I’ve been told that healing comes with time after closure. But what if you never get closure because your definition of it is different from the person who hurt you? When the person who hurt you refuses to take accountability, healing becomes less about answers and more about acceptance.
In my experience, the hardest part wasn’t the breakup; it was realizing that I had accepted so much that I knew was wrong against me, yet I couldn’t accept that someone could lie and still refuse to acknowledge it afterward. I spent a long time replaying the events and conversations, wondering how I looked past their lies that were right in front of me. Saying “I love you” for the first time shouldn’t be because I found out the truth about the other girl. Love is such a sacred thing, and using it as manipulation is so painful. Yes, she’s just a friend… that you spent the night with after our first date. Half-truths get weaponized into false security and a lack of true accountability.
The idea of “healing without closure” is anatomically impossible. How can a wound heal itself without stitches? Do cracks in a sidewalk make it imperfect? A wound can heal without stitches; it just has to do it differently. Cracks in a sidewalk technically make it imperfect, but when have we ever truly been without a flaw?
Healing doesn’t always have to be tearing down what once was to build up something completely new. Sometimes it means finding a way to grow and adapt to what already is. Flowers managed to find a way to grow through the cracks in the cement. They beautify what is already reality, even if it’s less than ideal. I choose to make the most of what my life is because I know I can’t go back and relive it. I will be a flower growing through a “broken” walkway.
I can allow myself to feel sad or disappointed in how I have allowed myself to be treated, and even if I am still taking time to sit in my sorrows, I can still remind myself that I don’t have to change who I am or what I’ve done. I don’t have to reach out, and I don’t have to get over it right away. I can simply exist knowing that I’m not high maintenance but high-quality and deserve to be taken care of both by the world and by myself.
Learning to heal without an apology meant understanding that someone else’s inability to be honest does not invalidate my experience. For many women, we are taught to seek resolution externally. I’m told to be understanding and patient. They have shown me all that they are willing to be, and I need to accept that as fact. No amount of patience turns potential into reality. Reality, though, could be based on potential, but must still be grounded in truth. Their reality doesn’t have to be mine. My reality is what I choose to accept.
Healing doesn’t always look like closure. Sometimes, it’s choosing to forgive because you can’t possibly forget.
Sometimes, it looks like letting go.