Obsessed!!

He is full of hate and anger... he is NOT what I need or want in a partner. Whenever we broke up, he became abusive towards me. I now see him for ALL that he truly is. He comes across as a nice person, but underneath it all, he's really not. A wolf in sheep's clothing, he is.

Awesome job!!!!!

thanks, Divine!!! I want to kick him where it counts.

Thinking of you.

thank you, Purple!!!!

You doing OK right now?

Hardly. :/ I am an emotional mess.

When I left my H after 33 years in a bad marriage I never thoughtvsbout him except when he messes up my credit. It was empowering to be aline for the furst time in my 54 years if life.

In my senior year of HS, had a ling distance relationship from across the country. Got a dear John letter from "dear John"( his name was really John) that he was getting married to a girl in his HS class. Was I pissed off....yiu betcha. This was back when snail mail was the only way to communicate other than phone. Sent him a happy life letter. Later that same summer I got a letter from him whining about how he shouldnt have gotten married. Talk about empowering....my tough **** letter felt so good to write. It was then I determined that I would make sure I never had to marry into the class I wanted to end up in. I would get there through my own hard work & college degree so if i ever did get married I would NEVER be dependent on my H if he ended up a jerk like that long distance guy had. Well, the best laid plans dont always work out like planned even though I did have a good computer engineering career....plans can go arye & I did end up trapped in my bad marriage the last 13 years. Taught myself even more lessons & doubt I will ever consider even dating again at this point in my life.

I am actually MORE emotionally stable now than I ever was before in my life

Just wanted to say I spent 7 years single healing and being entirely selfish after that relationship broke down.
It was the best time I have spent on myself.
It taught me exactly what I want, what I am willing to compromise on , what I absolutely won't compromise on.
That I am fine on my own so I am not afraid to stand up for what I want.
I am sure not everyone needs to take that long, but it definitely did me untold good, and taught me ALOT about myself.

thank you, Eskielover.... wow. You DO sound empowered from all that you've gone through, and strong! Erebos, you as well!!!! You two can be role models for me.

I need to feel empowered being single right now. I know there are a lot of benefits to it, and that it doesn't mean I will be alone forever. One of my biggest fears is that I will get rejected because of my mental health issues..... I don't want to face rejection because of that and there is a social stigma against MI.

I know I was wronged in my last relationship and badly, but he accepted my issues and understands them. But in the end, he gave me the short end of the stick and treated me badly. I have had several abusive relationships, and this turns out to be another one. Not all my relationships have been negative or sour, but many have been, with seriously contentious, ugly, nasty endings like this one.

I fear that I am too damaged.... damaged goods from all the abuse. I know I need to take the time to heal, and perhaps read up even more on abusive men and how to avoid them better.

My therapist says I lead with my heart and don't use my head enough, which is so true, and most especially with this last one. I was so caught up in the feeling of being in love, that anything which contradicted that feeling I ignored and dismissed. I am a hopeless romantic who loves the feeling of being in love. So stupid.... I feel SO STUPID. I am 47, I should know better by now, especially after ALL I've already gone through with jerky, abusive men.

I know I shouldn't beat myself up over it and I know I should be kinder and more compassionate with myself, but I cannot help but feel stupid and sheepish. This is my own doing... I ignored the red flags, like when he stole a pair of earrings for me and like when he told me that his other ex fiance is a total biotch. Stealing showed his true character, yet I believed his lies that it was a one-off incident. BS. Well, it turned out he wanted to do a lot of illegal things. And clearly, he ended his last engagment in a very contentious way, which should have been a clue to me that perhaps he is not quite right. He turned out to be a huge liar and scam artist who downplayed how he truly feels about me in the end, pretending like it wasn't all that I thought it was......pretending like we really have no connection even though we were engaged.

Being kinder & more compassionate with yourself doesnt mean that you shouldnt firce yoyrself to learn from your mistakes though.

Being alone for me has been a time to define myself not in terms of someone else. I now know my values. I know where there is NO comprimise & when it is ok to a limit. I know that if I meet the right person, our values will complement each other & it wont be me giving too much or him giving too much. There will be a compatibility & if not, then there is no relationship. I dont have to grab at straws & make square pegs fit into round holes just to have a relationship. If we are NOT EQUALS intellectually, financially, emotionally, sexually, i wont waste my time even trying to make something work. I dont need anyone in my life that bad. Once you know yoyrsrlf, you know the kind of guy that you want...dont waste your time trying to force someone who doesnt fit ALL YOUR NEEDS not just feeling loved, into makibg a relationship work because in the end you will keep ending up the way you have in the past.

Thank you. Thing is, I know what I want. I've spent a lot of time alone in my life thinking about just that. I've had a lot of relationships, but a lot of alone time too. But I DO try to make a square peg fit in a round hole, when it comes down to it. I try to force it to work because other things DO work.... I will definitely learn from this vast mistake. Never again will I allow myself to get so fooled by someone.

golden_eye, you focus too much on having someone accept you to the point where you take on individuals who are so needy that they let you down and take advantage of you.
You end up being put on these kind of individual's patsy list and that NEVER leads to feeling self fulfilled. You end up in a caretaker/codependency role in an effort to "feel" like you have a purpose and this is most likely something you "learned" to do unknowingly in the environment you grew up in.

Yes, perhaps. My father always told me that I attract all the broken birds... I used to try to "fix" them, & perhaps I did the same here by trying to save him from homelessness and help him get on his feet. I think I just don't go for my equals because perhaps I view myself as a bit "broken" myself.

I think you can start learning to focus on actions more than words. Actions of this man neither when you dated nor when he broke up indicated deep level of commitment or deep serious intentions. Only his words indicated feelings: telling you he loves you and complimenting you and talking to you. His actions didn’t.

He lied and stole and used you and isn’t paying money back. These are actions. words mean nothing. Engagement also doesn’t really have any meaning all by itself. Asking someone to marry them doesn’t really mean anything unless it’s supported by actions. How could he even consider marriage if he didn’t have a place to live or means to support himself.

Next time when you date, pay attention to what man does, not what he says. Just watch his actions.

He did have deep serious feelings for me though, I know he did. He just cannot get his act together in his life. But I agree that actions must back up words.

Please be careful about justifying his behavior and excusing him (or any man who acts like him). It’s way worse than just not having his act together. People who just don’t have their act together don’t necessarily lie or steal or use others. It doesn’t mean that he had no feelings for you of course.

Yeah.... I just see him as one seriously messed up dude. He cannot be honest, he is a con artist, he did use me and took advantage of me. He took my love for granted and stomped all over it. He probably would do this to any woman, I'm sure. He is a user and an abuser. Screw him.

Sounds like you are still trying to convince yourself of how bad he is & trying to convince yourself that he could do this to other women. When you use the word probably that implies some level of doubt
You also kept seeing very negative things about him that you couldnt trust but you kept HANDING out your love when you had enough valid reasons to stop & take control of your emotions.

It's a valuable skill to learn to see things like this happening a lot sooner in relationships so they arent allowed to go so far. When we see red flags we are responsible for our lack of responding to them when we can just as responsible as they are for takibg advantage of us when that happens.. Not saying its easy to learn but its one of the most valuable things we can learn in life. Mindfulness, seeing the BIG picture & acting on it rather than excusing it away because we wish that reality we see was different

Mindfulness is a good life skill not just in BF/GF relationships....seeing what is going on early on in a situation can save a lot of greif later on. Mindfulness requires usto use both our logical & emotional mind to mske good choices in our lives.

Girl i need some of your rage, we can trade if you want to. I get that feeling angry and wanting revenge is not super good but come on, sometimes it´s what you need to feel to move on from someone.

Yes, well, I believe I fed into the fantasy he painted of himself as being this "good" honest and honorable person. I wanted to believe him, I wanted to be in love. The first time he stole earrings for me I should have walked away. I saw his true character then. But I believed his lies about it.... I wanted to believe him. He painted such a nice portrait of himself.... I fed into it hook line and sinker. Then when we lived together, the reality of him was quite different. I saw the extreme immaturity, the complete lack of responsibility, the lack of motivation, the alcoholism and the abuse. Even after all of that, I wasn't willing or ready to let go. I still wanted the fantasy. My therapist says I was living in a fantasy world, and this is true. I wanted him to be different than he was..... and he wanted to be different than he was. He is very GOOD at manipulation, so I let him manipulate me. I allowed this.... I believed his lies. Now I see it all in truth and it's sinking in more and more each day how bad he actually is and how far my vision of him is from the real truth. I see where I went wrong. I definitely should have walked away the moment he stole those earrings.

YES I believe it is good for moving on. I would gladly trade out this feeling though for something else!!!!!! Rage is not the greatest feeling to have. But it certainly is propelling me forward to seeing how much more I deserve than what this A-hole gave me.

I was more in love with the fantasy of him than I am with HIM. I now see him for all that he is, and he is not a good man.

Now you have more space in your life for the people and things that are truly good for you.

Our 20/20 hind sight is what we can learn from but definitely not something to beat up ourselves over.

Ugh, the red flags I saw before I got married & even wanted to call off the wedding for were the same things I finally left for 33 years later.

I RATIONALIZED those red flags away thinking them not possible so went ahead with the wedding. Wasnt happy so got list un gettjng my degree then my career instead of ending it. When the career collapsed that was when thebREALUTY if those red flags before the wedding smacked me in the face but I still didnt understsnd at the time.

All that has been what I learned from. Wasted time in my life...in terms of relationship YES. NIT wasted in terms if whst i have kearned & grown from it. That is what iur focus needs to be turned to after life didnt go the way we really wished it would.

Learning opportunities are very valuable in life.