Has anyone ever properly processed a relationship years after it ended, even though they had already moved on? It feels like I’m breaking up with her all over again.

[matic57477x]

I’m 20 now, and I met my ex when I was 15. She was my first love and my first everything. We were together for about a year, but after we broke up we were on and off for another couple of years. A lot happened between us during that time. It became extremely toxic and painful, but we genuinely loved each other and kept trying to make it work.
Eventually, things got so bad that we stopped speaking completely. It’s been about a year since we last spoke, and I genuinely thought I had moved on. She has another boyfriend now, and I have feelings for someone else. I don’t want to get back together with her and I don’t want to disrupt her life. I genuinely know that relationship is over.
But recently I started reading through our old messages from when we were together and after we broke up. I had read some of them before, but I’d never properly sat down and gone through everything and actually processed it.
And honestly, it has completely fucked with me emotionally.
It feels like I’m living it all again.
I can remember individual days so vividly. I can see us gradually falling in love through the messages. I can see the stupid conversations, the jokes, the way we spoke to each other, the happiness we had. Then I can literally watch it change. I can see where things started going wrong, where we started hurting each other, where the relationship became something completely different.
And the weirdest thing is that I’m feeling all of this while knowing I don’t want her back.
I’m happy remembering some of it. I smile at the messages. I feel grateful that I experienced it. But I also feel incredibly sad. Sometimes I get this horrible feeling in my stomach and it genuinely feels like I’m breaking up with her again.
I think part of it is because I never actually got to process the breakup properly the first time.
The breakup itself was messy and the years afterwards were even messier. I spent a long time angry at her and feeling betrayed by things that happened. I was young and I couldn’t understand why someone could love me so much and still decide that we couldn’t be together.
Looking back now, at 20, I understand it differently.
I can see that we were both young. We both made mistakes. We both hurt each other. We both tried to fix things in our own ways. There were moments where we genuinely still loved each other but the relationship just wasn’t the same anymore.
I can finally understand things she said back then that I couldn’t understand because I was so clouded by anger and hurt.
And that’s probably the biggest thing that’s changed.
I don’t really feel angry at her anymore.
I actually forgive her. And I forgive myself too.
The part that hurts the most isn’t even that she’s with someone else. It’s the fact that someone who was once one of the most important people in my entire life is now a stranger. At one point we knew everything about each other. Now I don’t know the slightest thing about her life and she doesn’t know mine.
She once said to me, “It’s scary because to think one day I will forget your voice and we will genuinely not speak again.”
At the time that felt impossible.
And now it’s literally happened. I don’t remember her voice anymore.
That’s what makes it feel so final.
I think I’m finally realising that I don’t actually miss the relationship. I miss what that period of my life meant to me. I miss who I was then. I miss the innocence of being young and genuinely just being happy with someone I loved.
That first year with her was probably the best year of my life so far.
And I don’t feel ashamed saying that.
I’m actually grateful it happened.
I don’t want to erase it. I’ve put all the old pictures and messages into a folder because I know I’d regret deleting everything. I don’t want to destroy the memories. I just want to put them somewhere and let them belong to the past.
It feels like I’m saying goodbye to that chapter properly for the first time.
Like the first breakup never really gave me a chance to grieve because there was so much chaos afterwards. Now I’m older, I understand what happened, and I can finally look at the whole story rather than just the parts that hurt me.
It’s almost like I’m breaking up with her again, except this time I’m doing it peacefully.
I’m sad because it really is over.
But I’m also happy because it happened.
And I think that’s the strangest part.
I don’t want her back. I don’t want to contact her. I don’t want to change the life either of us has now.
I just finally want to let the memories exist without anger attached to them.

Why would you keep messages from a former relationship that ended a year ago esp if you’re both in new relationships? You need to cut the cord and draw a line under it, very unhealthy.

I’m married now, have been with DH for 13 years, married for 3.

My boyfriend before I met him I genuinely thought was the love of my life and he was the person I would spend the rest of my life with. He ended up cheating on me, regretting it (apparently) and begging for a second chance and I decided to keep my head high and say no, as much as I desperately wanted to be with him I don’t stand unfaithfulness.

He eventually met someone else, I’d been with now DH for a couple of years by then. A few years ago it popped up that he had gotten engaged and I felt heartbroken all over again, and then more recently they’ve just welcomed their first baby and again, I just feel awful.. even more so because I’m happily married and still heartbroken that I feel like that should have been me. Very confusing emotions to have but we live, we move on. I have two absolutely beautiful children and a husband who dotes on me, I have a very very good life and am very grateful.

i dont know if I’ll ever completely get over it, but it’s manageable 🤷🏼‍♀️

It sounds to me like you are trying to relive and recapture it, which is maybe something to think about talking through with a therapist?

Not in a bad way but just if you are still feeling quite attached to this relationship then maybe you should talk to someone, because it's kind of pointless to fixate on things that happened in the past and get swallowed up by them.

You’re 20. Stop navel gazing. Delete the messages Go live your life.

Time gives you perspective. I see my previous relationships very differently now and those changes keep happening. But then I first fell in love 39 years ago; it would be strange if I didn’t understand more about it all after so many years.

Neither of you 'genuinely loved each other' if -as you described it - the relationship was toxic. That's the bit you need to work on. Recognising what a loving relationship is, how you each enhance each others lives, no toxicity, no hurt, no pain.

Delete the messages. Heal. Move on.

You're still young, you have your whole life ahead of you! Delete the messages and don't live in the past. The relationship is over and you like someone else. Concentrate on that.

I disagree, keep the messages and photos, they and the relationship are / were part of your growing into a mature person, who sounds emotionally intelligent for someone so young. There is nothing wrong or damaging about reflecting on our past it helps us form our futures and if you genuinely are able to look back and revel in what you had for the good year together without wishing it all back then good, do so and move on and forwards with whoever comes next in your future love.

In some cases, it can take many many years for your subconscious to get over some people. I would go as far to say that sometimes you never actually do, but life moves on, memories fade and you learn to live with it.

i totally understand this, it doesn’t mean you don’t currently love DH. But you can still feel emotions for someone that you don’t need to act on. It’s just old wounds.

Definitely after all this time i finally understand why alot of the things which and why they did. Which i think is something i owe to my younger self who went though alot and this had a lot to do with it. i felt anger for a long time and betrayal, but finally that’s gone. i have closure in my own right which i never managed to get before.

100% i agree, i thought about deleting them but i know later in life i would deeply regret it. it’s not something wish didn’t happen, im glad it did cus i wouldn’t be who i am today without it. it was nice to re read the messages and feel the emotions for one last time before i put that box up on the shelf, that’s all i’m doing packing it away and putting it somewhere safe. it doesn’t need to be thrown out

It is not unhealthy? this is a relationship which i never had closure from. i wasn’t re reading the messages to find sim that wasn’t there. i was reading to understand why things ended the way they did, which after doing so now i understand and my anger and hurt has turned into cherishing what i had when j was young and what it taught me, as well as where i went wrong and things i should’ve done differently. i hope this changes your perspective

Two people can’t love eachother if it was toxic? We did love eachother and i can admit that. but during the relationship it was not toxic it was during the breakup and the period after. we went through alot together. and after a year of pushing that aside iv finally been able to admit to myself that it was real but just because something was real and you love eachother doesn’t mean you end up together. i dont have feelings for her. but that doesn’t mean i cant feel things for her still. that’s two different things

Archive the messages, if you can’t bring yourself to delete them. And edit the name/number in your contacts so the messages are hard to find. Ruminating like this will inhibit you truly moving on. We live and learn, but part of the learning is recognising what’s past is past.

I understand how you feel OP as I’ve held on to messages from someone too. I keep them in the locked chats folder on WhatsApp as I never go there. And no one else can find them. But if I do ever want to read them, they are at least still there. I know I would regret deleting them.

At your age we didn’t have the internet or mobiles; it was all done via phone calls and in person conversations so I have no record of those. If we wrote a letter it was a nice interesting one - however I still found these painful for some time afterwards. I kept them though, as I knew that one day I’d feel very differently. And I do.

At one point in my teens I could list every one I’d snogged; now I can barely remember any of them.

Archiving sounds like a good idea.

You’re only 20 and have loads of time to experience other relationships, and you’ll learn different things from all of them. Mistakes are useful to us, it helps us learn. You’re clearly very reflective which is a really useful skill.