If your ex-boyfriend or ex-girlfriend cried during the breakup, your ex’s actions show that your ex regrets hurting you, not dumping you.
Your ex is sorry for causing you pain and thinks that you deserved better pre-breakup, breakup, or post-breakup treatment from him or her. Your ex would go back in time if he or she could, but your ex wouldn’t go back in time to change the future.
The only thing your ex would change is the way he or she acted or reacted. That’s why your ex feels that proceeding with the breakup is still the best thing to do and that getting back together would be a mistake.
Lots of dumpers cry during the breakup. They feel so guilty that they do many confusing things during or after the breakup.
Some of the things dumpers do out of guilt are:
- cry
- hug their ex
- kiss their ex
- promise their ex things
- say they still love their ex
- say they need to work on themselves
- and appear anxious and confused
You mustn’t assume that an ex who cries during the breakup still loves you. If you interpret tears as love, you’ll be disappointed when you learn that your ex wants nothing to do with you. Your ex just wants to know that you’re doing okay so that your ex can move forward with a clear conscience and start a new chapter of his or her life.
Once your ex stops feeling sorry for you, your ex will be glad that the breakup happened and that he or she can finally self-prioritize.
So do your best not to fall for your ex’s tears or even words like, “I need to fix/find myself, I’m an idiot for breaking up with you, I know I’ll regret this one day, it’s not you, it’s me, I’ll always love you.”
These words are common breakup excuses dumpers use to strategically alleviate their guilt and get their ex off their back.
My advice is not to underestimate dumpers because dumpers know that dumpees won’t give them a hard time if they appear to be in a self-pitiful state.
They know that dumpees will sympathize with them and try to understand their “problems” even though their problems are with their ex.
We could say that dumpers can be a bit manipulative as they pretend their ex is perfect and that something or someone else is responsible for the breakup.
In reality, though, they’re just afraid of talking about the real reasons behind the breakup because they’re scared they’ll hurt their ex’s feelings and receive a strong response from their ex in return.
In this article, we’ll talk about why your ex cried during the breakup.
Why did my ex cry during the breakup?
When dumpers cry during the breakup, some dumpees immediately assume that their ex still loves them and wants a future with them.
They think that their ex has to go fix himself, beat depression, convince his parents, or save Princess Peach from Bowser before their ex is ready for a romantic relationship and commit.
But boy are they wrong. They’re being deceived by their dumper’s guilt-ridden actions and lies as well as the lies they tell themselves.
What dumpees don’t realize (at least initially) is that their crying ex doesn’t possess romantic feelings for them anymore. Something or someone destroyed those feelings and replaced them with negativity.
That’s why tears have nothing to do with love and attraction.
Tears in most cases represent pain and suffering and reveal that something is not okay with a person’s psyche. In your ex’s case, that something is your ex’s conscience and the understanding that the relationship he or she has invested time and effort in no longer exists.
These two things are good enough for your ex to cry and show that he or she hates losing the emotional investment he or she had with you. But despite hating to lose it, it’s not inconvenient enough for your ex to do something about it.
Guilt never is as it tends to go away rather quickly.
So if your ex broke up with you and cried during the breakup, know that your ex didn’t shed tears out of love.
Your dumper cried after breaking up with you because he or she felt bad for not seeing a future with you and not wanting to work on the relationship as eagerly as you did.
In other words, your ex disliked the way it felt to reject you and trigger your anxiety. He or she wished there was a way to break up with you but also avoid hurting you and complicating things for you.
My ex doesn’t know what he wants
If your ex said he doesn’t know what he wants, your ex served you the biggest lie he could fit on your plate. He made it seem like he was lost and confused and that he had no choice but to break up and try to find himself.
But that was just a distraction.
Your ex knows exactly what he wants or rather—who he doesn’t want. He just doesn’t want to tell you that because the truth could elicit an unwanted response from you. A response that hurts him and makes him feel trapped and even more guilty.
The only reason why your ex avoided explaining as to why the breakup occurred was that he or she was afraid of your reaction and didn’t think that closure was important to you. He made his own healing a higher priority than yours, which is why he told you a bunch of random things that thousands of dumpers say every day.
I don’t know where dumpers learn these excuses, but I suppose they’re not that hard to come up with.
It comes naturally to most dumpers. Especially those dumpers who are used to lying and manipulating people as such dumpers have experience and tend not to think twice before telling a lie.
It’s not about you when your ex-girlfriend cries
I’ve seen all kinds of dumpers.
I’ve seen dumpers who cry, laugh, appear cold, distant, or pretentious, and dumpers who get angry and bring over their new partner to officially break up with their previous partner.
Many dumpers, unfortunately, don’t care much if at all about their ex whereas others feel extremely guilty and cry as a result.
That’s why there are many different types of breakups you can go through as a dumpee.
Some are painful and others are a bit less painful.
But usually, the amount of pain you encounter depends on how mature your ex is and the way he or she treats you during and after the breakup.
If your ex is kind, sympathetic, and genuinely wants you to recover fast, you could get over your breakup relatively quickly.
And contrarily, if your ex treats you badly, lies to you, and manipulates you, he or she could delay your recovery and even force you to develop trust issues and other problems.
Know that no matter how your ex treated you on the day of the breakup and after—you’re the only person responsible for your well-being. You owe it to yourself to protect your heart and recover as fast as you can.
So take the steps necessary to detach and heal from the breakup even if your ex hurt you, gave you false hope, and cried during the breakup.
You must do it out of respect for yourself and your loved ones.
Here are 4 reasons why your ex cried during the breakup.
Why did he break up with me if he still loves me?
A lot of dumpers tell their dumpees they still love them and that they wish they weren’t breaking up with them.
But as you now know, it doesn’t make sense to break up with someone you’re in love with. Not unless you’re being forced to break up with your ex by your parents and have no control over your relationship.
I suppose that’s a topic for another time.
Today, you need to understand that if you love a person, you’re going to do your very best to stay with that person. You’re going to protect your partner, improve communication, express gratitude, fears, and problems, and refuse to let your partner go.
You won’t abandon your relationship when love (the desire to stay connected) is present.
But if you don’t love your partner anymore, then you’re going to give up on your partner when things get difficult and give him or her a chance to find someone who can love your partner and reciprocate his or her feelings.
If your partner told you he still loved you but didn’t do anything to prove it, you have to be smart and refuse to take his words literally. You have to remember that love comes with expectations and that the guy doesn’t have any.
He’s completely fine with the way things are as he can handle seeing you in a relationship with someone else. A person who can do that is fully detached and will remain detached for the unforeseeable future.
But why did he tell you he still loved you then?
He told you this for the same reason he told you any other breakup excuse. He wanted you to feel good and walk away without getting caught in an uncomfortable situation.
My ex said we might end up together in the future
This is yet another hope-instilling breakup excuse that just doesn’t make any sense in the real world.
Although there is always a possibility that your ex will want to get back together with you years later, your ex should not be promising you things that he or she is unsure of.
Your ex shouldn’t do it even if you’re begging and pleading with him or her for a second chance.
Saying things, such as, “It’s just a break, It’s temporary, we’ll see how we feel about each other in a few months” are all relationship “pauses” that don’t specify how long these pauses are going to be.
All they do is promise that everything is okay and that your ex will return to you once your ex has dealt with whatever issues he or she is currently dealing with.
So if your ex cried during the breakup and made it seem like the breakup is only temporary, don’t fall for it.
There is no such thing as a break in a relationship. There are only breakups, and in some rare cases—pre-agreed mutual arrangements to resume the romantic relationship after taking care of some necessity.
My ex cried during the breakup and never contacted me again
As difficult as it might be for you to hear this, you need to know that most of the time, dumpers break up with their dumpee because they aren’t happy in the relationship. They don’t feel like they’re on the same page with their partner and that they’ve grown apart.
Dumpers essentially feel that they have to invest a lot more time and energy into the relationship than they’d like, which is why they start feeling smothered and associate negative emotions with their partner.
As a result, they slowly become annoyed or repulsed and end up leaving their partner.
So even though you may not have done much to push your ex to break up with you, know that you didn’t have to do anything. Your ex’s unregulated thoughts and feelings were enough for your ex to detach and seek happiness elsewhere.
Napoleon Hill, a famous self-help author once said, “Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve.”
If your ex develops a bad opinion of you, your ex believes you’re not good enough for him or her regardless of whether it’s true or not. An unhealthy thought or belief is enough for feelings to disappear.
But my ex told me I was the best
If your ex cried during the breakup and told you that you’re the best person he or she ever met or dated, you probably already know that your ex wouldn’t have broken up with you if your ex meant that and valued you.
You know that your ex would have matched his or her words with actions and showed you how important you are.
But since your ex didn’t do that, it’s safe to say that your ex just told you what you wanted to hear. Your ex made you believe you were perfect so you wouldn’t blame yourself and make him or her feel bad for dumping you.
Try to avoid taking compliments from your ex seriously. Compliments and breakups don’t mix well together. They are just a distraction for you to take your focus off your ex and put it on yourself.
By focusing on your good qualities, you can temporarily forget about the problems at hand and avoid guilt-tripping your ex with your anxiety, questions, and concerns.
Did your ex cry when your ex broke up with you? Did that give you a lot of false hope? Let us know how crying affected you below the post.
And finally, if you’re looking for breakup analysis and want our help, check out our coaching options here.
My name is Zan and I’m the founder of Magnet of Success. I enjoy writing realistic relationship and breakup articles and helping readers heal and grow. With more than 5 years of experience in the self-improvement, relationship, and breakup sphere, my goal is to provide advice that fosters positivity and success and avoids preventable mistakes and pain. Learn more about me or get in touch today.
My ex-boyfriend broke up with me 7 months ago after being together for almost 10 years. After 3 weeks he started talking to someone else. He claims that they were not talking when we broke up. Which is not important to me. He came back to me a couple of months ago stating that he wanted a future with me and that he never quit loving me. He is still with the woman that he monkey branched to. He states that he will never tell me goodbye or ever get past me. He cries every time that he sees me. I know that he loves me, but I had to let him go for my own mental health. I have gone into no contact a few times but this time I need to not answer him when he reaches out with unimportant items. We both are hurting so much, but apparently, he is not hurting enough to let go of the new girl that he has been with for 6 months. I am a bit worried that I am broken and I am not sure if I will love another man again with the fear of being hurt.
Hi Michele.
Your ex hasn’t suffered enough to come back to you. He’s still with the woman he branched to, which means he’s not interested in you at the moment. You need to protect yourself and stop communicating with him. Ask him not to reach out next time you hear from him and stay in NC indefinitely.
You will love and be loved again. It will take time, but you will.
Kind regards,
Zan
Hi there,
I have found this post today after going through a break-up of a short-term relationship. It lasted just two months and the first 1.5 months were absolutely beautiful and I really fell for this guy. But then Covid struck with us not being able to see each other and I got really anxious and clingy. Wrote rambling texts etc. I thought we would recover but he left to move cities early. Up until he left, he was talking to me all the time so i thought we had a chance. The Good mornings, good nights, daily check-ins etc. But I knew things were strained. He still came and put furniture up for me. I didn’t think he would if feelings were gone. And he cried when he left and said you never know in the future. He got home thanked me in a text, wished me well and said you never know in the future again and I know where i am if I need him. Since moving, he’s gone silent. Even said I was welcome in his new city.
I believe he’s a nice guy. But I feel angry about the false hope. It keeps me clinging on hoping he will text etc. He wished me merry christmas. I admit I have anxious attachment. And I did things wrong. I take responsibility for that. But the kisses/hugs on leaving and the hope for the future continues to haunt me. It’s painful. I accept that I wasn’t ready at the time, in the sense that I hadn’t had a relationship for a while and things had moved so fast, that I did lose myself a bit. And just wanted him, wanted him, wanted him. But I wish he had just ripped the band-aid off while we were still in the same city. It feels like he just ran off. Even though he did nice things. In my head i was hoping the nice things were done out of attraction. But it almost hurts more to realise it was out of pitty/guilt/fear of hurting me. Because he’s hurt me more by not directly saying it was me.
He was straight back on tinder in his new city and put he wanted a meaningful relationship.
I don’t think all dumpers are selfish. At some point, if they know the relationship is not going to work out, then dumping the dumpee is the kind thing to do instead of just staying indefinately. no reason to be mean about it , but if it isn’t working out, then it isn’t working out.
Hey, I was dating this older guy for a few months. Everything seemed to going great! I would never call him he would call and he would make plans with me. He Introduced me to his friends, He invite me camping where I met his mother.
The last day we were together we had a blast, painting with a twist, sushi and drinks. Then two days later he FaceTimes and crying he realized he hasn’t ever been a lone and he needs to “work on him”. He cried, he said he went from 13 year marriage to dating someone for a year and half to dating me. He knows if I mean 2 years ago we would be married living a great life together. He needs to stop looking for love. And I need to too! ( I also was in a 13 year marriage and have dated pretty consistently. And I haven’t truly let myself breathe. there’s truth in his that statement)
He was kept saying I’m not throwing you away. I need to be alone and work on me. He kept crying. I started crying afterwards. I told him I wasn’t there but I could see myself being there with him. I understood that he needs time, so take it. I Also told him Logically I respect it, emotionally it hurts. We haven’t spoken in a few days. We’re is tears so fake?
I think this is what I’m going through with my ex girlfriend. She cried while she left and she’s been crying throughout the week after. She tells me she loves me and misses me, but then she’ll be angry. She’ll fight with me and be mean one moment, then loving the next. We’ve seen each other a couple times and we went out to a movie then kissed goodbye. The next morning she tells me it’s too hard to talk and see me so she needs space. We were together for over a year, we lived together and talked about marriage. I’m just lost and wondering if it’s time to try to move on.
Thanks
My boyfriend and I had been going out for 2 and a half years and were looking to move in together until all the Covid stuff. We were still in love after lockdown but in July things at work were starting to depress my boyfriend. He suffers from depression anyway but he’s on medication and usually ok but this time he got really low and started avoiding me. After a few weeks he told me he felt a bit better but his feeling for me hadn’t come back. He wanted to continue with the relationship to see if they did come back but I said I didn’t want to carry on if he had no feelings for me anymore. We both cried. He said he must still care because he cried. We’ve spoken since because he went depressed again (from work things) and I asked if he felt anything about the split. But he said he didn’t feel happy but he also wasn’t broken by it and still felt indifferent to me and the situation. Is he still depressed and is there a chance he will come back, or is it the end. I’m starting no contact now (even though it’s been nearly two weeks since the split) but we work together so it’s difficult.
Hi Zan, I am going through something similar and wants to understand the situation when I came across your posts. We are both in our early 40s and we have been together for 1.5 years. We were attracted from get go, and had a great relationship. He made me a part of his close circle and I did it for him too. We have met families, traveled together, spent holidays together and lived together for 2 months (quarantine shut down). At the end of this I brought up the question of moving in together, since I thought it’s time to push it to the next level. The only hesitation I had in the relationship is that he has not told “I love you” yet, where I told him that an year into the relationship, and said it two more times since then. He replied, thank you and that’s great. It was hard for me, but his actions spoke lot of love to me and I thought it’s a matter of time. (However I did find out he has said it 3 times before, in less than a year in previous relationships. This information certainly made me feel insecure. )
Two weeks ago when we had the moving in together conversation he asked time to think and then broke up with me. I was blindsided and devastated to get dumped by someone I loved very much. he cried a lot during the break up. It confused me, and he said he is happier being alone than being in a relationship right now, and that he broke up because he couldn’t say I love you.
Given that we are in 40s, and invested 1.5 years and have had a great relationship I am super confused why he took this decision. And he cried so much. I am curious to know what you think of investing 1.5 years at our age and not being able to commit? Is he showing emotional unavailability? Fear of Commitment? Or is it that he just didn’t love me? Was he just confused given he just lost his job and trying to figure things out there too.
Hi Rad.
Your ex probably wasn’t emotionally ready to date you yet. Since he never told you he loved you (but told his other exes), he needed to take things very slowly with you. But since you pushed him to move in together, you made him feel anxious and caused him to experience fear of commitment.
I don’t know if he never loved you, but from what I see, he wasn’t able to emotionally invest in you as much as in his other relationships. Perhaps it’s got something to do with how his serious relationships ended and the way he recovered from them.
Stay strong, Rad!
Zan
Thank you so much for your insight on this Zan. I think you are spot on about him not being emotionally ready. Few months back he went for therapy voluntarily, and he said it was about making things work. I took it as a big positive. At the end of it he started having job trouble. In retrospect it was bad timing for a big conversation and I could have done it differently. Not hearing that he loved me was really bothering me, and I really wanted to know where his heart is at. I would have been ok with not moving in, as long as he was able to say that he wants the relationship, because it’s important to him.
I read many of your other posts, and They helped me a lot to be ok with the break up. I requested for a no contact, he was surprised, but agreed. He wanted to keep in touch because he said he valued my company, and he cares about me. He has ex’s that are friends at this point, and he openly says he care about them too. But the important thing is like you have mentioned many times, he lost sight of the value of our relationship and that’s why he broke it off. Though I miss him terribly, I don’t need another friend, I wanted a romantic partner and I made it clear to him. So I am going in for an indefinite no contact. No matter how hard I will not reach out.
Thank you so much for all of your valuable posts zan!
Hi Rad.
Your ex pushed you out of his life to fully commit to his problems. Maybe he’ll realize your relationship value once he’s solved his personal issues or conversely, failed to solve them and sink deep in depression. There’s no telling what will happen to your ex’s emotional state. But if you want to do the right thing, don’t offer him help. He currently doesn’t want to converse with you and needs a lot of time to think.
Focus on yourself in the meantime and expect him to breadcrumb you in the following months.
Kind regards,
Zan
Mine ended up 7 days ago. We dated for 1.5 years. We came from different backgrounds. He came from Iran and traditional muslim family. He was being honest with me from the very beginning he told me he didn’t want a relationship as he knows in the end he would marry someone from her culture and religion. I still dated him knowing this because he was so nice to me (does everything that a bf would do) then recently he told me he wants to “explore” before getting arranged into marriage by his parents and he decided to slow things down with us and he told me we need to prepare to stop soon as later on it will be so much harder if we get attached more. He told me all he had in in his mind was getting too attached making separation harder later on. He cried with me during break up and even 7 days after he was crying on the phone with me. He still calls and texts me everyday because i asked him to do so as it makes my pain more tolerable.
Does going no contact work here? My ex and I broke up two weeks ago, she used some of the excuses given here and also cried during the breakup. She told me she liked someone else who was a year younger than she is, I tried talking to her about how she’s giving everything up for something that may not work out. On my part I was abusive and did a lot of hurtful things during the relationship and now I’m willing to change because suddenly I realize I do love this woman. She made me promise that if we ever had to come back together, I’ll give her a chance and also, she tried to stay friends while seeing the other guy. I decided to go No Contact and she reached out to me on the second day saying she feels bad how the relationship ended and that she loved me when she left, I replied telling her that I’m okay and I want her to be happy. I haven’t hit her up since then but she I have been posting a whole lot about my progress on Twitter where I know she still stalks me. She has also been posting a whole lot about being in pain and being happy that I’m doing okay. Is no contact going to work or has she lost every feeling she has for me? Is there any point reaching out to her or should I just try to be better on my own and hope she comes back. I cried today at the office and I feel so down, today is the fourth day of no contact and she has not said anything else or tried to reach out again
Hello Zan,
My girlfriend broke up with me 12 days ago. I am 19 and am a freshman in college and she is 16 and a junior in high school. We are both very good students, are pretty sensitive, and can be emotional. For the final two weeks of the relationship, I could see that things were not going so well. She seemed disinterested in texting and even in person; however, while these 2 weeks were on the whole bad, there were instances in it when she was in a very good mood and was very flirty like before. In this time, I later learned that she was talking to mutual friends about our relationship, “not feeling right anymore,” and that, “she would only do something if she felt sure it was the right thing to do.”
When she finally did break up with me, she started it by saying how I was really great to her and never treated her wrong. Her reasons for the breakup were that she, “didn’t feel in the right place to be in a relationship,” and that, “she felt like she wasn’t being fair to me.” She didn’t actually cry but was on the verge of tears and she also hugged me, put her hand on my shoulder, and held my hand, before she went back inside and watched me leave her house from this little window by her door just like she would when we were dating.
Since then, I’ve realized that I drove her away due to a loss of attraction. I was insecure and would constantly seek validation from her, to the point where I would ask her if she still liked me multiple times a week. Also, I completely saturated her with nonstop texting and snapchatting to the point that I probably began to feel more like a insecure chore than a partner.
In the days following the breakup, I heard from mutual friends that she was constantly crying and was saying how bad she felt about it. It also made her really jealous to see me with another girl at a party the day after the breakup. She told a mutual friend to tell me that she’s willing to be friends with me, “whenever I’m ready.” When this friend asked her if she thought me and her would ever get back together she said both, “I don’t know,” and, “I’ve just never been in a relationship that felt right.”
That was in the days immediately following the breakup (about 3 days). She then went and celebrated thanksgiving with her father and sibilings-in-law in California. This is her favorite place in the world and is where she feels most at peace. During that time, when friends would bring me up, she would simply say, “I don’t want to talk about it.”
She came back recently and has gone back into her very busy and demanding routine, and she told me back when we were dating that she always felt depressed when she gets back home. I saw her real quickly at work (we both work at Dairy Queen) between shifts, and she simply told me something about an order then left as soon as she could.
She has not contacted me throughout any of this process, and I have not contacted her. I have been doing no-contact from the very beginning, and have never pleaded or begged for her back at all. The only contact we still have is sending “streaks” to each other on snapchat.
In my case, I have been trying to do all I can to move on from her, say you say that’s the only time they ever come back. I have been going to counseling to address my insecurities and the depression that I have unfortunately struggled with since my childhood. I have been spending a lot of time crying and being very emotional talking to my mother for support, but have also been going out with friends, flirting with other girls, and trying to focus on my school work.
Quite simply, have I been doing things right thus far?
Eric,
There is something called an anxious attachment style. Read about it and maybe it will help you understand yourself better and learn from it. You have been doing things right as far as not contacting her and I hope that you will continue doing that. When she’s ready to contact you, she will. Give her space and time. But in the meantime (and it sounds hard) don’t wait for it. Take care of yourself, especially since you’ve been dealing with depression since childhood. Going to counselling is a good thing to do and also being supported by your family. It’s only been 12 days. This first part of the breakup is the hardest time to get through and you probably feel like it’s never going to feel better. It will. You will feel differently a month from now and two months from now and six months from now. Trust me on this. Stay strong. Take care.
Dear Zan,
Thanks so much for your thoughtful reply. I really appreciate your time and communication.
So then what is the right thing to do if you have initial attraction, you get involved with someone, but your feelings don’t grow?
Should you be “generous” instead of selfish, and stay longer when you do not feel in love or well-matched for a life together?
Honestly, I would never describe anything about this man as “not good enough” so much as “mis-matched” or incongruous with me/my life (as I believe I was, for him) once I started getting to know him and his situation.
For the right woman, he’s perfect! (as evident in his current relationship of 3 years and counting, whereas ours lasted only a few months)
So, by your measure, would you advise that, Once you are involved with a person for a few weeks or even a couple of months then you are “selfish” for breaking up when your feelings don’t deepen?
Even if you have Not declared love?
Not made any promises or plans?
Only been physically intimate a handful of times?
Far from “chasing happiness” immediately after the breakup, I spent time grieving the loss of his companionship and affection, working on myself, and hoping that he was recovering quickly. It’s a terrible feeling to hurt someone.
And, when he reached out to me, I accepted his calls and offered sincere apologies, honesty — no false hopes — and as many explanations as he needed as to why I did what I did.
I never lied to him, never ignored him, and did not date anyone else until He had first moved on.
I wonder if, at some point, you could write about how to choose a relationship more carefully, and possibly Prevent painful break-ups?
You are incredibly insightful. Kudos.
Having immersed myself in all manner of relationship websites and forums (Gottman Institute, School of Life, Medium, Quora and more), by comparison your content strikes a unique, very effective note and rings True.
I really want to do better and I Never want to hurt another person, again.
(I also Never want to Be Hurt again! I have had well more than my fair share of brutal Rejection.)
You are spot-on when it comes to pointing out the selfishness and questionable ethics of most dumpers.
Looking forward to your next post and thanks again!
Hi Ava.
From my personal experience, I can tell you that it’s a good idea to let go of a relationship you don’t enjoy staying in. You usually know after a few weeks, so the sooner you break up, the less pain you will cause.
Delaying and doubting usually only makes things worse for the dumpee, so you just have to be honest and tell the dumpee the truth.
I’ll write about your requested topics in the future.
Best regards,
Zan
Hi Zan,
Thank you for the time you take to respond to so many comments!
I have almost always been the Dumpee, not the Dumper, so I very much relate to your advice.
The one time I broke things off in my post-divorce decade of dating, was far and away the shortest “relationship” I had had.
Never have I stuck around for a year or Years (as every one of my Dumpers DID), and then callously discard a person after so much time had been invested.
It was my mistake and my responsibility for hurting him, I know that. But it was an honest mistake.
No matter how rare, sometimes there is such a thing as an ethical Dumper.
You are so articulate, I would look forward to your future post that might address this.
I am not perfect, but I am honest and caring.
This man appealed to me from the start, a lot. He was wonderful.
It was confusing to have mixed feelings begin to set in, but when they did I ended it.
There was no deceit, no cruelty ( other than needing to get out), no rudeness/ignoring, no monkey branching, etc. I truly felt remorseful because I have been on the receiving end of painful rejection SO many Times, it was easy to empathize!!!
I really wanted it to work and I missed the nice treatment, but my feelings weren’t there and there was nothing I could do about it. I never lied or said Ioved him, I never made any false promises, and I did break things off as soon as I could – though maybe it should have been even sooner…
Anyway, I run into him all the time lately and he is warm/friendly and Happy with the woman in his life. It really helps ease my Guilt, and I’m sure that he sees that he has a better match now.
Thanks also for considering future blog topics.
Sincerely,
Ava
Hi Ava.
Thanks for the recommendation!
One of my future topics is about how dumpees improve way more than dumpers do.
Thanks for reading the blog.
I appreciate your comments!
Zan
Hey Zan, I always look forward to email updates on your blog. And this one was interesting, as always!
So… In fact, I was the Dumper/Crier in one of my break-ups, a few years back.
And I can tell you with full sincerity, I really felt remorseful and it really was Not an attempt to escape Guilt, nor in any way be phony/manipulative, etc.
I just felt genuinely sorry. That’s why I cried.
A part of me did not want to break-up. In fact, the first time I attempted to do so, we both ended up crying then I cooked him dinner and had sex with him.
We both felt better for a moment but it was, ahem, very ineffective in terms of a break-up. (yikes)
The next time I managed to do it, though. No food or sex, just the break-up. ugh.
I wished I hadn’t let things get so involved, but I had truly hoped that I would grow to love him and want a life together. I just didn’t. So I felt obligated to end things as soon as I was sure about that. (Er, after that one evening)
I cried during the break-up, and I cried every time I ran into him for a few months after that. I couldn’t help it!
He had been kind, forthright, and I truly Liked a LOT about him.
It had been a lonely couple of years before I met him, and I hated going back to being alone.
He was different from men I had dated before, so taking that as a Good sign, I went for it. …But.. ultimately we were not a match. There was no denying it.
There was no other guy waiting in the wings, in fact I purposefully took some time off dating afterward, both out of respect for his feelings as well as to sort myself out.
Sometimes the tears are, for real, tears of regret.
I knew him to be a good, loving man. He did Not deserve rejection. It wasn’t merely my wanting not to be “the bad guy.” It was my genuinely wishing that we had been a better match, and feeling sad about being alone again (yes, that part was my being selfish).
It was my knowing that he deserved love and wishing that I could have felt differently. We are both over 50 so every day becomes more precious.
But even in my youth I had a strong sense of obligation not to waste anyone’s time if my feelings weren’t deepening. (And OH how I wish others had been as ethical with My time..)
In this case, even though I Loved that he pursued me (breath of fresh air these days! ), and that he was Serious about Me (Even Fresher Breath of Air!!) , within a few months I recognized incompatibilities and inevitable issues with blending our lives together. So, I called it off before we met all of one another’s family members, or any other action denoting commitment (traveling together, holidays together, etc).
He has a lot to offer, so, unsurprisingly he now is in a happy, committed relationship that has lasted 3 years so far. I run into him now & then (and I No Longer Cry! haha!). It is always friendly, from what I can tell. (I won’t hazard a guess as to his opinion of me, but he is always friendly)
Now, a question: What could I have done better?
Would it have been better to hold back the tears somehow?
Wouldn’t that have constituted a fake coldness that I didn’t actually feel?
I believe that I did not “breadcrumb” him with post-breakup contact that could lead to false hope. (In fact I Never initiated contact. However, if/when he Did contact me, I responded — but not with mixed messages or phony words that would cause him to hope for reunion.) I wanted him to know that I would never just ignore him if he reached out.
I suppose, and hope, from his perspective all’s well that ends well.? Since our split, I have been the Dumpee with other men, TWICE, in the years afterward. Perhaps that gives him some small satisfaction..?
I have never had an Ex cry over dumping me.
That would be very unusual, indeed.
My Dumpers, in particular the most recent one, have been rather cool and worse — downright Cruel and seemingly remorseless, in addition to moving on to other women with lightening speed! Ugh.
I cried because I know my dumpee Matters, and I value his humanity. I just didn’t want to spend my life with him.
My dumpers, in contrast, seemed to reach a point of such hatred they had no qualms about ignoring, insulting/criticizing and leaving me during some particularly difficult times in my life when I could have used someone to protect and stand by me, not abandon me.
So, nobody’s perfect and I realize that it’s wrong to hurt someone.
But.. Is there such a thing as a Good Dumper?
Might that be a worthy blog post?
I am not egotistically holding myself up as a shining example, I’m just wondering what your thoughts would be on that?
In my experience, not that there’s ever a “good” break-up, the best time to call things off with someone who doesn’t agree is when you’ve given it a chance (because there Was initial attraction/affection), but before things get too established. You have serious doubts and know that you want to leave, so you express that and you take action.
Only one of my dumpers did so at that early stage. While I was shocked and hurt, as I didn’t perceive us as having any serious problems, my pain was minimized by his doing so after just a few months — as opposed to Years — and prior to us blending family occasions. Also I immediately initiated No Contact, and he respected that. So, the recovery went as well as possible.
My other Dumpers had a way of letting things go on — in the most recent case for 18 months and declaring love and discussing plans to move in together, including me in his important Family events… Right up until the moment of Dumping and ignoring me!
Literally our Final Conversation took place over a lovely dinner (that i had cooked). I had no idea we were on such thin ice.
During the meal he revisited the idea that we would move in together in the next year or so (something I wanted and he had gone back & forth on) . He also was complimentary, saying he was proud of how I was handling my current difficulties.
.. Yet, that conversation soured, and ended with his abruptly leaving, and afterward ignoring me and the plans we had had for a trip the following weekend, as well as his birthday the one after that — and capped off 2 weeks later with his leaving a large pile of my belongings in my driveway while I was at work.
It was a stunning turnaround , to put it mildly.
Oops. Pardon my digression.
My point is that I can guarantee he did not shed a tear while doing these hateful things, and I have remained baffled at the viciousness of his words and actions.
This one is by far the worst, but of course I will continue Indefinite No Contact after my mistakes of those early Post-dump weeks.
Kindly pardon my verbosity, Zan. Your website has become a regular stop for me and never fails to generate thoughts. So, I guess I then tend to Over-share…
I would be very keen to read your thoughts on what constitutes an Ethical Dump.
(maybe you already have; I will go back and look through the site)
Thanks again for being here.
Your website has been one of the keys to my current healing process and I am very grateful!
I’m glad karma took hold of you. How you got dumped appears me as poetic justice.
Really? How so? Please elaborate.
Are you suggesting that once 2 people start a relationship, there is Never a good reason for a break-up?
Are you also suggesting that even the most conscientious break-up is only worthy of punishment? Kindly explain what I did, in your opinion, to deserve that horrible treatment.
And, kindly explain your spectatorial enjoyment of my suffering.
I am very curious how a person reaches such a bitter place, and would like to learn about that.
Hi Ava.
I’ve been thinking a lot about what you wrote.
The truth is that the more I think, the more I see that you felt guilty for hurting your ex. You cried because you didn’t grow to love him. You’d hoped you would feel more toward him soon, but feelings of love and wanting to build a future together with him never came.
Instead of getting attracted, you began to feel repulsed, so you had to end the relationship even if he was a really nice guy. It simply wasn’t working for you because you couldn’t connect to him as much as you wanted to.
You knew there were parts about him that you liked, but as selfish as this may sound—they weren’t good enough for you. Your ex just wasn’t fulfilling you emotionally.
So in a way, you regret letting go of some parts of him, but not him wholly as a person and what he has to offer.
Because you hated losing those benefits, as well as causing him pain, you, therefore, felt guilty for being selfish and chasing after your own happiness.
There are good dumpers out there. It’s just that they are incredibly rare. They are typically the people who hate hurting others, cry during breakups, and oftentimes take the blame.
But nonetheless, all dumpers are selfish.
Kind regards,
Zan
He broke up with me after 1 year together and he did all the things that we mentioned here: cry, said he loves me, said we need to work on ourselves, time will answer, still contact me for things like he is hungry or i ordered this and thay for you. It’s really hard for me to let him go. Struggling now.
Hi HL.
I know it’s hard, but try to work on accepting the breakup and letting go of hope. The guy said all these things because he felt really bad for leaving you, hurting you, and destroying your plans for the future. I suggest you sign up for therapy and stay away from your ex. Don’t let him confuse you with his guilt and/or shame.
Sincerely,
Zan