This Is The Importance Of Closure (And How To Get It)

Closure sounds neat, a word to put an end to everything, sew up any loose ends. But it isn’t.

Closure comes at a price; you cut away many pieces of yourself so that you can sew the ends together, and the results hurt and linger on for days.

Unfortunately, we need it. It is the full stop to a sentence, the end to the beginning.

I needed closure from you. Because obsessing about just wasn’t good for me. It was eating away at my soul, and I felt desperately pathetic. It was like I was a dog at the dinner table, begging for affection like it would beg for scraps from the table. I was better than this, I could be better.

So, I tried to be as busy as possible. But little things would remind me of you, and I would feel down again. Plus, I loved to torture myself and message you whenever I could, feeling elated at the simplest joke you made. Why do I do this to myself?

I tried to go cold turkey; eliminate all contact. But I forgot that communication works both ways. Just when I thought I had forgotten you, you would come back again, and I would find myself back at the start. I felt like Sisyphus, rolling the boulder all the way to the top only for it to roll back to the bottom and have me start again. I had to stop this. So I told you. I told you in the most cowardly way possible, before I left for vacation. It took you a while, but you got a hold of me.

“We should meet,” you say. I scour my head for an excuse.

“This is not optional,” you intone. I have no response but to acquiescence. I don’t like this side of myself. We arrange to meet for coffee. You are an hour early. I notice you sitting there as I linger outside, not ready to go in. So I wander around before returning an hour later, still hesitating, still not ready. But this time you see me, and wave me over. I force my feet in, force myself to smile as you stood up and gestured for me to sit.

“Can I get you anything?” You ask politely, as if we were strangers on a blind date. I shake my head, politely declining. There’s that word again. Were we still the same two people who had shared all those conversations together, late into the night?

You started talking, about your past relationships, the type of boyfriend you were. You encouraged me to share, and I did. And somehow, we were back again, to who we used to be with one another. It was comfortable, familiar. I felt the swirls of longing echoing all around me.

Did you feel it too?

Suddenly, your face takes on a pensive expression. You look at me, carefully.

“Do you believe love can grow?”

This question throws me. I look at you, not sure how to respond. I open my mouth to clarify and then … I know. I understand what you are trying to do and love you so much more for this.

“No, I don’t.” I see relief flood your face.

“Are you sure? Because…we could try if you wanted.”

“I’m sure,” I say, softly. You look at me a moment before turning away, perhaps to hide the reprieve that you felt at my answer.

We part ways outside. I ask for a hug and we laugh as your fingers get stuck in my hair. And then, you leave. I watch you walk away, leaving me desperately trying to hold myself together.

Quickly, I attempt to sew myself up. You can do it, I coax myself. It is a bad patch job. I fall apart a few times on the way home. I cry in pain as I take the needle to myself, sewing up what I had hacked away.

As you read this, you must be asking yourself. Where is the closure? Why is it that every line penned just charts the agony?

Pain is always the first stepping stone to closure, and after that, time. Time will get you where you need to be.

You don’t believe me? It is three years since that happened to me, and after three years, he contacts me again. He is getting married; he wants me to come. The wounds that I had sewn up hum, as if anticipating that they are going to be ripped open again. But they don’t. I have moved on, because life goes on; and so will you.