Is It Possible To Get Closure In Relationships?

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“I don’t know what closure is,” my husband said. “Who gets closure? If you do get closure then fine but I’d not go looking for it. The concept makes no sense. I don’t know who comes up with this stuff.”

As a Venus Neptune type, I know exactly what he means. Nothing ever ends. There’s no way to close anything because you never know when a person is going to pop up in real life, your thoughts, your dreams, in a conversation, in a poem, in a song…

I’d never heard this stated so plainly. To look for “closure” is to waste your time.

105 thoughts on “Is It Possible To Get Closure In Relationships?”

  1. As of today, eh?

    I just came back from my lawyers. He’s advising me to drop my case against the person who ran me down in 2002.
    Even though he’s under court-recorded testimony as LYING, the insurance bodies have decided to rule in his favour.

    6 years of waiting and I stand to receive not one penny. Thousands of dollars in therapy: I paid. I lost my apartment. I even got charged for the ambulance. I missed 3 months worth of work.

    Furthermore, the insurance company has told my lawyer that if I continue pursuing the Truth (which they have, and are so above and beyond reproach they can ignore it), they will come after me for all of their legal costs (in the thousands, this has been going on for 6 years!) and will renew it every 10 years FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE so that they will still be hounding me in 50 years should I EVER come into money.

    So yeah, that’s my decision today. Walk away now, fucked over and in debt, or pay later for the rest of my fucking life.

    I guess time’s up and I have to give up getting closure. Bitter is an understatement.

  2. kashmiri – I am sorry but I think we are talking about two different things. You are looking for resolution or comeuppance.

    I think those things are different from “closure” as in 2 people sit down and say, “You go your way and I will go mine,” and then walk off thinking of each other.

    Where is the closure, hmm?

  3. “then walk off thinking of each other.”
    I think I’m the queen of this. I still dream about a person I loved who rejected me ferociously and that was 10 years ago. I might think about it during the day, but my psyche remembers it while I sleep.

  4. Yeah…(I meant to write I DON’T think about it in the day, but you know what I mean).
    I generally don’t tell people but I can think obsessively about this stuff for years.
    In the case of my ex-friend who we spoke about it consultation, well it’s been 2 years and ever since she sent me a nasty email last month I think about THAT day and night.

    The interesting thing was, even though I never speak about her to other people she basically begged me to “stand by my decision to cut her out of my life and leave her the eff alone.”

    Now, I never speak of her, right?? But somehow she finds fit to accuse me of screwing with her. In the *real world* that is true, but the fact is, I do think about the horrible things she did, over and over and over…
    Weird shit. The only thing that seems to help is focussing the best I can on being present, in the moment. Otherwise I’m just arguing with NOTHING.

    Oh yes, Neptune trine Venus…

  5. Nope, no closure in life. But there is erasure. All standing accounts are abandoned, seemingly erased as if they never happened. Just frozen in time. Things do pop up occasionally…but then over time even they are eroded and forgotten. Once things get to this point it becomes impossible to go back in time again.

  6. I was thinking about this post as I was driving to the store today, and specifically about my ex-boyfriend as of last year whose bits and pieces I still find around the house from time to time (a note in a drawer, a shirt button under the bed). And who should pull up in the next lane but him? He didn’t see me. And I felt really sad. Soldier is right. Closure, my ass!

    Kashmiri, I don’t know your story, but what does your lawyer have to say about this? And can you get a second legal opinion? This doesn’t sound kosher at all.

  7. agreed! if closure were so attainable there wouldn’t be so many sad love songs.

    i’m also prone to being haunted by memories (moon conj neptune)…sometimes they turn out to be a premonition and i run into person x. sometimes they’re just fantasies but you do wonder whether the other person was thinking of you too in some kind of cosmic connection. oh, neptune you silly goose…but still nice to think.

    besides,…blasts from the past can be really intriguing. (cancer mars?)

  8. I so appreciate this subject. I’ve mourned the loss of a relationship for the past year… felt all the feelings, ranging from love to hate. And it’s been embarassing to admit sometimes how much I still think of my ex. So I feel some of my struggle with this has been affirmed here. I will say this…there is no closure for me, but I’ve been surprised by a new feeling or state of mind/heart that I only recently identified as forgiveness. Some sense of peace over the ending. It’s a fleeting thing, but it’s strong, and it’s here, and I’m grateful.

  9. Del: they are allowed to do this, by law.
    I could explain everything but this isn’t really the forum for it. Let’s just say that it’s a system rotting on the inside. The insurance company IS a what in Canada is called a Crown Corporation. They ARE the government.
    My only choice is to walk away now so as not to get sued. Imagine that: getting sued after someone almost kills you.

    The first thing my SO said after I told him was “At least you can have closure.”
    Well not dying was the best thing to come out of it, so if I can escape being hounded by the Insurance Company/Government for the rest of my life that’s good too.

    Insurance Company=Government. That’s why they can get away with it. Taking on the Government single-handedly…uh, it’s not so realistic, sadly. 🙁

  10. Kashmiri,

    I am hoping that ICBC and WCB are going to get the Pluto in Cap corruption treatment big time. I am willing to wait to watch them have to deal with their crap Karma. I think what ICBC is doing to you is criminal.

    Best regards,
    Daemoness

  11. My Aries moon wants you to FIGHT those m-fers! But my Saturn-Mercury knows it’s probably pointless.

    Perhaps a flaming bag of poo on their doorstep as a compromise?

    (not that it matters at all what I think you should do)

  12. Del: I can’t fight. I wish I could but I’d die trying. I don’t want to die.

    Daemoness: I’m glad you know the bodies I’m speaking of. I think it’s criminal too, and one can only hope Pluto in Capricorn will lead to something…what I don’t know. Rotten, rotten, rotten. And there are even more people with even worse injuries and financial problems with me.

    Anyway, the fight is over, as in really over so the only thing left to carry on and just be grateful I’m not dead.
    That is the closure.

  13. llama- ha ha that’s funny. I’ve thought about it! The WCB board is the most highly secure building in the region (more than the jails!) surrounded by bullet proof glass, and every few years you hear some crazy story of some sad sack driving their pickup through the building.
    The populace just nods and thinks “Yup, that bunch of bastards pushed another person to the brink.”

  14. Maureen, if it’s any comfort in my experience sometimes those fleeting feelings take up residence and become more permanent.

  15. Great answer. Thanks. Need to meditate on this for a while though. I’m just in a phase when I’ve given up getting any closure because it’s simply, truly impossible. So this thread comes in a very timely manner.

    Pluto just went direct close to my DSC. Ole.

  16. kashmiri- What? what? WHAT?????

    I obviously can’t advise you when you know it so much better than I do. But I can’t believe this is the way to go. I smell scare tactics. Fuck them. They won’t be in power forever. At the very least DO NOT sign away any kinds of rights to future litigation. You may have to bide your time, to strengthen your position, but inside do not EVER let this be over until it’s over.

    It is ILLOGICAL that something like this should be dismissed or excused. I don’t know exactly how, but get your elevator pitch straight in your head and repeat to everyone until you’re blue in the face and people listen.

    Why shouldn’t YOUR life and suffering matter?? You are NOT faceless and nameless. And it’s morally wrong for them to get away with this.

  17. PixieDust: it’s too late. I’m grateful that you care for me, I really am. But the battle has been fought and lost. I’m a South Node Aries with Aries Mars opposed Pluto and trust me when I say giving up is not an option.
    However conceding defeat is, and after 6 years of fighting this I have to concede defeat. To continue forward is highly risky, both financially and spiritually and I just have to believe that Pluto in Capricorn will expose and amputate poisonous institutions. But in every battle there are casualties and I can be grateful I’m still alive and have a desire to move forward with spirit in tact.

  18. Closure? I dont really think there are sufficient words in the world to crystallize why an impt relationship would be ending.

    Last month at this time, I posted here that the guy who I was in the midst of moving in with, told me told me “Even if we live under a bridge, I’ll still make sure you have the bigger piece of toast” I love you forever.

    These are trying times and i was glad to know I wouldn’t be collecting cans under the bridge by myself.

    So, he broke up with me again. It’s the third time. He gives a reason each time so shouldn’t I don’t feel closure? I don’t.

    So sometimes you hear your partner quacking but there is no closure. It’s just his opinion of why he’s not here. I musta been in a different relationship.

  19. Just a little coincidence for the day. My Cognitive Psychology instructor used that exact same picture example in his lecture… today.

  20. Ah, Kashmiri, my heart goes out to you – over the year or so that I have been coming to this blog, I have been delighted, educated and enlightened by you and your spunky, funny and soulful insights, and I admire the courage and the belief in yourself that it took to hang in there with such a soul-sucking process, only to have it end in the horrible way that it did. I just imagined myself as a big radio tower to send you and everyone else living with such tremendous loss waves and waves of love and healing, hope the waves make it to Canada and everywhere else . . .

    And I agree: there’s no closure, only eventual acceptance, at least that’s been my experience. It’s been 17 months since I lost my mother, and though it’s a bit easier with that passage of time, I still find myself reaching for things to buy her because she’d like them or picking up the phone to call . . . well you guys know how it is. Each time it happens, I accept all over again that she’s gone, and shed a tear or two to let the sorrow out, and then I try to look up and go on, putting one foot in front of the other.

    And I agree with you, Amber, ‘closure’ is a pop culture term, and one which sets up a longing for something that doesn’t exist. Thanks to the Soldier too for crystallizing the issue for all of us, and thanks to Elsa for sharing it with us -I had never thought of it in those terms before.

    I couldn’t force myself to feel closure after all or any of my losses, but I could eventually accept that they had happened, and in acceptance I found peace, which is the closest I ever got to closure.

  21. kashmiri, I understand you’re tired and I know you can’t go on forever beating a seemingly-dead horse. And yes, spiritually and morale-wise it’s good to learn from experiences and find a personal growth reason to explain it all. That is good and healthy.

    But the financial stuff, and especially that ultimately this is a public office screwing a private person who suffered a physical and financial loss– that makes my blood boil.

    All I can offer is to carry the flame and hate them for you, and hope for their karmic payback. I really don’t mind at all!! Sounds funny, but I want cosmic justice on this thing.

    Just carry on as usual, folks! 🙂

  22. I was just thinking about this the other day. I was thinking about how many loose ends I have floating around, and I prefer it to be honest. I don’t like “goodbyes” and “this is it’s” and “never-agains”, etc. I don’t like anything to be “final” which is what I equate with “closure”. I like to be open.

  23. and P.S.–where do you find the astrology in that? Perhaps my Saturn in Libra? Or my Venus, Saturn, and Jupiter in the 11th? What’s the astrology behind “closures”?

  24. (((Peppermint))) I usually dream about people…that they’re with me, and in the dream I’m all: Hey, you’re not dead!

    Some people don’t like that sort of thing but I like it a lot. Makes me feel close even though the person has left this life.

    Thanks to you and everyone else who left supportive comments about this.

  25. kashmiri and Daemoness- don’t worry about the current government. Thay have been screwing around with so many things here and taking so many rights and freedoms away all of the time talking about ‘open government’ while they piss on the average person from great heights. These scumbags are definitely going to get rocked by Pluto!

  26. No closure !
    When I was dillusional and scared that there was a closure,…. there were a million proofs that I was wrong

    Venus Sco trine Mars Pisces
    Neptune quintile Mars

  27. I want closure. I want to be shut of things and never have them come back. I realize that’s impossible, but it doesn’t stop the wanting.

    Aquarian moon wants to detach; trine Pluto (with Pluto conjuncting Mars and Venus) wants to obliterate.
    Venus-Neptune knows it’s boundless, though. That’s where the pain lies.

  28. I had the most lovely conversation with my ex husband on the solstice- his birthday actually. It wasn’t closure but it took us to a new place of ‘going on’. How can there be closure when the universe is continuous?

  29. In nature, there is no such thing as a closed system. As far as I am aware it doesn’t exist. So anyone looking for ‘closure’ is trying to act against the laws of nature. Good luck!

  30. What a reminder… Just in time, as I bemoan my familial estrangement.

    Uranus in the fourth house is a bitch. But I guess I ain’t heard the fat lady sing yet, now have I?

  31. I wish I had known this a long time ago. I agree. I wasted a lot of time trying to wrap things up in a pretty ribbon. I still struggle with it.

  32. This week, I was thinking about closure when a friendship broke suddenly on a weird note. Will I ever see this person again? Don’t know. Can’t make it happen. Should I even care, I wondered. Then I thought that closure just doesn’t exist. Nice timing!

    I dom’t care about closure anymore. But when I was much younger, I craved it or I didn’t feel in control. If that final “ending conversation” didn’t happen, I felt like a failure or something was missing. Eh, since then I accept these unexpected relationships that come in waves and go out with the same flow. (I’m a Venus/Uranus type.)

  33. Instead of saying “closure” we could just say: “transformation”. With every contact we make, we exchange some kind of energy, so much more when it’s with a person we loved so much. The energy of this person stays with us. But we can transform it. So it’s not closure, it’s “recycle”. With it comes Peace. Peace then becomes unconditioal Love. From there we are free.

  34. Per Dixie: “i’m beginning to think the whole weak link with the closure concept is requiring, expecting, or anticipating participation or explanation from the other.”

    ABSOLUTELY agree with these words from the wise!

  35. As i once discovered: you´re only done with something when it doesn´t matter to you anymore if you´re done with it or not.

  36. I like how this one keeps popping up. 🙂 I also like how Kundrie put it, and today I was thinking along the same lines.

    There may not be “closure” in the how/when/why reason-type way that Dixie is talking about, but there’s definite closure in the “I’ve settled it in my mind and it no longer matters” way, which is what I was trying to convey in my distance and obliterate comment. Not that you won’t be reminded from time to time, but that the reminders aren’t shocks to the system.

    Does that make any sense or am I rambling again? *grins*

  37. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you. I beat the hell out of myself, think I’m pathetic because I still am haunted by things that I believe I should be “over”. I always think everyone else seems so able to move on and gain closure and I’m this wuss who can’t. I guess I’m not pathetic after all, I was just trying to get something that can’t be had…Closure. Whew!! Thought I was some big loser. One less thing for me to beat myself up over. Thanks for the liberating post.

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