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Breaking No Contact: How to respond to breadcrumbs from the Dumper if at all
I wanted to discuss the topic of what you should do ideally if the dumper decides to reach out to you in your period of no contact. For some of you reading, this would be the ideal situation given the incredible pain and sense of loss you’re experiencing due to their sudden or prolonged absence in your life.
But not all contact from the dumper is indicative of reconciliation or is made with the intent of getting back together. As the dumpee, it can be very difficult to discern if the contact from your ex is them testing the waters with you to see if it possible to revisit the relationship again or if the contact is borne from more selfish, inconsiderate reasons which do not take into account your emotional well-being or your progress and can actually serve to damage your self-esteem and hurt you even further. The latter contact from the dumper is called breadcrumbs.
The Definition of Breadcrumbs
What are breadcrumbs? Basically any contact from the dumper that does not communicate the clear intent of reconciliation. And YES, this includes: “I miss you,” “How are you doing? I care about you and hope you’re doing okay,” “I’m sorry it has to be this way,” “You still mean so much to me,” etc. Nowhere in these texts do they convey the need to start again or work on the relationship. As tempting as it may be to respond in kind (and trust me I ALWAYS speak from experience), what often happens is the dumper backs off in contact again the moment they are aware that you are still willing to get back together with them at a moment’s notice.
During your period of no contact with the ex, this is the time when they are experiencing the consequences of their decision and can truly feel the magnitude of your absence. There could be a multitude of reasons why they have decided to reach out (loneliness, perhaps a recent rejection from a girl they were pursuing, maybe even rocky times with someone they’re currently dating or in a relationship with, or the lack of sex etc.) and hearing from you is a way to boost their ego (make them feel desired), assuage their guilt for hurting you, or reassurance that they can go back on their decision (as they’re now starting to feel traces of doubt) and that you’re still a good back-up option.
How to Respond to Breadcrumbs
The best way to respond the breadcrumbs (if at all, you can definitely choose to ignore them in favor of your healing) is to be polite and short, and re-state your need for no contact. An example of a response to ‘I miss you,’ – “Thank you for letting me know. I respect your decision and wish you well.” This shows your ex that you are moving on and that reconciling with you (if that is their wish) will take more work than just words with no follow through. You are coming from a place of self-love and high value where you are demonstrating to your ex that you are living a life free of the need for their validation.
If they ask you how you are doing, again, keep in mind that you don’t have to respond. No Contact should make you and your ex mysteries to one another. Why should your ex know about how you’re doing and what you’re up to when they made the decision to remove you from their lives? If you choose to respond, again as with any breadcrumb, be polite and short. “I’m doing well. Best wishes.” Always close-ended. If your ex truly wants reconciliation they will not stop at one text and they will make themselves clear.
You ask yourself, but what if they think I hate them or that I’m being rude? Common concerns when you do want to get back together with your ex. Keep in mind that nowhere in your responses are you rude. You’re simply refusing to engage further conversation. Because unless they want reconciliation, you are prolonging your healing by keeping contact with your ex and they get to feel better/less guilty and more secure in their decision to break up with you because hey, the dumpee is still a good plan b if this whole being single thing doesn’t work out. And if you chose not to respond? How is that being rude? They are your ex and they broke up with you. They cannot expect you to respond as you would when you two were together. Your healing comes first.
Breadcrumbs vs. Reconciliation
Realistically, reconciliations will need to start somewhere. Dumpers will send out feeler texts that resemble breadcrumbs in order to gauge the dumpee’s willingness to get back together (as some dumpees may have longed moved on with someone new or simply harbor too many negative feelings towards the dumper to ever consider speaking with them or reconciling as you see in cases of where the dumpee has been cheated on).
The difference between true attempts at reconciliation versus breadcrumbs is typically that the dumper’s contact will increase over time even after you send a polite and short response or ignore them completely. Contact will keep coming. Sometimes this can set the dumpee back in a big way as they are unsure what the dumper’s motives are and the repeated contact can encourage hope in the dumpee’s heart.
At some point, the dumper will ask ‘to talk’ or ‘meet up’ if they haven’t already stated in their messages that they miss you and have realized they made a mistake and would like to try again. If they ask to meet up or talk without the expressed regret of breaking up with you, you are more than free to ask them “Why would you like to talk?” or “Why would you like to meet up?” that way you can determine whether or not seeing your ex again is beneficial to you.
By all means, if you have long moved on and see your ex purely in a platonic way (this means potential news of them being madly in love with someone else will not be hurtful to you), there is no danger catching up. But if you are still hung up on your ex and are working on actively moving on, it’s important to protect yourself as meet up’s can result in having sex with your ex where there was no discussion or mention of getting back together. Your ex can then say, “That was a mistake,” or “I never said we were getting back together.” And again, you are back to square 1 of your healing.
Are Dumpers that selfish?
The way I write about dumpers may seem unforgiving or as if they exist only to bring pain and misery to your lives. I’m not saying dumpers aren’t human, you know your dumper better than any of us here and would have a truer idea of what his or her motives are for breaking no contact with you. Break ups are a painful, confusing time for everyone, not strictly the dumpee.
Loneliness strikes both parties and it’s natural for your dumper to miss you and the deep friendship and emotional bond you two shared over the course of your relationship. This can extend to sex. But take care: missing someone is not the same as wanting them back. Your ex can’t simply choose the parts of the relationship they want to keep (friendship, sex) and the parts they don’t (commitment, monogamy, etc). If they make a decision to break up with you, they chose to lose ALL OF YOU. They thought about this for a while, debated the pros and cons. And arrived at the decision that their lives would be much better by ending their relationship with you. Respect that decision. And let them live with it through no contact. For the dumper, it’s one thing to think about never seeing or talking to your girlfriend or boyfriend again, quite another when the reality is actually unfolding and their forced to come to grips with the decision they made because you the dumpee are keeping solid with no contact.
You are making it easy for them to move on from you by remaining in contact “as friends” or “exes with benefits” while they pursue others, and harder for you to move on, heal and mend your heart, and be open one day to someone who actually wants to be with you. By choosing to remain in contact and settle for being in limbo, you are reaffirming your ex’s belief that they can find someone better because if you can’t walk away out of self-love and out of recognition of your own value, then you must not be someone worth having. It’s basic human psychology. This is not games, this is about you taking the time and space for yourself to move on from someone who has hurt you and who saw no future with you.
In short, always put yourself and your healing first and be the guard of your own heart. Do not entrust it to someone who has broken it before with so little to go on. This is my personal opinion born from my own experiences and other dumpees’. It is your life and you make the choices you can live with. Just remember that you are number one. Keep up the no contact everyone.
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No Contact III