What does it mean when someone you hurt says " I still need time to myself to decided if I want to talk to you & possibly date you again"?

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A2A, I normally don’t answer questions of the form “What does X mean,” but this one seems to beg my attention.

It means they breaking up with you but are still leaving the door open for reconciliation. You have a brief window to examine your own behavior outside of the context of dating. Hopefully you’ll learn something about yourself. When and if you start interacting again, they are going to be watching closely to see whether or not you’re still exhibiting the same behavior.

I just did this with my girlfriend, we’re currently not speaking right now. I’ve reached the point where I can’t devote any more time to the relationship unless she can change her behavior. The door’s still open but it’s closing fast.

If we’re still not talking by the beginning of next week then I’ll consider our romance effectively over and I’ll give her until the end of the month to repair our friendship. I will need to impose heavy restrictions on it because she’s the kind of person who can’t ‘just’ be friends, so I have to protect myself.

If the romance dies, then I’m not going to say it’s never coming back, but I’m definitely not going to entertain the possibility for at least a few months and will do my best to move on in the meanwhile. If I can’t move on then I’ll have to come to terms with the fact that we’re not done yet and I’ll let her back into my life to try to figure out why I’m still holding on to her.