Dear saggad,

you’re very welcome.

And thank you for reminding me that not everyone has to be forgiven, cause my efforts to forgive didn’t work so far. Maybe I should accept the fact that I can’t come to 100% peace with her in my mind. And I have to live with it maybe…

Yes, I think your first priority at the moment shouldn’t be to forgive her. I think it’s okay if you allow yourself to feel the anger, because it’s a justified anger. She did treat you badly, she was dishonest, betrayed your trust and stole from you. Feeling angry is an indicator that we were wronged or violated, so it’s a healthy protective mechanism. It’s to signal you that you shouldn’t allow the same thing happen in the future.

Over time, as you feel more able to protect yourself from abusive people, you won’t feel intense anger any more, it won’t occupy your heart and mind as it does now. You will be free from it.

And my effort should be toward forgiving myself and giving myself permission to live again.

Yes, absolutely!

and yes, I have to learn how to recognize selfish people and unhealthy relationships. Any advice about it or a book to read would be so helpful.

Hm, I don’t have a specific book that comes to mind. But I think you did recognize already in 2019 that this relationship was unhealthy, because you described it back then:

My first relationship (which was with a 32 years old woman) was pretty awful. I was in relationship during 3 years with her and during those years I was only taking care of her problems and I’ve never touched her even. … those 3 years was absolutely​ bad. I loved her but I didn’t receive anything from her… I don’t know why I was in that relationship… I knew that she only want me in her bad days and I didn’t have any meaning for her at all…

So you knew she was using you. That’s good. You did have the awareness of it, even if later you got back together with her. We can talk about the circumstances how and why you got back together, but it’s good that you actually know what a bad relationship is, and what a selfish behavior looks like.

You also knew what you wanted from a relationship. You wrote this in 2019:

I felt that I should be in the right relationship and being able to love someone and enjoy the life with her (and not only being an helper and then a garbage)

You also knew that the girl whom you were with later wasn’t good for you:

I knew that she was not the right choice, she never could accept me as I am. But I felt the need so I decided to be with her.

So you knew that if the woman doesn’t accept you for who you are, she is not a good choice. But you went along anyway, because you desperately wanted a relationship.

So I think you do know what an unhealthy relationship is, and what you should look out for. You only need to decide not to go into such relationships, or stay in them, against your better judgment.

I think you’d basically need to work on the reasons why you tolerated selfish and abusive behavior by your first girlfriend, and what is it that made you get back together with her and trust her, in spite of her self-centeredness.