I have a significant other, and we have been a couple for many years. We tried living together 3 times. The first was for 7 years.

Each time, I decided we needed to part. We live apart, now. He is quite secure in his living arrangement and seems to have no regrets about the arrangement. Whenever he needs support, I am right there. He has had a number of major health crises. I am a nurse.

The first time that I left, it was because of alcohol fueled abuse. Never was it physical. Generally, it was him calling me a complete looser. (Kind of ironic, I know.) Sometimes, he had some basis for this claim, and sometimes he said it when I couldn't have been doing better with my life. It generally had to do with how much money I was earning. I was sort of the bread winner for quite a while.

When he finally stopped drinking, I thought we could live together in peace. It didn't quite work out that way. We are apart now for 5 years. I have found it very lonely. We see each other frequently, and are on the phone several times a day.

I have sensed something wrong between us. I have been out of work for the better part of 2 years, and I am applying for SSDI. I have struggled with severe depression all my life. He finally put into words what he thinks of me. He says he "still cares for" me, but he is back to pretty much calling me a complete loser. He says he doesn't believe in depression. He says it's just something that I do to myself. He says I'm lazy. He says I have been "layin' around on my behind" when there is plenty of work out there and I am plenty young enough to be still working. I kind of even believe that, myself, and he tells me he knows I believe that.

My doctor tells me different. Even if my boyfriend is right in everything he says, I don't think he is helping me by saying it. On the other hand, I'm glad he said it all real explicitly today, because I didn't know he felt quite that condemning of me. I feel terrible that he can think of nothing good to say about me.

I think this latest put down is part of a pattern of emotional abuse that has gone on for a very long time. I think taking so much abuse and forgiving so much abuse may be part of what has kept me down in life.

I don't want to blame him for my failures. I just want to do what I need to do to survive. (I have some bad s. ideation, at times.) I think I should cut the cord. I feel like he already did that with the things he said. It is quite late in life for both of us. It almost seems silly to separate completely from him, now. However, I wonder if it might be better for me if I did???

Does what he said to me sound like abuse to anyone? Or might it just be a fair assessment that he just candidly put out there to try and get me moving? It's really not fair to ask anyone to answer that. Still, I need some help thinking this through.

Years ago, even his children said they would never blame me if I left him.

He does not financially support me and never has.