Dear Ed:

I will quote from your original post and follow with my comments:

“I ended things when she wrote me a top 10 list of things she hated about me” – congratulations for ending a relationship with a person who hated you! You did the right thing for yourself.

“I was in therapy because of my chronic depression and ptsd” – again, you did the right thing for yourself by attending therapy. I hope that you can return to therapy if/ when needed: if not for the long-term then for a.. reminder session or two.

“Things were fantastic in the first year and I honestly dreamt about marrying her one day” – it is possible that during the first year … dreaming, you focused only on the fantastic and turned a blind eye to problematic expressions and behaviors on her part.

“she wrote me a top 10 list of things she hated about me and her telling me that these things are the reasons why she’s treating me bad… I’m having intense moments of self-hatred, during which I’m blaming myself for everything wrong in my life” – (1) she expressed hate for you=> you feel hate for yourself., (2) she blamed you for her behavior=> you blame yourself.

“My therapist told me that I’m doing great regarding my problems and that I shouldn’t let anyone tell me otherwise. Still I’m having intense moments of self-hatred” – it is difficult to not take to heart what a person says about you when you trusted that person before, for a long time. For a whole year-  you (dreamingly) trusted her.

“If anyone reading this has advice or wants to share own experiences, please do tell me” – I loved and trusted my mother as a child and after she repeatedly expressed hate for me and blamed me, I hated myself and blamed myself for many, many years. I had to see my mother as she truly was so to understand that her hate was not about me, that it was… who she was.

Do you see your ex-girlfriend as who she truly is and has been all along in the relationship with you?

anita

Dear Ed:

You are most welcome. I want to answer your question and will do so after I return from my 1-hour walk. For now, in regard to “I’m still working on seeing my ex as who she was” – think about what you needed her to be vs who she was: who you needed her to be likely overtook your vision of who she was.

anita

Dear Ed:

I rested and I think that I got unstuck. Continuing: I think that the subconscious belief of an unloved young child (a belief the child is not aware of in the form of words), is that the parent used to love the child but then stopped, and the reason: the parent found out that his/ her child is bad or faulty, inadequate, unworthy… and therefore stopped loving the child.

I think that the story of the Garden of Eden is based on this child-belief: at first God loved Adam and Eve and therefore life for Adam and Eve was wonderful and eternal, but then Eve and then Adam did something wrong (ate the forbidden apple), God found out, and stopped loving them, kicking them out of the Garden into the world where they were to suffer and die.

When I understood that my mother didn’t love me from-the-beginning, I understood that I didn’t LOSE her love (it wasn’t there to begin with). No Loss of Love= no fault or worthlessness on my part that caused a loss.

Let’s look at what you wrote: “Things were fantastic in the first year and I honestly dreamt about marrying her one day” – the first year was like the Garden of Eden experience and you thought of … eternity with her.

“After the first year everything that was great turned bad, like her being empathetic, honest and understanding turning into anger, lies and emotional distance” – an exile from the Garden of Eden

“I ended things when she wrote me a top 10 list of things she hated about me and her telling me that these things are the reasons why she’s treating me bad” – she told you that you did some wrong things that caused her to … kick you out of the Garden of Eden, wrong things that she found out about, supposedly, following the first year.

But what if she didn’t really love you during the first year, what if it only appeared that way to you… in which case, No Loss of Love= no fault or worthlessness on my part that caused a loss… (?)

anita

Dear Ed:

I am well, thank you and you are welcome. You are gracious: thank you for that!

“it hurts like hell… I will reflect on the blanket and my tinted vision in my past… I will try following your suggestion about replacing blame with empathy” – I know that it takes work, time and rest so to feel less and less hurt. With less hurt, it is possible to understand more and more.

Please take your time reflecting and replacing blame with empathy, and post again if and when you are ready to communicate with me again (I have more to reflect on and to  express about your topic).

anita

Dear Ed:

You are welcome, anytime.

“While I know what my worth is, I am unable to feel it” – this means that you intellectually know that your sense of self worth, aka self-esteem, should be strong and healthy… but it is not.

“So when somebody gave me ‘worth’, I would use this external validation as my blanket” – this means, to me, that you are vulnerable when women/people treat you nicely, that you feel undeserving of it and all too willing to do whatever they want.. to overaccommodate them?

‘‘love’ my ex gave me was gone, or as you suggested, was never really there“- maybe she was .. nice to you in the first year, maybe she had reasons to be nice?

“And even when somebody treated me badly, it was at least a statement about me and so I would prefer that to being without any indication of my worth” – it reads like you grew up emotionally neglected or ignored; unattended to, unacknowledged either positively or negatively?

“If I may ask, how did you feel after understanding that you had no part in ..losing’ your mothers love?” – I took it way less personally when other people didn’t pay attention to me, when they liked other people more than they liked me.

“You mentioned that you would like to express more on the topic? Please feel free to do so when you find some time, i really do appreciate your insights” – thank you. My intent when I mentioned it was that over time, if and as we continue to communicate (I am interested!), I will be expressing much more, bit by bit, one post at a time.

anita

Dear Ed:

A third try at answering your question (after re-reading our communication this morning): “If I may ask, how did you feel after understanding that you had no part in ‘losing’ your mother’s love?” –

– first, two words: persona and anima. Persona is a person’s external presentation, how a person presents himself or herself to other people, and Anima is a person’s true inner self. No one’s persona and anima are identical at all times, neither should they be: most people don’t physically attack others when angry, and that’s a good thing; also, being polite is a socially accepted and desired persona.

In regard to my mother, the gap between her persona and anima was huge: her Persona was that of a very loving person (a loving sister, a loving aunt, a loving friend, a loving mother), but her Anima was a very angry, vengeful and punishing person. When she dropped her Persona aka her Mask, all hell broke loose.

I now understand that my mother’s love for me- and for everyone else-  was not true love (Anima) but a presentation, a mask, a Persona. When she got angry enough, she dropped her persona and expressed her anima, then calmed down and resumed her persona. There was no substance to that loving persona, it was only a presentation.

Did she have love within her? I am sure she did. She definitely started as a loving child who dearly loved her mother… but over time, that true love was pushed down, squeezed, and she became a Persona (in between the times she got very angry).

Let’s look at what you wrote about your ex-girlfriend: “Things were fantastic… After the first year, everything that was great turned bad, like her being empathetic, honest and understanding turning into anger, lies and emotional distance” –

–  What happened to her empathy, honesty and understanding? Did she lose them? Or did she drop her Persona and revealed her Anima: angry, lying, emotionally distant?

“she wrote me a top 10 list of things she hated about me and her telling me that these things are the reasons why she’s treating me bad. During this relationship I was in therapy because of my chronic depression and ptsd” –

– She knew that you suffered from depression and ptsd, and yet, she took the time to make a hate-list and hand it to a chronically depressed and traumatized person: this is her true face, her anima, post dropping her mask, her persona.

“me feeling like I was failing my ex was the reason why I held on to the relationship” – she selfishly expected something from you that you didn’t deliver and she got angry and dropped her mask. What did she expect… I don’t know, but her mask was going to come off completely as it did- at one time or another, no matter how hard you would have tried to please her and how successfully you performed. It was only a matter of time. (I am sure that you had peaks at her true face way before she dropped her mask to such an extent that you noticed).

anita

Dear Ed:

I am glad you wrote back. (I thought that maybe I scared you away by how much I wrote to you!) I will be able to read and reply in a few hours.

anita