Dear joanna:

I re-read your posts from Oct 15 to Dec 8, 2017. My goal was to read about your relationship with this man. First, quotes, second will be my input. There may be something new in my input, maybe not. You can let me know, if there is something new in your understanding.

“He lied to me, cheated, didn’t even promise he wouldn’t and I agreed to all this, because I couldn’t leave. He ignored me for weeks and didn’t respect me. I was starting to have enough of this in April. We didn’t see each other for 3 months. After that I started to feel worse, my anxiety worsened… He told me…that I don’t even deserve to break up with because we were never a couple…I can’t stop thinking about this guy and how he broke my heart and didn’t ever care, how he despises me and my feelings and what a piece of s**t I must be if someone can treat my that way…My anxiety got worse because of this guy, yes. My anxiety doesn’t go away and now that he’s gone for good did not make me feel better…I am aware this men caused most of my anxiety but I still cannot hate him for this… I can’t hate him because I still blame my tendency for depression and anxiety for all this, and think that I could have responded differently to treating me badly… when it comes to people with bad influence I always seek their attention, and see them as a challenge. To change them, to make them see me, to make them care, I have to earn it… It started  8 years ago when we met. A year ago we started dating but he was on my mind way earlier. I can’t let him go… I keep talking with this guy whom I broke up with… I get the feeling I made the mistake and should have stayed, and that I will be alone forever. The fact that I lost a job and am I am sick makes it worse. We talk and he is nice but I keep torturing myself with what I did and how I shouldn’t have broken up with him…I feel suicidal since he’s gone. Since I’m alone and aware he’s gone forever and it all should have been different. I keep beating myself up all days, and all nights. I can’t stand thoughts. I wake up and it all starts in my head until I fall asleep again at night…when I met this guy he reminded me of my father so much, felt so familiar, so nice and safe. And then when I failed to make him love me… I had this chance and I couldn’t, and I don’t know why, what is wrong with me. I can’t understand that…I  understand he is a bad person, but I can’t forgive myself I couldn’t make him love me, I keep analyzing every moment which could be different, every conversation which could be better, even yesterdays texting when I could have been different… I always want to punish myself, why am I like that, why I can’t be a person he wants. Maybe some detail I’d say or do would change how he feels about me.”