The inconvenient truth about being dumped

Having your heart broken is probably one of the most physically painful experience that is brought on by pure emotion.  The ego does not like rejection and there is no stronger form of rejection than being dumped. You are truly in your pain body when this happens, the emotions are so strong your body feels like it has been torn to pieces. 

It’s hard to just walk away and start to move on after being dumped. You find yourself wanting to continue talking to your ex to try and understand what happened, but it’s like digging for gold in a pile of shit. The further you go, the further it just stinks. You do this because you’re trying to seek closure. Thing is….you won’t get closure from them, you get closure from yourself. Even if they had a good reason for breaking up with you, it still won’t matter. Nothing they say or do will give you closure. YOU give yourself closure. 

I had the rug pulled out from under me after a four and a half year relationship.  I didn’t see it coming and I loved him with every part of my being. It hurt to say the least.

I was in the thick of it. The pain I felt would bring on tears at any given moment and I wanted to know more, I wanted to understand why. I finally got him on the phone when he was actually willing to open up about the girl he left me for.  I was so upset, tears running down my face, voice shaking and I asked my first question, “where did you meet?”, I got as far as my second question to which I paused after hearing the response. He asked me “is there anything else you want to know?”, in that moment it was like a light switch.  It wasn’t what I wanted to know, it’s what I wanted to get.  The conversation ended after that second question. 

What I wanted to get was a reaction from him. He spoke to me so emotionless, so bored in a way, like I was just wasting his time talking to him. I wanted him to respond with something, anything! I wanted to know he was hurting just like me. I wanted to hear him say things to me that he wasn’t saying.  

This phone call was somehow fortunately right before I had to undergo a transvaginal ultrasound, which was running a whopping three hours late. I was forced to sit in the waiting room, lucky that it was an empty waiting room as I couldn’t stop crying. But that time helped me immensely with my healing. It’s funny how the universe makes you slow down right at the moment you need to. 

It was in that waiting room I discovered the inconvenient truth about being dumped.  The truth is he didn’t need to give me anything.  Not himself, not anything. I was NEVER going to get what I wanted from him. I was never going to get the emotion. I was never going to get the reaction I wanted. Because really, what reaction would that even be? What would really be enough? Nothing would be enough unless it was a time machine to erase the breakup and continue living happily ever after, which of course was not going to happen. 

I was never going to get the tears from him that I was crying. I was never going to get the sadness from him that I was feeling. I was never going to hear him longing for me like I was longing for him. He was never going to hurt the way that I was hurting…and that’s okay. 

The realization that he is his own person. That he CAN be with someone else, he can choose to leave me, he can respond the way he wants to, he can be happy while I’m sad, he can move on while I’m suffering. Who am I to try to control him? I don’t need him to make myself feel better. I gave myself acceptance of the situation and in doing so I gave myself closure. Acceptance of the situation set me free. This is how you give yourself closure. 

Why is this truth inconvenient? Because your ego likes to wallow in its own sorrow and accepting the truth, whips it back into line. Does any of this make the pain go away? Of course not, but when you accept you won’t get what you want from your ex, it stops you from chasing it and in doing so helps you to actually move on. 

The simple realisation that you will never get what you want from your ex. No matter how much he talks to you or how many tears he cries, it will never be enough until you accept it is enough. Nothing will take back the situation but you have the option to take back your control of the situation.  No longer needing anything from your ex helps you to bring the control back into your life. 

And yes, after that phone I never spoke to him again about our relationship, about her, about what happened. I no longer needed anything from him, I just needed myself.

Steph