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Am I the victim or the villain or my own story? Do I deserve to feel pain and trauma? Will I ever heal?
7 months ago · 0 · Guilt, +2
250
To this day, about five months after my ex gf and I broke up, I don't know whether I should consider myself a horrible individual or not. Because the argument that led to a make-up but with the mutual decision (more mine than hers) to break-up was then followed by her accusations to be a liar and a cheater once I was no longer there, with her, to be able to respond. These accusations and insults happened via text by her, exactly as I was moving somewhere across the country and was several hours away. The first was only somewhat true, the second was not. The accusations were accompanied by threats to destroy my reputation by publicly exposing evidence of me privately fantasizing about famous hot girls and celebrities on Instagram and "letting the people judge me." I never once cheated on my ex, and always avoided even coming close to it, avoiding attractive girls exactly because I knew it would destroy her and would destroy my own self-esteem. These fantasies, as pathetic as they were, were going to remain just that. My attraction for her, however, had waned over time. We were likely incompatible already when we started dating almost four years prior. She was my first real relationship, and I wanted it to work, almost at all costs, and to lead to marriage, kids, a house, stability, and happiness. My determination at making it work and the tough times we went through (finding ourselves living together during COVID lockdown, my dad's death, and relocating across the country to a beautiful, warm and sunny place) made us emotionally bond regardless of our incompatibilities and lack of interests. I had so much affection, gratefulness, and appreciation for her good traits for her that I tried to suppress my feelings (or lack thereof) and my attraction for a fundamentally different type of girl. I remained with her even when at times I really could not take it anymore, by repeating to myself that I was never going to find anyone better than her. That maybe relationships are just this way, and it was normal to feel like I was walking on eggshells. In the end I had to relocate for work, because as an immigrant to this country, I couldn't find an employer willing to hire me where we were living, and she never wanted to commit with me allowing me to remain there with her. Nor did she made the decision to follow me. Her inability to commit or at least follow me proved to me in part that our relationship had run its course. The distance between us, I thought, would soon have told us whether we really needed to return together or not. However, the argument, the accusations, and the turbulent days of fall-out that followed cut the process short abruptly. With the accusations, the insults, the blackmailing, also came being walled off and blocked off of most communications to the point that I did not know what was happening and what she was thinking. With this also came the threats to destroy some of my personal items I accidentally left behind, as well as the scorching of the earth around me: all our friends were presumably told that I had been awful to her, lied and cheated on her. My sister was also contacted by her, in the attempt of convincing her of the same (she stayed on my side). So my former friends also immediately stopped talking to me, and I found myself suddenly eradicated from the place I had considered "home" for the previous 3 years. Then came the coordinated erasure of all memories of me: along with the deleting of the pictures of me in her albums and in those of our friends (which I can imagine happened), also my removal from group chats and the like. And then the badmouthing that I can hear in my head. On my trip to my new place I came to internalize these accusations and essentially gas-lit myself into thinking that I had perhaps in fact cheated on her, and that I was nothing but a perverted, sick man, and a liar. At times during the trip I felt maybe I should just drive t full speed against an oncoming semi coming in the other lane. Out of shame, and wanting to cause her no more pain, I made the decision to get out of her life for good and to not try to defend myself anymore and to let her receive the support of our friends, just accepting whatever they wanted to believe in. For her sake, I thought, one last gesture of love for her. She did in the end return my belongings, along with some gifts I made to her that symbolized my love for her, now returned to me in reject, showing her belief that everything had been "fake." In addition to lying and cheating, she also suggested I maybe stayed with her to get to live in a beautiful place and maybe to get a Green Card through her with marriage. My four years with her, mind you, were years in which I tried to support her in everything out of love and kindness, from hugging her each single morning to driving her everywhere and letting her always have the first sip of every drink of mine. So these accusations hurt me very profoundly. In the end, she made an apparent effort to provide some closure - a good bye message where she wished me good luck on finding happiness, but that never did it for me. I proceeded for the following months to blame myself for it all. For having lost love for her due to some personal wishes for what my partner should be like, but that maybe were nothing more than social-media-induced, arrogant obsessions that I developed. For not having swallowed my dreams of grandeur, thinking I deserved someone a lot better than her. For not having deemed myself content enough with a gal as great as her. For not being "sane" but being a sick pervert. I never heard from her again. The last time I spoke to her in person and I saw her, she kissed me, right before I jumped in my car and left. I think I have my own faults - lying and fantasizing about other girls - but I think her reaction really went beyond what I deserved and that left me completely unsupported and hated and humiliated at a time where I needed some support the most. In some ways, she was really petty, and cruel. And yet, I still cannot hate her. I am not sure why. I still think about her daily, usually as soon as I wake up. Thinking about how I maybe destroyed the only relationship in my life to date, how I made the only person outside of my family who loved me and supported me, hate me, still haunts me. The happy memories we collected over those four years come back to remind me what I lost (although the bad memories of course don't seem to back to my mind as much). I loved the premise in our story. How two young guys met at a graduate school in the American Midwest - one from across the ocean, and the other a big city-girl, and fell in love. How they formed a bond that went beyond their cultures and races and went to live in quasi-paradise on earth. How they were going to build a life together, and have the most beautiful kids together, and just age together treasuring the moments of excitement, discovery, and wonder they had in their young years after they met at that graduate school in the American Midwest. And how it all ended in a ugly way, somehow, without closure. I feel like now, no matter what, I will never experience a story as beautiful as this, even if I will ever find another girl. The place where I relocated felt as isolating and as empty and grey as the job that I came here turned out to be, and it feels like exile and punishment for having been the villain of my story. But inside I also feel so much pain that I rarely can think straight during a regular day, and I don't know if I am entitled to it and much less what to do about it. I think the memory of these five months and of the pain I am feeling will always be there and will never leave me and will always poison whatever relationship I will attempt to establish. My trauma will always be there. I tried to ask for help to those friends I had left, but some left me in return and the others are not very willing to support me. I feel lost in life and I cannot help but think that this is the result of karma, for evidently I must be guilty, after all.
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