Both my sisters each suffered from the ending of painful romances. And in each case, these names and dates were forbidden topics. In the case of one sister this romance had been very long and so it was quite a shock for all of us not to simply have the young man in the house. In this case, unlike Anne, my parents were very unhappy about the breakup.

Despite modern culture's openess about romance and such things, my family never much talked to my sisters about their breakups. There were a few fights but not much openess or comforting. After the initial period of shock, they were never spoken of and are each still is somewhat an embargoed topic many years later. And we (I hope) did not treat my sisters like Anne Elliot. With one it was only after my sister married that we talked about it at all in general conversation.

And this boy had been a big part of my sister's life.

There are a whole host of reasons I can think of... It is usually just easier to talk about little unimportant things than discuss the difficult stuff.

- they didn't want to create any awkwardness in conversation.
- Everyone else(but Anne) just wants to forget about the unpleasentness.
- Sir W. and EE would have wanted to forget about it entirely
- Lady Russell may have thought that it would only upset Anne again. I think we see as much when Anne must compose herself.

But you are right... In such cases, often it is better to get things out in the open and talk about them. It promotes healing and allows the person feeling the pain to lean on others and get sympathy. Anne must have felt very alone beause she could not even look as though she was upset.

And this often still expected of young people who suffer heartbreak. The rest of the world keep spinning and they must go on.