Dear Amy:

Late into your thread, I appreciate your kindness to all members who replied to you, being appreciative and gracious in your every post.

In your original post you wrote: “instead of pulling myself down and being there for him and with him, I pushed him away”- if your choice was between being pulled down, going down with him or saving yourself  then the latter was the right choice for you. Your main responsibility is to protect and promote your own well-being.

On a later post you wrote that you are “devastated over this and i hope i can bounce back without him as he was always my rock”-

He was not “always (your) rock” was he? You wrote that he pulled you down, in your original post.

You wrote: “but  I feel like I’m missing a chunck and everything is dark when he’s not here to light up the room when he walks in”- this is the nature of emotional attachment, that feeling of well-being in the presence of the person to whom we are attached.

On a later post you wrote: “But then people were saying I’m happier without him and he will never change. I’m angry Now because I let him go over listening to other people saying negative things because there not happy”-

People cannot predict the future, as in “he will never change”. And indeed people do project their experience into others, often enough, inaccurately. This is why it is important that you evaluate what people say and decide for yourself.

I suggest that you consider the nature of emotional attachment: people do get intensely emotionally attached to people who benefit them.. but in many cases, to people who don’t. Plenty of people are attached to abusive people. I hope you can separate this non-selective nature of emotional attachment from the evaluation of this young man as either beneficial or damaging to you. And keep in mind that your primary responsibility is to act for your benefit and protect yourself from preventable damage, or being pulled down as you called it in your original post.

anita