This year was going to be different than the last. I promised myself that. 2017 truly has been a different year for me, especially when considering that I’ve finally found closure. Closure that I had not expected at all. In previous articles, I had briefly mentioned the toxic relationship I had gotten out of, one that had ended right before I had started here at Odyssey. I often spoke of my partner in a negative light but made the relationship seem like a complete nightmare. But there were good times too, I assure you of that. I wouldn't have stuck around the entire time if there wasn't. Although, most of the time, it was a "rough patch." My partner and I constantly had major rough patches throughout it but there were tiny glimpses of hope which is what kept me in it.

I often speak about my singularity with my close friends and family. My friends want me to just "get with someone already" and my family tells me to just "wait it out." I took the advice of the latter and it truly has been more helpful than just shoving my way back into a relationship. I have learned to breathe on my own, about myself (including how to control my anxiety issues) and how to obtain better relationships with the people around me. Although I was able to understand myself better, there was just one chapter still unwritten from 2016 and it had truly bugged me to no end. I took a huge leap of faith and contacted my previous partner. The fighting towards the end had torn any strand of a functioning relationship we could have for the future but I tried anyway.

At first, the contact was extremely awkward. We chatted, catching up on each other's lives and then I hit them with the hard and heavy: the closure. A lot had happened in that relationship and I had not really had the opportunity to move on from it because there were so many loose ends to tie up. They understood what a lot of the things they had done were wrong. (I'm no saint either and I had fully confessed to all of my wrongdoings.) It felt nice to not have the finger pointed at me and to have shared the guilt like it was done in the past.

I wasn't very open in the relationship, that was my biggest fault, I finally laid it all out on the table in front of them so that they would understand my perspective on certain aspects of the relationship. How much some of their actions had hurt me. As I have stated in previous articles, I'm trying to be more open and it definitely has been an extreme change for me but Odyssey has definitely helped me with that. To be able to speak my mind and allow others to understand my side instead of sitting down and allowing myself to be pushed around by others.

I'm so glad that I was able to get this closure. I truly needed it and now we have both moved on from this part of our lives.