I’ve been thinking lately about my exes. No, it’s not that I want to get back together with any of them…their ships have sailed thankfully into other harbors (no pun intended). But I do think about setting the record straight.
I am a Libra, so I constantly like to weigh both sides of an argument, and I like to see justice when someone is wronged. I hate movies like The Last Seduction where a character like Bridget can get away with deceiving men, and not feel guilty at all. But mostly, I hate it when I am not heard, or when I am misunderstood.
And of course, when there are break-ups, there are misunderstandings.
I’ve written emails that I haven’t sent, I’ve crafted brilliant conversations in my head that I’ve never spoken aloud. I really really wanted to pull the drunk at midnight calls just to have an excuse to list all of the ways in which I think I’ve been wronged without seeming like a crazy girl. I felt my exes (two specifically) needed to know the particulars of how they had wronged me.
There was a guy I dated years ago who dumped me without warning, letting my calls go straight to voicemail while he ran off to Hawaii with his new love. In response, I pathetically called him for weeks afterward, begging for a closing conversation. I wanted to know from him what had happened. What had I done wrong?
But the closure call never happened. He just vanished from my life. And I really wanted to let him have it. I was right in feeling betrayed, and he needed to know how he’d wronged me.
Then there was the guy I dated who wanted things to continue despite the fact that they weren’t going well at all. When I broke it off with him, he went on a 30-minute rant about how I didn’t really know what I wanted, how I’d led him on, how I didn’t deserve a good man in my life. I was too stunned to fight back, so I just took it. By the time I knew what I wanted to say back to him, he was no longer listening. I didn’t get to have the closing conversation with him either. This made me angry. He had no idea who I was or what I wanted!
And as a side note…there was also a guy from eHarmony who stood me up for our first date, and then sent me a nasty email and closed communication. I never even got to email a response back. I was so pissed, I called eHarmony to rant about him and how he didn’t even know me well enough to write such a crazy email. The operator on the other end of the line just kept saying “uh huh” and “sorry about that”. Then they offered me another free month.
As much as I would have liked to use Facebook as some kind of weapon to post my feelings about being shut out, about feeling powerless, about not being heard or understood in these situations, I didn’t. Mostly because I only joined Facebook two years ago, and these break-ups happened before. Now I realize this was fortunate.
If I did have the chance to rail against the exes now, to give them a piece of my mind…would I do it?
I was sitting at CoffeeBean this afternoon, and listening to two women next to me having an argument. They weren’t dating…one was a client who had hired the other for a job, and didn’t like the result. Instead of having a rational conversation so that they could move forward and figure out how to solve the problem, they got personal and mean. I’ve never been witness to such a hostile working relationship…one of them even stood up to yell at the other, to make sure she was heard. Of course, they were both right in their own minds. They both made convincing arguments in my opinion, even though they weren’t rational. I felt like I was watching Jerry Springer live. In fact, I was worried one of them would hurl a chair at the other…that’s how intensely they were arguing.
It got me thinking. I have felt the same rage. I have felt wronged on many occasions…career, men, etc. I have stood up and screamed and let the other person have it when I felt it was necessary to my sense of self-preservation. I was right, and I knew it. But the ironic thing is, it didn’t make me feel better. In fact, it left me feeling a little “less than”.
This is when I discovered that being right didn’t necessarily have a place in my relationships with others. It didn’t help me learn. And it certainly didn’t help me feel more understood.
I’m not advocating being submissive in some way. I just think that at some point, I had to realize that no matter what I thought or how I felt, my ex had his own version of the story. One that didn’t include my opinion. No matter how inaccurate, I was never going to get them to change their minds about me. So at some point, I had to stop trying.
I’m still struggling with feeling misunderstood. But now, I’m finally learning that someone else’s “truth” about me doesn’t have to be mine. I am responsible for my own life, and my own thoughts and feelings…nobody else’s. I have no control over them, only myself. If I try to “make” people understand me, it is a losing battle. I can only convey what I think, and they have the choice to accept it or not.
Have felt misunderstood by an ex? Did you argue your point? Did that work for you?
About Kelly Seal
Kelly is a freelance writer based in Los Angeles, CA. She blogs about dating, relationships, personal growth and what "healthy living" means to her. You can follow her on Google+, Twitter @kellyseal or through her website www.kellyseal.com.
Child, take it from a Gay, Adopted, Mexican–being misunderstood is just part of the game. And the stuff about closure, someone somewhere put it “out there” that closure must come from the person you’re trying to have a final “parting” with. FALSE! you can have closure all by yourself, just like sex. Sure, it’s fun to have a spectator, but it’s not always needed. Being understood comes from inner wisdom. Trust the Mexican on this one. ;0)
Oh my gosh I agree so much with Nandoism. You can have closure all by yourself. In a way, it has to be by yourself. I’ve had “the closure” talk with exes where I felt no closure at all. I’ve had repeated closure talks with exes that just couldn’t let go. It takes a decision within yourself to truly move on and get past things.
But I know what you mean about wanting to vent that anger and frustration. I’ve done it, and it’s not pretty. I think the letters you don’t send, or maybe the anonymous venting blog post are a better outlet for your anger. Just be sure the one you’re venting about doesn’t know your blog address. 😉
Sniff—thanks you two. I like having a voice (which I guess is helpful for blogging purposes)…but this is not helpful when it comes to closure on a relationship. It took me a while to learn (and like I said, I’m still struggling)…that just because someone else may think of me in a certain way, it doesn’t mean that it’s true. I don’t have to defend myself or my feelings. Freedom…
I have to say it’s always better not to post any post-break-up rants on facebook. I did that once and regreted it for ages afterwood! The internet is not tha place to vent anger or start arguments.
the only way a closure talk works is if things have gotten so bad that both parties really want to out and have been putting it off. How often does that happen? Otherwise you’re trying to have a rational conversation with someone who is emotionally traumatised. It’s not a recipe for being understood…
I find that anytime I get into a nasty argument, which is very rare, even if I make my points and I’m right, I still feel like shit afterward. And that feeling doesn’t go away.
Learning how to not let others define you is a huge part of being happier.
I always find your posts to have much wisdom in them. (OK, WTF, that sounded like some martial arts master talking!) What I mean is, this was a smart post.
Thanks for the comments.
OOTG – (Blush.) Thank you for your kind words. It means a lot to me. And I totally agree that not letting others define you makes you not only happier, but more ok with others. It still is hard for me, but I’m working on it.
Browolf – good point. And one person is usually more angry than the other when two people break up. Never a good situation.
Black Unicorn – Although I haven’t posted any break-up updates on FB, I have gotten involved in arguments over politics, religion, and other stuff you just shouldn’t talk about over a social networking site. One went on for 3 days before I finally pried myself away. Ugh.
Odd how you wrote this post around the same time I was feeling the need to set things straight with my latest romantic disaster. Pretty much like your Hawaii-runaway lover, mine went to a conference in Oregon, and over a weekend, fell completely in love with another guy. He had the chic, during a 2-month-overdue Gmail IM session, to giddily announce that he had met somebody and was keeping his fingers crossed for it to work. I couldn’t help but ask “What about this love I am in?”
In a nutshell, he said he may have loved me but doesn’t and cannot right now, and whatever I believe is all up to me, then he logged out. Never heard from him ever again.
He went on to delete EVERY single comment he had left on my MySpace profile, deleted me from all of his Instant Messengers, and deleted his Facebook profile altogether.
Last January, I heard on the news of a train collision in his area, so I emailed him to inquire if he is OK. He gave me a very detached, Tech-Support-sounding reply. Expressing my relief that he was safe and sound, I wrapped up my note by a sarcastic “Well, we can go back to not talking now.” Being the perfect engineer that he is, he did execute my command.
Dissatisfied with his alarming oblivion to what he’s done, I wrote him back wondering if he was aware of how he, suddenly, picked up and left without even telling me, and how he seemed to not even care about what had become of me. He accused me of wanting to make him feel terrible before wishing me, yet again, all the freaking best!
Our differences started when I had fallen sick for 6 weeks, which had necessitated 3 doctors and a big bag of medication, all the while keeping my daily speaking engagements of 6 hours straight! So, the last thing I had on mind once home was to get on skype and talk until 3 am. –Yes, we met online and he pulled the plug before our supposed face-to-face meeting — To add insult to injury, we had a 3-week national Internet problem that only allowed access to the different Google applications.
He couldn’t believe someone could fall sick for this long (even calling me a hypochondriac) or that a whole country could experience Internet problems for this long (not my fault if I live in a third-world country and you, as a microchip engineer, have access to the Internet 24/7).
Jeez, I thought I had gotten this off my chest but realize I did not. I just remembered how nobody, including so-called friends, was there for me at the time. So, yep, it’s sad when an ex doesn’t even give you the opportunity to lay out your version of the facts. It’s just selfish to think one’s reality is the only objective one.
Thank you for this post. Looks like I really needed it.