Messages leaving open a certain person

Okay so say I’m texting with someone and I accidentally close my phone or the app or switch over to something else real quick if I don’t click the back button and completely go back to my full list of messages vs a specific thread next time I open my messages that persons conversation is open. Now this might be great for some people but one you have to make sure you look before you start typing and two then it constantly stays open for that thread unless I delete the conversation completely and if it’s like your spouse child or parent etc maybe u have years of texts and don’t wAnt it deleted. Is there a way to stop this feature or anything I can do? I don’t know why it does this but I personally find it severely annoying and sometimes it won’t close out for a long time other times after a little bit yes texts will go back to normal but I feel you should be able to either turn this on or off or not have it at all.