Is Delena Over For Good?

Are you picking up the pieces of your heart right now? Because I just had to stop doing that to sit down and write this post. The Vampire Diaries Season 6 premiere aired last Tuesday and it was hard to watch, mostly because Elena had become a vampire drug addict since Damon's "death." But Tuesday night's new episode, "Yellow Ledbetter," was even harder — especially if you're a Delena fan — because Elena had Alaric erase her memories of Damon. And now she just thinks he's Stefan's monstrous brother. Ugh, I feel my heart breaking again.

I know this seems like the best possible thing for her, considering she was ready to tear Luke apart for more witchy hallucination herbs when her initial efforts with Alaric failed. But what does this mean for Delena? When Elena first went to Alaric at the end of the Season 6 premiere, I was skeptical about whether or not she really wanted to do this. I mean, she loves Damon and TVD is obviously going to get him back in the world of the living. If Elena loses her memory of loving Damon, that gives Delena no hope when he returns and it takes away all of Elena's drive to find a way to save him.

This was by far one of the saddest episodes TVD has done in a long time. Season 6's second episode piled on the Delena feels as Elena remembered intimate moments from their relationship, trying to help Alaric figure out when exactly she fell in love with Damon. And it was hard for her and hard for Alaric and, to be quite honest, hard for me. I love Delena — even though they scare me sometimes — and I obviously, like Caroline, was hoping that Elena would decide to keep her memories instead of turning into a coward and running from them like Stefan's been doing. But, alas, she didn't.

And this big decision on Elena's part might mean the end of something TVD spent so long trying to build. After she reminisced about the real moment she fell for Damon, Elena told Alaric that she was done and that she was ready to let go and forget it all. It hurt — it really hurt. And Delena might really be over, unless Alaric can give Elena her memories back or if, deep down, Elena's attraction to Damon still survives.

Elena's clearly lost hope and now that she's wiped her all-consuming, every-fiber-of-her-being love for Damon from her memory, she'll eventually move on. Sure, her motivation to bring Bonnie back is still there, but her motivation to bring Damon back would've been much stronger. Is this TVD's way of trying to tell fans that no 'ship is endgame at this point? Because Delena seems dead-on-arrival after this and I'm so not OK with it. At all.

Image: Quantrell D. Colbert/The CW