Lost loves. Should we say goodbye

A good question. It depends on the circumstances of both parties. It’s a shock to find out that it’s too late to speak to someone you hoped to talk with again one day, but I believe in an afterlife.

The past is the past and I am not sure that trying to say goodbye in this life to those who were once dear, will bring any clarity or closure and might just reveal things we are the worse for knowing.

I have no choice, the two other people I was close to, where we parted in confusion have both died. Both of them were fortunate, as I have been, to meet partners for life, who have been just that, and, as both were well known in their professions, I have read obituaries that make it clear that their marriages were happy.

To have had any contact with them would have muddied waters and caused confusion, for what? For me to get an greater understanding of events that occurred 50 or 60 years ago - and which they may have long forgotten.

I was in contact a 2 years ago with an old flame. I met up with him a couple of times and learned a lot of things I wasn't aware of at the time which was in the 60's. He was 8 years older than me. I stopped contact and thought about stuff he said. A lot of things fell into place and realise I've done the right thing by no contact. The words of a song of one of my favourite artists (Phil Collins) always comes to mind. The song is Can't turn back the years...
"No matter how much you think you want or need it, the past has to remain just that, the past".

Depends but if you’re asking about old lovers or exes no definitely not for me, you’re not with them for a reason and the past is the past

I think it depends. If it’s an ex from your teenage years and you parted and both moved on quickly, then no I wouldn’t want to meet with them again. If it was a more serious, committed relationship that ended badly, particularly if down to you, then yes, I would want to try to apologise, even many years later because however happily you both may be with somebody else later, neither of you will have forgotten what happened. Not so much to say goodbye though, more to put the past demons to rest. I’ve done this with my most serious ex, and we both felt better for doing it.

I think Casdon is spot on.
As a youngster, I lost (what I thought) was the love of my life, due to circumstances beyond our control. In retrospect, he wouldn’t have been ‘right’ for me down the years.
In 1998, I was shocked to find he’d died in his early 40’s. Then by chance, over a light hearted discussion about school pants (!) I discovered the lady working in the Post Office was his sister! She was a late baby, some 15 years younger than him, but I was shattered when she looked at my name and said quietly, ‘our Alan always loved you’.

I wish I could’ve met him, as responsible adults, to find out what had really transpired behind the scenes.

I stayed friends with exes,still am with some.I hasten to add that all but one were non sexual relationships I was married at 21.Good catholic girl here.
The one who was is till a friend not only of me but my OH.I liked the boys/young men I went out with,had similar musical tastes and interests,in most cases worked in the same industry.
Why would I stop being friends with them simply because we didn't want to be partners for life?
Without exception they are all good men ,happily married with families ,the same as my OH and I are .There used to be 3 or 4 of us who would meet for catchups and lunch but that has scaled back since covid.My children are friends with their children so we still get all the news.
Its a small town,even if we hadn't stayed friends we'd bump into each other daily in the town.I liked them as people and still do ,but I wouldn't have wanted to live with any of them .My OH is my soul mate

I find it very difficult to let go. I was divorced years ago but stayed friends with my husband right up to his last illness and was with him when he died.
And my partner who dumped me, we keep in touch with an email every Christmas, just exchanging news etc.

There seems to be an assumption that if you did not stay in contact with someone you must have had an acrimonious parting. I didn't in either case, but one was at university in the 1960s and ended before we graduated, although it might have been starting again, but then we didn't have the itnernet, Facebook, other social media or mobile phones to keep in touch, so we graduated and went our separate ways with no way of making contact with each other.

Some thing similar happened with the second one. He moved abroad for a year, but did not return and contact between us gradually petered out.

I’ve just cut myself off completely from someone I had a relationship with after my marriage ended. Even though the relationship was doomed to failure, after a few years we started talking again and it carried on because we have the same sense of humour, like the same sort of programmes etc. I think it hurt me as much as my marriage breaking up when it ended because I felt I could have tried harder with my marriage but I put my heart and soul into this relationship. He had trained as a counsellor so when I first met him I became very emotionally dependent on him. He’d also gone through a painful divorce too so understood how I was feeling.He was also someone who was quite economical with the truth at times ( and still is). I had to go cold turkey when we split up and, just recently, I realised I had to do the same again. Even though we were never going to meet up again I felt as if I was being disloyal to my partner ( which I would never do) even though he knew I still talked to him because we have a shared history and mutual friends.

I was somebody’s “lost love” and he approached me again when he grew old wanting some kind of closure or “answers”.

Except he didn’t want the answers Id already given him fifty years before. He viewed it through his eyes only snd wanted me to say if only and what a mistake blah blah.

It was horribly embarrassing and he hadn’t changed one bit😱

This thread reminded me of someone else I had a relationship with. He had marriage in mind, but I always made it clear that whileI liked him a lot, I did not love him and never would. It ended when the friendly relationship with DH, whom I had known for years and socialised with began to develop.

Any way, as a result of this thread I put his name in google and was taken aback by the result. It was a legal report of a contested criminal conviction that ended in my ex spending a year or two in prison. The full report was behind a pay wall but essentially he had a falling out with a business partner over money he took from a company he was director of.

In retrospect it makes sense because he was a Chartered Accountant and a member of the relevant institute and back in the late 70s/80s when these institutes had directorys of members published in book form every year, I picked a copy up, idly in the library one day and looked him up and was surprised not to find his name. Now I know why! They would have chucked him out after his conviction.

Does that count as 'closure' and the answer to unanswered questions?

No. Monica it doesn’t count as closure, not in the sense I meant anyway. Many of us probably Google people we have known in the past out of idle curiosity, that’s not the same as having unfinished business with an ex, where the ending of the relationship haunts you for whatever reason (doesn’t have to have been acrimonious). In those circumstances it needs to be an honest conversation, apology if necessary, and gaining a better understanding of why what happened did. It’s difficult of one party hasn’t moved on, but in my case we both had and it was really helpful.
Some people, like yourself from what you’ve said, don’t have this type of skeleton in your closet so I appreciate it’s hard to understand why others do.

I imagine if you believe, praying may be your answer.

I met my husband when we were very young children, never dated another, married at 16 - over 60 years ago. One of us will leave this world first - God tells we'll see each other later. I'd pray for a quick passing, if left behind.

Casdon A previous post, rather suggested I had - and I have. But I think the past is the past and as Lathyrus shows, if the opportunity arises to resolve the past, it may not be the opportunity you want.

In my case both those involved have died, but in neither case do I regret the loss of an opportunity to try and understand what I did not understand nearly 60 years ago.

In most lives there are events that we did not understand at the time and do not understand now, we cannot go back constantly trying to relive our lives and find out why things happened. They happened, we dealt with it and it shaped our lives in some form - or it didn't.

I was fortunate that both my signifcant others warranted obituaries, one local to where he lived, one in a professional journal, so I know something about the rest of their lives. Their lives were very different from each other - and very different to the life I have lived. On consideration, for different reasons, the life I have lived has offered me more than life with either of them could have.

Everybody has different experiences Monica, and it’s too late when somebody has died if there was something you still wanted to say. I had read your previous post, and understood from it that there was nothing you wanted to discuss with them, which is good. I can only speak for myself though, as we all can, and I was very glad to have the opportunity to make peace. I know he was too. It’s not to do with later relationships, we both had happy marriages.

I had a very happy time at college spending most of that time with my first boyfriend . After we split up I never heard from him again but am still in touch with female college friends who I actually spent less time with! For a while I thought it would be interesting to bump into him to see if there was still a "spark" - then realised we would both look significantly different from when we were young and lovely! I think it's best to keep happy memories undisturbed

After two marriages to men I fell in love for the first time in my life with a woman. She was 10 years older than me and had lived a wild and independent life. She turned up one day on the doorstep of my Hebridean Croft and changed my life forever. We were together for a couple of years before parting. I learned for the first time in my life what love was. We parted at a junction on the A1 in 1994. I knew then I would never see her again. My life long wish is to be able to thank her for giving me the opportunity to experience what love is and to enjoy every moment in the here and now. I’ve no idea where she is now but I would give everything I have to thank her for the gift of love.

I said I was sorry at the time and hope both of them went to to have happy lives.

I do know one ex-boyfriend got married and I'm sure his wife was a lovely, kind young woman.

As for the others, they were short-lived brief flirtations. I'm sure they think of me as often as I think of them.

Casdon Itis not that I have nothing to say to them. There were aspects of both relationships that I did not understand and was left wondering about. It is just that I do not think that meeting up many, many decades after the event and talking about the relationship is going to get anyone anywhere.

Memories will be very different, personalities will have changed and developed, and, as I say again, Lathyrus's experience shows that the other party may be coming to the party with an entirely different agenda; to prove they were right, to prove you were wrong.

Far better to learn to live with the past and all its unresolved problems and relationships.

I’m glad I didn’t choose to live with the past and all its unresolved problems though Monica, I can only speak for myself. We were essentially the same people we had been almost forty years before, and I felt as though a burden had lifted afterwards.

Twice Ive meet people thst I was crazy about years ago. It wasnt the same and they wernt the same as I remembered. The past is the past and should be that.

It’s a difficult one. There’s no right or wrong way. I have children with my ex husband and have seen him at their weddings etc and we just acknowledge each other. Although 30 years have passed I feel when I see him that I wish we could just sit and talk. He found out about 15 years ago he has a genetic condition inherited from his mother of which she died of in her early 70’s and now he’s suffering with it and only in his 60’s. I wish we could talk before it’s too late. I think every situation is different and we need to deal with accordingly.

My daughter found my bucket list and decided that at least one of the items would be taken care of. She drove me hundreds of miles to see a man who is/was the love of my life.

I hadn't seen him for 15 years. We spent two happy days together until it was time for me to go home. Nothing was really said about the past, but he told me later that seeing me had helped him a lot. He didn't explain why.

If you do decide to see someone who was very precious to you I would advise making sure you both deal with the herd of elephants in the room while you are together !