Why was i reported?

What exactly was inappropriate that I said?

Dear Dove:

You shared that you had a boyfriend who lived in your state while attending university. In the beginning he was “so sweet and kind”. He kept saying every day that he loved you “so much”. For your birthday he went out of his way to get you “a really thoughtful birthday gift”, and in the birthday card he wrote: “we’ll create the best and most powerful love any two humans have ever known”, and “I look forward to many more years with you”.

You shared that you have “such a low self esteem”, that you have an anxious attachment style, that at one point in the relationship, you felt that he was your savior and “the biggest highlight” of your life.

Toward the end of the relationship the two of you fought a lot, he “became extremely cold”. He told you that the relationship was not healthy, and you thought so too (“I know our relationship wasn’t healthy.. he said so, and I thought so”). And then, he broke up with you, and soon afterwards told you that “he was planning on breaking up with (you) for MONTHS now”- during the time that he got you the thoughtful birthday gift and wrote those words of love and promise in that birthday card.

The following things happened in succession: (1) He broke up with you, telling you that “he had feelings for this girl in his home state”. (2) He  changed his phone lock screen from a picture of him-and-you,  to a picture of him-and-her. (3) He signed up to online dating “for fun”. (4) (The day before yesterday), he told you that he quickly deleted his online dating profiles and decided to “work on himself and his studies for a year”. (5) He expresses romantic interest in one of the girls in his online classes and said that he “got a Covid test a few days ago just so that he could kiss her safely”.

The two of you agreed that “it would be best to cut off all contact”. You currently feel “absolutely dreadful being replaced.. obviously, he didn’t think I was worth it… barely able to eat or function with how much pain I’ve been in over him… All our good memories feel tainted.. I feel hopeless”. You created a new profile on Instagram and are thinking about contacting him and finding out “more about the  new girl who he’s seeing”.

“Please help me to feel better”, you asked.

My reply to you: you will feel better, you will see. Feelings don’t stay the same and when we feel down, we don’t stay down forevermore. What I found out in my life is that misunderstandings caused me a lot of misery, and that the more I understand correctly- the better I feel. Sometimes I understand things that I don’t want to understand, things I wish were not so, but after the new understanding sinks in- I feel surprisingly better.

And so, I want to help you understand better what happened. I will suggest things to you, and if you want to, you can tell me if what I understands feels true to you, or not. Eventually, if we communicate long enough, we can reach an accurate understanding.

It seems to me that your ex-boyfriend is an emotional thrill seeker, that he is chasing excitement and that his feelings of love for you (and for the new girl) are not deep, but rather have to do with his need to feel excited, so to .. overcome the boredom of his routine living from day to day. If his feelings of love for you were deep, I would think that he wouldn’t want to hurt you by telling you about his interest in another girl.

Any of this feels true to you?

anita

About your boyfriend, maybe your relationship did mean nothing to him. But that’s no fault of yours. Avoidant style people will always be avoidant unless they take conscious action to change the patterns, no matter which new girl they kiss. Feel sorry for the new girl. Because after a couple of months, she’s gonna see his unhealthy relationship patterns, and suffer the same pain you did.

Work on overcoming your anxious style of attachment. Examine the areas of your life. My anxious attachment style left many areas of my life underdeveloped. My hobbies, my studies, my volunteer services, my mindfulness practice, and even my friendships because I put all my eggs in one basket and naively thought it would give me purpose and joy in life when really, true contentment and happiness comes out of many factors. And then take actionable steps to improve those areas. What did you use to enjoy as a kid, before the anxiety and the deep, desperate need for relationships? The anxiety is always gonna be there, but it doesn’t mean you have to spend your life fixing yourself. You can still have romantic relationships and feel anxious urges, but your mindfulness will gently remind you that you’re your own separate person. The anxious urges will never fully go away. You’ll just get better at managing them, and feeling those emotions out, instead of running away from them and finding solace in another person. And some day you’ll reach a plateau where more days and not, you have a secure level of attachment. But that’s further in the future, so right now, focus on your beliefs and digging out your core values.

In the beginning of the journey, put all romantic relationships on hold. It may feel tempting to find a new guy, and cling to THEM. But do the serious work of being alone with yourself. Every time you feel anxious or the desire to call your ex, just bundle up in a blanket and let yourself feel those emotions. When the brunt of the emotional wave has passed, get back to living your life. Slowly but surely, you’ll enjoy your own company.

Make actionable steps. It may seem overwhelming to suddenly start knowing yourself, and learning self-love, because they’re such abstract concepts. So maybe your to-do can go something like this:

1) I’ll write down how many times I felt my anxious urges, to gauge how much progress needs to be done.

2) I’ll write down how I responded to those urges. Did I feel the urge to distract myself with food, Internet, and studies? Or did I let myself feel the brunt of that anxiety, and when it passed, I talked about it with a friend or I returned to my life/

3) I’ll start studying my childhood. Year by year. And see where those anxious urges originated. How did my parents give me love and affection? Was it an unpredictable relationship where I needed to fulfill their conditions to get their love? How did my romantic relationships and friendships reflect my anxious urges?

4) I’ll make one step to improve my life.

• This could be taking a walk, petting a cat you see on the street (and later washing your hands) or making sure you eat right and drink enough water. Make sure they’re small, daily steps instead of huge momuments: I want to be healthy (yes, but what does healthy mean?)

This journey is gonna be a long one. But don’t be overwhelmed. It’s not about perfection, where you suddenly never have problems with clinging to people ever again. It’s about growth, so when you DO face those problems, you have the tools to handle them. There’s a lot more I can say, but there are so many resources out there that can help you out. I have no idea if you’ll use those resources, but I hope you do. Because you’re a wonderful person. I know you’re a wonderful person because we were all beautiful people before life took its toll on us. And our job as adults is to find that beautiful child and nurture it.