I believe myself to have certain narcissistic traits, perhaps even the full-blown disorder. I've always had extreme problems caring for others, as all I tend to think about is myself. I rarely think of consequences, especially interpersonal or emotional ones, when I speak to people, coming across as either arrogant or harsh.

I have just broke up with my girlfriend of 14 months. I had felt like since the beginning I'd been living a sort of lie, because she was quite overweight for her 4'11" frame. Nevertheless, despite my nagging doubts I decided to make a go of the relationship. She was a lovely person with whom i had instantly clicked on the phone and over Skype video calls. We initially met through an online dating website.

At the first date, she invited me back to her flat. I felt so comfortable with her, I decided to take her up on her offer. Though after the first few weekends, I had begun to express doubt in my mind regarding her weight. She had quite wide hips, twice as wide as mine, excessive cellulite on her thighs and stretchmarks on her breasts. I found this off-putting, so I asked my friends for advice. Their responses were all the same - that I was looking into things too much and being shallow. I took their points, and tried to switch off the negative thoughts. I'd had previous times where my head lied to me, so just put these feelings aside and carried on.

These negative thoughts and feelings resurfaced again a few months later, and once again my friends advised me that if I really loved her that would not be an issue. So once again, I buried those feelings and just carried on.

Recently, within the last month those feelings resurfaced when she has evidently got a bit bigger. I noticed I had started to distance myself from her, missing some of her calls or leaving it a while to respond to messages. This time, I couldn't just ignore these feelings, and I felt like I wanted a get-out.

This last weekend, I decided to question her on her weight issue, and asked her if there was anything I could do to help her. She responded by asking me, if she wouldn't or couldn't lose weight, would it be the end of the relationship? I struggled with myself, before saying that it would be important for both me and her health.

She asks me how long I've felt her weight was a problem, and if there was anything else I found off-putting. I told her that yes, her cellulite and stretchmarks on her breasts did affect me, since the beginning. At the time, I felt like I was doing the honest thing, though after it was pointed out to me by someone else, I now know that was such a horrible and emotionally abusive thing to say, quite honestly devastating.

I told her afterwards that I still loved who she was (which is true, she is a lovely person to talk to and really understood me), and we cried while making little jokes about the good times we had. I asked her why she didn't feel angry about me in any way, and she responded that 'we're both adults'. It made me feel a bit more at ease. Though I have no idea how she honestly felt at that time. If anything she was reassuring ME (which now I feel I somehow manipulated into happening - I have a habit of making myself the victim and not the villain).

It got late, and I made my move to leave, but she asked me to stay, one more time. I held her tightly all through the night, knowing that my dishonesty about my own feelings had taken an effect on the relationship. We woke, and walked to her bus stop together, holding hands, once again laughing about our good times. I waited for her bus, and she told me she still wanted to be friends. Despite my reservations about how this could work, I told her yes, I would like that.

Today, after speaking to someone about what happened, I was told that my handling of the situation was so terrible. I should have never mentioned her body imperfections, nor how long it had bothered me. It amounted to verbal, emotional abuse (and now I'm not as confused as to why her brother messaged me asking if I want to say something to him).

The thing is, all throughout this, all Ive wanted to do is avoid being the villain. Sometimes consciously, mostly unconsciously, and my behaviour manifests itself through that. I've been unable to empathise with my partner, and what she may be feeling, I've been unable to address how devastating hearing that from someone you love and hold dearly really is.

I've done this before, with another overweight girl, because I am a user and need to feed my low self-esteem with people who I can feel superior over and who I know would never leave me. I dumped her by email because, get this, she was being awfully manipulative and guilt-tripping me, and I didn't see it for years.

I want to do something about this but I know the psychological damage is already done. I feel truly gutted for treating her so badly, to the point where I just want to die. Though it can be argued that this is my self-pity kicking in again, to try and distract from what's really the issue.

She still wants to be friends, though after this, is there really any hope? It's funny how she made me feel at ease during this break-up, and I offered her so little sympathy or empathy in return. All I gave her was pain.

She was aware I was waiting for a psychologist evaluation for a long time. I finally got an appointment yesterday for 2 weeks time. Though now it's too late for this situation. I now don't know what to do.