Ask Amy: Three years after the breakup

[movingfinger]

Dear Amy: I am struggling with heartbreak from three years ago.

Last night, I dreamed about her, where she professed her love for me again. I woke up feeling worse than ever.

Long story short, her parents broke us up because they did not approve of a same-sex relationship (neither did my parents).

I put it all on the line fighting for our love, but she didn't, after her parents broke her phone, threatened to send her to a psych ward and left her locked up in her house.

I waited for more than a year. Then I realized that she had regained access to Facebook and had a new phone, and yet no message to me!

I never got closure, and I was left with a broken heart and long-lasting emotional hurt. I really want to know how someone can do this after saying they love you and want to marry you.

I've thought so many times of messaging her, but I don't know what to do.

Emotionally Destroyed

Emotionally Destroyed: Please do message her. You may not hear what you want to hear, but knowing where she stands should help to provide the closure you seek.

You both had the odds stacked against you, and I agree that this is heartbreaking.

Comments

[movingfinger]

I think this advice is terrible in so many ways.

1, The woman's family have already shown what lengths they will go to to control her. How does LW know that someone else isn't reading her messages, too? What consequences might there be for the recipient?

2, CLOOOSUUUUURE can we kill this idea dead? Dead-dead? Please? Why is Amy encouraging her to contact her ex? In real life, there is no big scene like the movies where everyone sobs a lot on a misty waterfront esplanade with wrought-iron benches and then walks slowly in different directions. The ex has not gotten in touch. She knows how to get in touch. She does not want to get in touch. The LW wants to detonate a bomb of feelings and guilt on her ex, which will help neither of them.

3, What would help this grieving woman is therapy or at least some good reading along therapeutic lines. Amy does not suggest counseling for someone who has been clinging to a defunct relationship for years. This isn't healthy, and LW needs to move on.

[ambyr]

The sheer lack of empathy for her ex-girlfriend here is a little frightening. "I really want to know how someone can do this after saying they love you"? Well, they can do it because someone else "threatened to send her to a psych ward and left her locked up in her house." And if her ex-girlfriend is still living with/dependent on her parents, messaging her--as Amy suggests--may put her in very real danger of physical harm. If the motivation was "I want to find a way to help her move to a safer place" I could understand the urge, but "I want closure"? No, that's a shitty reason to endanger someone.

[cahn]

Wow, I literally read Amy's response as "Please don't message her" because I couldn't imagine anyone giving any other advice!

[laurajv]

This is one of those times when I wish the LW had written to an entirely different, very specific columnist. I feel like Daniel Ortberg would have given much more sensitive and good advice.

[mommy]

I put it all on the line fighting for our love, but she didn't, after her parents broke her phone, threatened to send her to a psych ward and left her locked up in her house.

What happened to LW was bad, but she does not get to claim that her ex didn't "put it all on the line." The ex-girlfiend clearly put a great deal on the line, and LW's desire for closure three years after the fact isn't going to help. It's time to put the relationship in the Important Memories box and move on.

I have to agree with everyone else here. Amy was not the best columnist for this letter.

[movingfinger]

BTW, I can't edit tags on this; the software has tagged it with tags from another post.