Why You Should Break No-Contact

On texting your ex, regrets, and - shit, I think my prefrontal cortex just developed.

Song of the week: Rivers and Road, by the Head and The Heart

This is my new series I started by asking you to send in your anonymous stories. Thank you so much for all of your submissions to my new form! You can send in your story here . Here’s this week’s story;

“Hey Em, I can’t stop thinking about my ex recently even though we split six months ago. We were together for three years but it was kind of toxic. I know I shouldn’t text him as we said when we ended to go no contact and I dont think he cares anymore but I can’t stop the urge. Do you think I should talk to him? I’m worried I’m an obsessive ex!”

The worst part about any breakup, particularly one you didn’t have any control over is there is nothing to be done except let time pass, and sometimes when time does pass, it reminds you that pain isn’t as linear as all of the advice columns pretend it is. It gets softer but sometimes it shifts into new shapes, then it’s months later and you’re wondering why they’re still on your mind. Worse still, you’re tempted with your healing heart to hurt it again because surely it can’t be as bad as you remember, right?

I thought I saw my ex-boyfriend at the bar, a tall blur of brown hair I hadn’t seen in months since he left my flat on an unassuming Sunday morning. I’d been thinking about him a lot again which was irritating and tiring. I was doing so well to be over it and now out of nowhere I seemed to be back at the start. Sometimes, I think it was actually just boredom, I’d forgotten what it felt like. Life was going well; I’d picked back up writing, I’d make new friends, I’d pushed myself far out of my comfort zone - and yet here I was on the other side of all of this growth, wondering if I ever meant anything to him at all.

At the start of the breakup, I missed him in the inbetween. The soft early hours of minimal distractions, then again late at night. I wanted so badly to resume our normal routine. I wanted to be chosen. I wanted to walk the streets again and daydream about our future that he had no particular plans to follow through on. To me, it was gospel. Something to repeat in hushed tones with flushed cheeks over dinner to friends. To him, I don’t know what it was. Impulse, maybe. After we broke up, he did what I had wanted him to do, he disappeared. I never saw him again and he never tried to contact me. And neither did I. I moved on and so did he.

But, as I stood at the bar and saw a once familiar person disappear into a mess of people, I did something I knew I shouldn’t - I sent him a text asking if he was here. It felt quick and harmless. Like muscle memory, opening his whatsapp and sending it through, it didn’t mean anything right?

The part of that relationship I had forgotten was the anxiety that surrounded him. As soon as I sent that message, I felt it again. The sour twist of my stomach as I watched each minute pass without a reply back, the sunken chest feeling as I thought about how it was a mistake and that I was just interrupting his life. As the night drifted towards the end and my conversations with friends dried up as I anxiously checked my phone, I remembered this was the real feeling I had been missing. The ups and downs, the dopamine chasing, the excuses. It made me remember how unhappy I was, how he made me feel, and I felt silly most of all because it was like I had told him, again, that I was happy to put up with it.

Humans love our habits, we seek out familiarity and comfort. Think about all of the great things you have in your life and how you only got them by letting go of the past. There are so many exciting stories out there waiting for you, you just have to be brave and go find them.

You said in your letter that you both agreed to be no contact, I’d remind you to remember why. I know for me one of the reasons I was so unhappy was how badly matched our communication style was - which is a really fucking fancy way to say he’d disappear and I’d be wondering what I did wrong. Do you want to feel that way again?

After a breakup, there’s a strange pressure we put on ourselves to appear absolutely fine as if it didn’t affect us, be happy and show up pretty on instagram. Hoping they know that you’re fine and over it, messaging him felt like admitting it wasn’t true.

I don’t regret reaching out to him anymore because it reminded me of all of the reasons why we broke up, and how far I’d come. It didn’t need to be this huge embarrassing set back, it could just be a gentle reminder that backwards is rarely the right decision.

Sometimes I think we imprison people into our lives through our phones long after they were meant to leave. Keeping them hostage as mutuals in order to never admit things are truly over, and that one day you will see them for the last time. We cling to these old comforts because it feels safe, but every time we do it’s three steps backwards. By breaking no contact it actually made me ready to admit I was never going to see him again, I removed off of my social media and I’d now taken six steps in the right direction.

Maybe you need to break contact with him to remind yourself that he’s not the answer you’re looking for.

-Shit, I think my prefrontal cortex just developed.