I'm trying to get some clarity and hope some of you here can help me out! My ex and I were together for over 6 years. We had an instant connection and pretty much were together all the time after we met. Our connection is still strong and when things were good, things were really good. I've never gotten along with someone as well as we get along. 4 years ago I gave up my apartment and pretty much lived with him in a house with 5 roommates. 2 years ago we got our own place together. Things started going downhill after that. His anger and impatience at the littlest things seemed to come up more and more often. It used to only happen a few times a year, now he was getting mad (never physical) at me for the most insignificant things. Like we would be making tacos and we'd end up in a huge fight because he would get annoyed that I was standing in the place he wanted to be in. He couldn't take any criticism but doled it out no problem. He has this condescending, angry tone that I'd asked him time and again to not use. He was always complaining about people, but was the star of the show outside the house. He's good looking, charming, funny and always the center of attention - though he does talk way too much.

As a young child he was diagnosed as severe ADHD.. to the point where therapists gave up on him and his parents told him he was just a difficult child and he would always be difficult. After doing some research, it actually sounds like he has more narcisstic personality traits (though not all), than ADHD, but I'm not a psychologist. The reasons add up.. his parents did a crappy job raising him. His sister was the golden child who never did wrong. She would just look at him and start screaming for no reason and his dad would come running to chase him down. His dad's an alcoholic who also had "the tone" and would talk down to his mom. He wasn't physical, but mentally abusive. I told my ex a few months ago that I didn't want to be his gf anymore because he treated his clients better than he treated me. I guess I hoped it would force him to be nicer. He cried and told me he was acting just like his dad and all his mom ever asked for was for him "to be nicer to her" just like I was. A month later he broke down and told me he felt like he was abusing me, but he didn't see it changing anytime soon. I took that to mean we were breaking up. Who in their right mind would be told they're being abused but it's not gonna change, and then stick around? He told me recently that he didn't want to break up, he just realized he needed help, but he didn't say that, and that now it's too late. He immediately found someone else to bond with although it was the one thing I asked of him if he really wanted us to remain friends (and possibly get back together one day) was that he not hook up with anyone until I moved out. Thankfully, the first night I moved out, he had an epiphany and realized he was in no place to jump into a relationship with someone else and how he can't believe he hurt his best friend the way he did. That he needs to work on himself before he can be anyone to anybody. And that he didn't realize I really had hopes that we could be together again someday and he was acting like he was still the 21 year old he was when we met.

So now my ex has started therapy with an awesome guy who specializes in everything he needs help with. We're texting, but when I brought up something about our relationship he said he wasn't ready for that. That it would only interfere with our healing. He said he still loves me, but he needs to figure out whether his feelings for me are really his own, or if they're due to fear or just wanting to please people. I said okay - no relationship talk until you tell me you're ready. And no expectations. I understand and I'm so proud of him for taking this step to work on his issues. I know there's a long road ahead of him and right now I'm focusing on myself - volunteering, taking a martial arts class, doing things I let go by the wayside because I was focused on him. So now I'm trying to figure out how to go forward with this. Can I be a semi-friend for him while he figures himself out? I love him and that's not going to go away. But more important right now is that he learns to love himself and gets some coping skills on how to handle his frustrations. So am I handling this correctly? I could really use some input from people who have been there. Thanks so much for reading!