Feel like I've made a terrible mistake

[falaff]

Hi everyone,

I broke up with my partner of 8 months due to a lot of issues around his insecurities leading him to be quite emotionally controlling in the beginning of our relationship. A lot of that behaviour stopped but he then became critical of me and very 'needy' in the relationship. He blamed a lot on my ADHD but I failed to make the link - I was never angry at him, unfocussed on our relationship, or ignored him. He did have issues with my 'obsessions' on things when they could be interpreted as liking other people (e.g. interest in an 'attractive' musician). We would argue for hours on end and little things would be blown up out of proportion. I am a very sensitive person and don't take criticism well.

I am really struggling with the break up and I am regretting breaking up and not giving him a chance. I feel that I have given up many wonderful things and someone who could have been a great partner if we had worked out our issues.

Everyone said LTB and I thought it would make me feel relief, and I fully believe that most of the issues were down to his insecurities. He agreed, and said he would work hard to change and understand me as a person and how our personalities differ. I have gone NC as I can't bear to see him as it is too painful.

The thing is, there was evidence that he was working on things. He would bite his tongue and was trying to be accepting of my hobbies and friendships that he initially found difficult. He has agreed to get counselling and do a lot of self help to work on his issues. He took a lot of responsibility for the breakup and was sincerely sorry. But I still left, after getting advice that he should work on these things independently of me and I was better out of the relationship.

He hasn't done any typical EA behaviour since - hasn't contacted me, hasn't talked to any friends negatively about me, hasn't made me feel bad for my decision or begged me to come back.

Have I made a mistake here and not given someone a genuine chance to change and make the relationship work? I know MOST emotional abusers don't change and won't accept their faults. But I know that a small percentage of them do.

Should I give him another chance? I am dying with grief over our relationship. I feel so lonely and lost. We did everything together, we had amazing times, and I am so scared I've lost something that could have been great had I given it a chance. I'm nearly 33 and feel very alone.

You cannot be reasonable on behalf of another person though.

You can only work on yourself. You can only be reasonable yourself. You cannot make another person grow, compromise or be reasonable.

Gotta go now but can you visualise the type of woman, somebody you know in real life who wouldn't put herself through this, who wouldn't allow this criticism in to her life on any terms?

I know mumsnetters jokingly say sometimes ''what would kate middleton do'' but i knew a woman who was lovely, to me, to everybody, and her husband and all of her friends were all lovely kind positive thoughtful people too and I used to sometimes ask myself would Annie Smith put up with this (fake name obviously)

Thanks for taking the time to share those, I really appreciate it

You're definitely ON THE START of a journey!

Good idea, I have several friends who I look up to and have given me advice.

People with mental health issues (temporary or long term, severe or mild) are maybe not the best at supporting and dealing with other people with mental health issues.

Obviously, you need to work on your own issues - learning to be an autonomous person who is capable of fulfilling her own wants and desires, but when it comes to relationships then two things:

1. A relationship doesn't fix you. It might make it easier to deal with your problems, and it might help minimise the symptoms, but it doesn't actually address the root of your issues. That's only something you can do yourself

1. When you are in a relationship, you need to find someone whose concept of "normal" meshes and is compatible with your own. Or, failing that, if you think your own judgement of what is "normal" is faulty, you need to find someone you can trust to make a better judgement than yourself.

For example (completely imaginary and extreme, just to demonstrate) if you had fixated on a fit musician, and you were spending hours every day listening to their music, going to their concerts, filling your room with their posters and you say to your partner "I want to go round to their house and knock on their door" then you don't need a partner who will say "Yeah, sure, sounds like a good idea" but you also don't need a partner who says "Oh my god, what's wrong with you? Why do you love him more than me? I hate you, and I'm going to jump off a multistory car park!!!"

What you need is a partner who says "Um, have you really thought this through? I mean, he doesn't know you and he'll probably have security and stuff. You might get arrested or something. Maybe chill out a bit about this guy for a while? Listen to someone else?"

My point isn't that you're a stalker. My point is that you need to find someone who accepts your issues and keeps you on track when necessary, rather than someone who brings a whole boatload of other, different, issues to the table which you then have to deal with on top of your own, as though life wasn't already difficult enough!

I'm not sure I've expressed the idea very concisely, but I hope you get the general gist.

Dear falaff,

seriously if you think that this is something worth going back to, when there were so many issues, you need to be working on you. This decision of 'reconnect in 6 months if I'm not with someone else', it's like being alone is the worst thing in the world.It's what others have picked up on - you don't miss him, you miss someone, anyone.

Until you are able to validate yourself as an individual in your own right, you'll continue to be looking for someone to fill those emotional buckets. And to cling on to people who are only giving you drips. when you have full buckets, you meet others from a place of not needing anything from them - and so you can allow them time to unfold, show who they really are, and for you to decide if you are suited.

Reading your character assassination of yourself makes me sad. You're describing yourself as the person that he has deliberately made you feel that you are, rather than the woman that you are in reality. While you still have that mindset, he is still exerting his power and control over you. Please let the fog lift now. I imagine that you are a lovely, kind woman and that you aren't any of the things that he has told you that you are. You need to get support, because I think that you doubt susceptible to falling into another abusive relationship. I think that you sound co-dependent and this makes you vulnerable to accepting behaviour that you shouldn't accept from partners for the sake of having a relationship. Please don't ever stay in any relationship 'at any cost'.

*doubt = are

I feel so sad about it today. I couldn't sleep last night and went on a stupid reminiscence slog through pictures of all the good times. I'm so broken but also angry that I tried really hard to make it work and he couldn't change. I feel so utterly heartbroken even though it was only 8 months. I just want to see him again.

You need to accept what has happened and forgive yourself for bad judgement. It came from scars left on you by your own childhood. Abuse is not an assault on your intelligence. It's an assault on your self-esteem,. and you can re-build your self-esteem.

It's OK to be sad. You need to heal and give yourself security. But you will move through this phase. Don't cling to it. You will no doubt spend some time trying to understand HIM, why he couldn't just be 'nice' but it's coming from a similar mysterious place borne out of the same reason you couldn't just walk away.

Concentrate on you now.

Accept what happened.
Be glad you've seen it for what it is.
It was a mistake.
Forgive yourself for making a mistake.

That's important.
Don't wallow looking at photos.

Instead, visualise yourself content in your own company, being brave, going to places you want to go to with new friends or on your own. Think of things you want to do in the future and even if your first thought is ''but I couldn't do that, people like me don't do stuff like that'' visualise yourself becoming the type of person that does do things like that.

I'm sure you know a woman who wouldn't put up with a second's nonsense from a man because she's so sure of herself and so content in her own company and her ability to fill her future with good things that she wouldn't give the time of day to a man who was abusive even some of the time.

Don't see him again. This is what you have to ride out. Don't get sucked in. BUILD yourself up to be the sort of person who can get through a no contact period.

It's simple but it's no easy but if it were easy nobody would be stuck in the cycle of going back to abusive boyfriend(s)

Thanks for the advice. I know I have to be tough. I am moving to a house just round the corner, we share the same gym, same friends, it's hard. It would be so much easier to just be with him. But I really can't let go of all of those positive things that I have built up just because it wold be easier in the short term.

When we argued and when we broke up he would say things like 'you're the nicest person I've met' and you don't have a bad bone in your body'; 'you haven't done anything wrong' and he's never met anyone like me, he's in awe of me, the list goes on. He said he loves my spontineity and enthusiasm, but then he would put me down for it. He is so obsessed with what people think about him and how he comes across. I just don't know how he can say those things and act like he believes them and then be so nasty.

The thing is it wasn't even full on nasty, and I feel awful for calling it emotional abuse. I can't get my head around it and he obviously says it's not emotional abuse. It's just a difference of opinion.

I tell myself all of the bad things that happened, I write it down - the friends I've lost, things I've stopped doing to make him happier, how I've started to change how I act in public so I don't embarrass him... but I don't seem to believe it. The good times weigh so much more and I feel embarrassed for being affected so much by all of the little bad things.

And he's so charming, everyone loves him, he comes across so well and so likeable. And it's like I'm this nutter who can't handle being in a relationship and cries if it doesn't go exactly my way and people aren't nice to me all the time.

I wish I had a thicker skin. I don't think I've ever had a full month where I haven't cried about something. I feel so emotionally worn out by everything, I actually wish I could just give up sometimes but I haven't got the guts for it.

Unless you have childhood friends amongst these ''mutual friends'' who have shown you loyalty with their actions as well as their words then I'd distance yourself. Don't feel you can't delete people from facebook.

Also, a gym is just a gym. Join another gym. EVEN if it's further away. Don't torture yourself. Help yourself move on. Help yourself recover.

It's good to write things down I agree but remember, there's no court case. He's not a cross-examining barrister. You're not up in the dock. You do not need a water tight case to earn or deserve the case to walk away and concentrate on yourself.

What's that saying, If it doesn't feel quite right then trust your gut. It isn't right. Have you read the sticky on the relationship board. the one that starts ''listen up''

I read that years ago and thought ''that just doesn't happen to people like me'' and I've changed. Now I believe that either it will happen or I'll be content in my own thoughts on my own but not lonely.

the listen up everybody sticky This is worth a read

I am resisting giving up the gym and the area and my friends because then it will be another case of having to start again and being the one that has to give up the little things in life that help me get through the day. I had to do it with my previous relationship and it was awful. The only thing that saved me was being able to go back to my parents and having work, and going very quickly into this new relationship. I just can't take the emotional beating of giving it all up again. And I tried SO HARD to make the relationship work, why should I be the one to give everything up so that we can have space from each other. I'm trying to be strong here and not let the break up completely destroy me.