this time you spent fighting for something that may eventually just disappoint you even more, after all the leg-work you already did when experiencing all the unavoidable emotions, can’t closure come from within?
Now that you already experienced and felt so much, try to change your narrative by yourself. Things ended, regardless of the unpleasant, unsatisfying way they ended. Try to think of the lesson you learned, of how much you’ve grown, of the pain you felt that nothing will ever take back.
Try to picture yourself in a phase after you’ve healed. It’s a much more productive, and soothing scenario to imagine. Focus on how you can love yourself in this difficult time.
List the mistakes you will never make again thanks to the lesson you learned in this experience.
Realize that very little, in other people’s actions, has to do with you or your worth. A cheater will cheat because they are capable of cheating, an abuser will abuse because that’s who they are, and a person who left because they were looking for something different, has the right to do that, even though it may hurt you. It’s admittedly hard to admit to yourself that people are entitled to leave. That applies to you, too: you can leave when things aren’t working out for you anymore, and when your time and effort are better spent elsewhere. Recognize dead ends.
In conclusion, closure is important for people. You may believe that you’re entitled to it, while the other person disagrees with you. You may have gotten the closure, but just didn’t like it. You might simply not be ready to move on.
You are entitled to any emotion you experience, but it would serve you well to take a step back and assess what your need for closure might be doing to you. You deserve to be happy and to control the damage. Remember to ask yourself the right questions to better understand your actual needs and the ways you can help yourself while needing as little as possible from others (especially those who might have hurt you).
Let me know how you will limit your need for closure today!
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