Writing A Letter To An Ex For Closure

Prior to writing this article, I searched the web thoroughly to discover what other people say about writing a letter to your ex.

Most articles I came across endorsed the writing of this romantic letter and guaranteed some sort of closure or long-term success with an ex. Ironically, these sketchy websites also offered to help broken-hearted dumpees write a custom, handwritten letter to their exes in exchange for some moolah (money).

On the other hand, I've also come across some angry, yet genuine dumpees projecting their own anger at their exes by burning the letter or by doing something outrageous to it.

Since most writers used a lot of profanity, I've decided to write a neutral article on whether you should write a letter to your ex.

Should I write a letter to my ex?

The first thing you should do is ask yourself what the purpose of writing the letter to your ex is.

Is it to get your ex back, to elicit some kind of a caring response or perhaps to make your ex realize everything he or she has put you through?

Give it some thought first and decide what your ultimate goal with your ex is. Set your emotions aside and dig really deep so that you can later find ways to work on your insatiable cravings.

Here's an infographic that could help you find the real reason why you may want to send a letter.

From my understanding, there are 5 types of letters you can write to your ex.

Love letter – to confess your eternal love.
Reaction letter – to elicit a warm reply from your ex with the intention to reopen channels of communication.
Acceptance letter – a one-way letter "to acknowledge" the end of the relationship.
Closure letter – the letter with which you demand an explanation as to why the breakup occurred.
Forgiveness letter – the letter to forgive your ex for horrible post-breakup treatment.
Hate letter – the nasty letter to inform your ex about his/her awful behavior.

Finding the type of letter you wish to send to your ex is something you must necessarily do for your own personal growth. You must explore your inner self to find the purpose behind your intended actions so that you can begin working on your impulsive desires. Your future depends on it.

Does writing a letter to your ex ever work?

I've had many clients, readers, and even friends that wrote letters in hopes of getting their exes back. As you might expect, it hasn't worked for any of them. Not even a single one.

That's because love letters, acceptance letters and all friendly letters aren't meant for exes. They are meant for partners – boyfriends and girlfriends and not for an ex who's lost feelings for you, took you for granted, cheated, ghosted you, etc.

Planting a seed after the breakup

Expecting a letter to "plant a seed" in your ex's mind is ludicrous. The only thing the letter will plant is a lot of annoyance.

It goes without saying that sending letters to an ex shamelessly contradicts everything the indefinite no contact rule tries to accomplish.

Instead of cooling an ex off, sending a letter aggravates an already suffocating ex. And in some lucky cases, an ex might even shed a tear or two for being reminded of his or her selfish decision.

But once that happens, your ex will run for the mountains and disappear off the radar. That's when you'll finally realize what the letter has actually done.

What if my ex keeps the letter for later?

If you're hoping your ex will store your letter for safekeeping, you're mistaken. Your ex will get rid of it the moment he or she is done reading it. Most dumpers do.

How can I confidently proclaim so, you wonder?

That's because your ex just doesn't want anything to do with you after the breakup. He or she is instead looking for the quickest way out of the relationship, while at the same time, your desperate letter tries to pull your ex back in.

You, therefore, have two contradicting forces in play.

The first one is your ex's revolting emotions, caused by a lack of space and the need for alone time to "think things through."

And the opposite force is your contrasting letter imposing your presence, feelings, thoughts, and beliefs on your ex.

So when your ex feels opposed, you can be certain that he or she won't keep your letter to read it again in the future. There's just no need for that as dumpers aren't very prudent creatures.

In the end, it honestly doesn't matter even if your ex decides to keep the letter as memorabilia. That's because it won't be the deciding factor in getting back together with your ex.

You have a way better shot with no contact.

People make emotional decisions

Here's a question from me to you about retaining the letter. Would you keep a letter from someone you don't care about anymore or perhaps even hate?

If you had no long-term plans with this person, I sincerely doubt you'd think, "Maybe I'll read this letter in a few months when I stop feeling so annoyed." Instead, you would likely do what you feel is right at that moment.

You need to remember that people are extremely emotional beings, hence why most of us act on instinct. Without sounding too insulting to my own species, a lot of us have what I call "the caveman mentality."

Commercials and scams especially play on our weaknesses and take advantage of our emotions. They are designed to hook us emotionally by offering solutions to our problems.

I don't blame people that fall for such tricks because I know how difficult emotions can be to handle. It's sad to say that a very small percentage of people actually manage to develop a mind over matter mentality with which they rationally think about their actions with their heads and don't act on their impulses.

It sounds so simple, but a lot of people find it extremely difficult to control themselves. It's as if their bodies are in charge of their brains and not vice-versa.

As Earl Nightingale—an American author best known in the human character development field says, "People are the way they are because they don't think. They never had to and instead just obeyed their animalistic instincts to do what they felt was right."

Controlling our emotions

Controlling our emotions isn't something we're taught in schools or at home by our parents. That's because we can't force our beliefs into another person's brain and expect him or her to understand.

To create this emotional filter, a person needs a lot of self-awareness and willpower. This means that nobody but we can help ourselves with our own thoughts and emotions—which are essentially deep-rooted beliefs and patterns.

Others can, of course, influence us, but for that to happen, we need to be ready to listen.

What does sending a letter do to your ex?

Sending a letter to your ex that rejected you is almost certainly going to end badly for both of you.

It's such a terrible idea because sending your presence on a piece of paper is the last thing your ex wants after the breakup.

That's because a breakup is essentially a dire need for space and distance—and a letter achieves exactly the opposite. It suffocates your already suffocated ex and brings back unwanted memories.

Since your ex doesn't want to see you or hear from you, this means that he or she doesn't want your love letters or "acceptance" letters either. Your ex just wants peace and quiet.

When your ex broke up with you, he or she felt relieved that it's finally over. Of course, this isn't necessarily your fault, but emotions running through your ex's veins tell him or her that it is.

So when your ex receives an unexpected letter from you, he or she will have felt strange. Your ex will feel like he or she rejected you recently and now you've turned into a stalker that won't leave your ex alone.

Your ex will put his or her palm over his or her face and exclaim, "Cant my ex just get a hint?"

You, dear reader, don't want to find yourself in the role of a stalker or be the ex that doesn't get the hint that it's over.

If you send letters and persist to get back together with your ex, your ex could tell others about your bad behavior—which would look bad on your record.

What does sending a letter do to you?

When you send a letter to your ex, you are basically gambling with your health by allowing yourself to become vulnerable again. That's because sending a letter to your ex has a hidden agenda – to obtain something which you otherwise can't get on your own.

It doesn't matter what you're trying to accomplish with your letter, but your ex can smell that you're up to no good a mile away. Your ex knows that you wouldn't be going through the trouble of writing him or her a letter if you didn't have an ulterior motive.

Since your ex doesn't like, nor approve of your "harmless" letter, he or she will uncaringly reject you again—which will bring back the pain from the breakup.

By sending a letter to your ex, you will force yourself to suffer through another rejection and reopen the wound the breakup has created.

Writing a handwritten letter to my ex has to make him/her feel something! Anything?

If you think that handcrafted, custom, nostalgic, emotional, and romantic letters are what it takes to get an ex back, you're mistaken.

It won't make your ex suddenly feel love toward you as he or she is way past the stage of romance. This stage ended weeks or even months before the breakup in some cases. That's why you can't expect your ex who's lost attraction for you to regain it with something as simple as a letter.

People learn through harsh truth, reality, and suffering the most, so if you're going to put your hopes on sending a happy letter to your ex, you may as well not feed his or her ego.

You're better off sending your ex a box of his or her remaining possessions.

In all honesty, anything is better than the letter.

"Act now or your ex will move on"

Since writing a letter to your ex suffocates him or her, negative behavior is sure to follow. Ignoring, blocking, replying in disgust or mocking you is not unusual ex behavior – especially after you've sent a letter.

As a matter of fact, I see this pattern occur almost too frequently. That's because an ex who literally begs for space after the breakup doesn't want to receive any letters and often even reminders of you. It doesn't get any simpler than that.

We can therefore say that writing a handwritten letter to your ex is very effective, but unfortunately—in a negative way. It truly sucks that anything that gives attention to an ex only makes things worse, but that's the harsh truth.

What's the big idea about sending a letter to an ex then?

Now we know that sending a letter to an ex only pours more fuel on the fire and lowers your self-esteem in the process. We also know that hopeless dumpees are either not thinking straight or are being duped into sending these letters.

The reason why dumpees believe it will work is that most dumpees have an "I have to do something or my ex will move on" mentality. And since a lot of scammers are aware of their desperation, they offer all sorts of ineffective tricks and gimmicks that actually do more harm than good.

If you're a dumpee, then you must (for your own sake) get the "I must do something" thoughts out of your head. This isn't your time to "do something," but rather your ex's turn to send you letters.

But since your ex is in a powerful state, that won't happen. Not until he or she becomes weak and vulnerable like yourself.

Should I EVER write a letter to my ex?

Writing a letter to an ex to get him or her back is always an awful idea. This includes writing a letter even if you don't want your ex back and just want to be friends with your ex.

Follow the rules of no contact and preserve your value as a dumpee instead. It's your best and only option.

Please keep in mind that if your ex wants to communicate with you, he or she will do so. But it definitely won't happen because of the letter.

Closure letter

Although asking your ex for closure doesn't seem like the worst thing in the world, it's still a terrible idea.

The likelihood of receiving positive feedback from this letter really depends on how much space your ex has had since the breakup and how receptive he or she has become.

One way to know for sure is to look inward and discern if you're still miserable. If you are, your ex is likely feeling powerful and will reject your attempt for closure.

Rejection is especially that much more likely to befall if your ex has exceptionally poor emotional self-control.

Add your ex's victim's mentality on top of that and you could even get a nasty response from your ex which would hurt you even more.

It's important to note that obtaining closure from an ex won't happen until your ex is ready to talk. And as long as your ex doesn't talk to you about the relationship/breakup, you simply don't send any closure letters.

Hate letter

There's nothing worse than unleashing your wrath on your ex.

Please understand that even if your ex treated you horribly post-breakup, how fast you move on is still completely dependent on you—and not your ex.

As a matter of fact, getting angry at an ex for treating you like dirt will only increase your long-term suffering and make you look as bad as your ex.

Getting angry at you ex will do two things:

slow down the time it takes for you to move on
prevent you from growing as a person

If dumpers could tell you how detrimental their anger is, you would really understand the gravity of my warnings.

Not only do dumpers not grow even an inch as a person, but they often find themselves stuck in a spiteful mentality for months. Sometimes, they flip their life upside down in a way that even their friends don't recognize them.

And I don't mean this in a nice way.

That's why you don't need to go down your ex's route. Not unless you care about your own reputation.

Forgiveness letter

Instead of writing any of the aforementioned letters to your ex, you should instead write the forgiveness letter.

You should mention everything your ex has done wrong and write down how you would have acted and reacted instead.

Also, don't forget to mention the mistakes you've made and how you contributed to the breakup.

Put down 3 reasons for each of your mistake and 3 solutions for solving them.

Make this letter 5 pages long if you want to, as long as you get everything off your chest as. You will find it very therapeutic if you do.

Once you've finished writing the letter, don't send it! Put it in your drawer and read it whenever you feel overwhelmed.

It will serve you as a reminder that your ex isn't the most amazing person on the planet and give you the motivation to keep working on your shortcomings.

And most importantly, reading the forgiveness letter will help you forgive your ex for hurting you.

It will help you move on without resentment and open you up to new love opportunities when the time is right.

Were you thinking of writing a letter to your ex? What do you think about this article? Has it knocked some sense into you? Please leave a comment below.