I was sitting in my psychology class when I realized it had been a year. Just a year ago, falling around Labor Day weekend, I drove down to Colorado for a wedding with a guy I was in an “almost-relationship” with. He was one of the groomsmen in an old college friend’s wedding, and I was certain that this is where he would pop the question, (not about marriage of course) about asking me to be his girlfriend.
We drove into the night listening to 90s boy band music, and the next day the wedding took place, but at the wedding he told me he wanted to wait a little more to become official. I was totally fine with that answer because, hey, I wasn’t entirely wedding for a commitment either. The next day, we drove back to Nebraska and boy was I starting to realize that I was falling head over heels for this guy. It hit me all at once, and I remember just sitting in the passenger seat listening him to sing, “Amarillo by Morning” thinking that this guy was going to be different from the rest. He dropped me off at home that Sunday morning, and that was the last I had heard from him.
In my psychology class we were talking about closure. My professor was telling us that the need for closure is a driving factor into many people’s anxiety and depression. The search for the truth, the reasoning that supposedly will bring you peace. In that search for closure, you begin internalizing the situation you’re faced, blaming it on your actions. I remember after the wedding, I began to believe that it had to be something that I did wrong. Was it something I said, did I not seem that into it from the start, was I texting him too much?
After that cycle, I then began what was called externalizing the situation. Well maybe he is the worst human being to ever exist. Maybe he was faking the whole thing for months to have a date to this wedding. Maybe he realized that I was busy myself. After the whole externalizing and internalizing spiel, my professor began to explain how people begin to obsess and get worked up after the whole situation.
In today’s day and age, this is usually caused from social media, and seeing what people post and most recognizably, subtweet. He deleted me off of Facebook following the wedding, but kept me on Snapchat, which made absolutely no sense. I would message him at first asking if there was something that I did to upset him, and then later on those messages would end up becoming angry rants about how terrible he was. In the end, that really didn’t do me any good because I had no answer about why he disappeared.
Closure is seen as the “cure-all” for these situations. Once we know exactly what went wrong, then we can move on. We base our whole recovery from closure, meaning that without it, you’re going to be stuck feeling this way. I can’t tell you how much time was spent on me over analyzing the whole situation and putting myself down because of it, to the point that I was suffering from anxiety and just talking about the problem would make me so angry.
What I wish I would have known is that I would be better off not knowing why it didn’t all workout. If the other person can’t man up and own up with an explanation as to why they no longer wanted to be a part of your life, then the reason being is probably useless, pathetic, and superficial. I shouldn’t have spent so much time worrying about what could have been, because I was letting the aftermath of what happened affecting my life at the present moment. As simple as it sounds, I just needed to MOVE ON.
No closure, no problem. Just move on and let it go. It didn’t work out one way or another because it wasn’t supposed to. When I finally talked to him six months later, it didn’t even feel better. Instead, it was just opening up old wounds that drove me crazier because it still didn’t make sense. I didn’t deserve to be left without an answer, I thought. But at the same time, he wasn’t worth my time because I deserve respect, consistency, and commitment.
So to those who are seeking for this closure, don’t. Stop rereading the old text message convos, trying to put together the situation to a puzzle with missing pieces. Don’t go through social media and creep on their posts and looking at the pictures they like. Don’t put your friends through you crying after a night of partying because you are crying over someone who doesn’t care about you.
You have to remember that in life, we don’t have all the concrete answers. This uncertainty is inevitable, and you need to live your life knowing you can’t figure it all out. What you can do is learn from the situation, close the door and leave that in the past and move forward. If only you could see how far better off you are without overthinking and dragging your self-esteem down—you have so much potential that you need to take advantage of. There’s so much more out there for you, and you are lucky to have people on your side that aren’t going to flake out on you.
Closure isn’t something we need to move forward from our problems. We THINK we need it, but it’s best to move on and learn the lesson that you deserve more.
