Dear Anita,

I apologise once again. I should make it shorter.

The one that I want to you to give feedback on is the “weird” view of love of mine. Do you think that I am sacrificing myself because my ex is having a hard time?

-Mina

Dear Anita,

1. “But then you wrote: “I do not understand why it is so hard to “forgive” or let go of the situation?”- so there is no closure?

There is a closure. I was expecting that after I found this closure, I will be able to let go completely and it will make my pain disappear magically somehow, sorry for the confusion.

2. “I am curious about your “somehow sick view of love” that you have to sacrifice yourself for the one you love, as proof of your love, hiding your real emotions. I wonder about the origin of this view. Any idea?

I am sure you have read all my posts in this thread. I mentioned how much my ex struggles in his life in details, I have no rights to make his life harder … by sacrificing myself – I think I am easing up his pain a bit.

3. “You told your ex boyfriend: “I am disappointed in you.”- I wonder what you meant by it?”

I feel disappointed somehow because he did not fight for our relationship – it was selfish for me to say that knowing his situation but I loved him. I really did and I was hoping we would be able to fight together.

4. “You wrote that you are still protecting your ex with his secret. How are you doing that, presently?”

I told you in previous posts, my ex boyfriend had to lied to a lot of people and hid his depression regarding his study plan. People are asking me why did I broke up etc, but I never once tell them the real answer. Even during the relationship, I never shared anything regarding his struggles. I have no thoughts to tell this story to anyone regarding him, ever. He showed me his most vulnerable side, he trusted me with it. He hasn’t been able to tell his study plan to his faculty and friends yet so I am “protecting” him. If I were mean or vicious, I can email his faculty right now or share it with my friends about how the Chairman of Student Council in Business School is depressed, and he is actually moving university soon abandoning his responsibility.

Hope it clears things up.

-Mina

Dear Anita,

1. “You are afraid that if you expressed to your ex your hurt or sadness, that he would feel guilty or a burden, correct?”

Yes, this is correct. I shut myself down when we broke up, I did not say anything. I pushed inside all of my feelings, all my anger, sadness, and upset feelings. I remember that the only sentence I said to him was  : “I am disappointed in you.”

I cannot even cry in front of him, my ex back then told me in the eyes and said that he knew that I would cry after this (after he dropped me off in my house) and that me smiling (I was smiling to hold my tears from coming) was me pretending to be fine. He saw me through.

2. “Can you tell me what this “cry for help” was about? Are you still crying for help, presently?”

The break up was tough, I was (mentally) dying inside. I seek help from almost everyone. From kind stranger like you, my best friends, my old HS teachers, my parents, and I remember praying to God.  But I feel like no matter how many advices or supporting words that I got from anyone, it never relief my emptiness and my pain. Everyday was hell and everyday was painful. I decided that the relief that I am looking for – only my ex partner can give it to me. Through that birthday message, he brought me back to life, as I already wrote above. I am slowly getting better after receiving that message. It finally felt like a real nice closure.

*I mentioned that I am still “protecting” my ex with his secret and the relationship was exhausting due to him being stressed out about his life and studies. Is there any correlations between me feeling this way right now and that?

*I do not understand why it is so hard to “forgive” or let go of the situation?

*I do not understand why I am still looking out and putting his happiness above mine?

Would love to hear advices x

-Mina

• This reply was modified 7 years, 4 months ago by Mina.

Dear Anita,

I will go through your questions one by one to make you understand better :

1. What I mean by torturing myself is – throughout this break up recovery phase, I have this somehow sick view of love that in order for my ex partner to be happy, I have to sacrifice myself. Me sacrificing my happiness is the biggest proof of my love for him. I pretended to wish him well, to wish him luck while basically “hiding” my real emotions regarding this break up from him. I do not want him to feel any guilt or burden because his life is already so hard. I would rather lie through everything although it kills me everyday. I am having a hard time to stop having these kind of thoughts.

2. The shifts were mainly the change in his behaviours. He was sad, seems depressed and wasn’t very responsive to me a few days before we broke up. I confronted him right away and was already expecting a break up at that time. My ex wasn’t a very good liar, we built our relationship based on trust and openness. We used to talked about everything in our life. Him not sharing is already a big red sign. He expressed his fears regarding his mandatory military service and his stress about starting a new life in a new university during the break up talk (he mentioned this a few times when things were still good between us, but we both kinda knew that this problem will eventually be the reason of the break up in the future)

My boyfriend wasn’t at the happiest place at that moment. He wasn’t supported by his parents to move university, and wasn’t able to get any support from anyone in our university due to him being the Chairman of Student Council in his major. He had a lot of responsibility to so many people, and him announcing that he wants to change university in the middle of a semester would be a scandal. He had to kept it as a secret from 15.000 students and I am the only who knew about his struggle.

My ex boyfriend might seems like a strong and reliable leader towards a lot of people but to me – he is just a 19 year old guy struggling and questioning everything in his “perfect” life. He cried and fight with his own problems alone. My boyfriend`s situation demanded me to be really careful. I cannot share anything that has anything to do with his personal struggle to anyone. It was really tiring for me, Anita. There were a lot of times I wished that I was dating someone “normal” so I can share to my close friends what kind of problems that our relationships was dealing so I wouldn’t feel so alone.

Even until now, I am still keeping this secret for him. He never asked me to (after the break up) but I want to keep it for him, it is the least thing I can do to help him as an ex. Every time someone from our school asked why we broke up, I would lie. My ex does not know that I am still looking out for him.

3. “It was peaceful knowing that everything wrapped up nicely from the very first day to our very last day together.”

What I meant by this – my ex boyfriend changed during his depression period. Few days before the break up, he did not seem like himself. During the break up, he felt so different. It is like I dated a person named A and then broke up with a person named B.

But when he replied to me on that txt message, he sounds like the old him that I know. It made me happy because it assures me that it was all real and that he was a real person. Do you know the feeling of meeting a really old friend that you haven’t met in years? You ended things on a bad note with this particular friend and you felt like she became a different person but then you met her again years later and she acted and talk the way that she used to before things got bad with you? That is how I felt about it.

4. “I wonder if you expect people, your ex boyfriend, friends, others maybe, to be always the same, treating you the very same way throughout. When he or she is stressed or otherwise is not the same, you get unsettled, distressed. Is that so?”

Nope. I understand why his behaviours towards me changed. When people gets stressed out, you cannot expect them to treat you the same. I think I worded my sentences badly – I apologise. I do not expect him to treat me the same but it was just sad that when he and I met for the last time to end things, he seemed so out of it. So that txt msg with him to me was the real goodbye. I dated with a person named A and broke up with a person named A too.

Anita, I hope you won’t mind reading this very long and complicated sappy story of mine. I actually never shared this detailed story to anyone, for the reasons I already stated above. I am very tired of pretending, keeping secrets, not being able to let go, and more than that – I am very tired of being stuck in here crying over a break up that is already done.

I do not understand why it is so hard to forgive the situation? I do not understand why I am still looking out and putting his happiness above mine?

I would love to hear advices and please take your time. I know that this is very long and kind of messy with so many details but I feel like I need to share this with you so you would understand a bit more why this break up is difficult and tricky for me.

-Mina x

P.s : Have a great day! xxx

Dear Anita,

Thank you for the advices. I will try 🙂

-Mina

Update :

What I meant by him understanding my heart is he understood that I wasn’t just wishing him a happy birthday, it was my blessing. That I forgive everything that has happened, that I hope you do not blame yourself too much, and I want you to be happy no matter what. I typed in those wishes with a hope that he will understand what kind of reply that I need from him.

He understood that I was giving him my blessing, so in return, he gave his too. He knew that it wasn’t easy for me to reach out to him on his birthday after all that has happened. I needed that from him, I wasn’t hoping for much but he gave me something to hold on to. I felt so unloved and abandoned after the break up but what he said that night made me realise that he did loved me, he recognises me and the relationship. That was what I needed. To hear that I deserve to be happy and I deserve to move on. I should stop torturing and blaming myself because someone loved me very much – the least thing that I can do is to live my life again.

-Mina

Anita,

You wrote : “To be less dependent on others, you need to develop the belief that you are capable of doing the job of taking care of you, working, driving, applying for your own visa… There is no other way to diminish your fear of being alone and overdependence on others.”

1. Can you explain in more detail about this? How can I develop these belief when all my life, I have been treated like a baby that won’t survive without its parents? I really want to stop being dependant on people, because I feel like I became a problem to them and it made me really hard to let go of someone that isn’t in my life any more just because I want to feel safe again by being with them somehow

2. I will answer your question above :

“do you feel that your mother is very attached/ somehow dependent on you and that if you do adequately take care of yourself and need her less, that it will be as if you are betraying her, or abandoning her?”

No, my mother isn’t dependant to me at all. She is a very independent human being, she is very social but she does not “need” people in a sense. She is not dependant to my grandmother (her mother) or my father (her husband) even me (her own daughter) so definitely no. She takes care of herself pretty well.

My mother would be very happy if I can take care of myself to tell you honestly. These days, due to my depression, I have became pretty difficult to handle. Even my ex partner cannot really controlled my behaviour and feelings anymore. I do not feel like I am betraying / abandoning her if I can be independent by myself, but I have never had such feelings in my life. The reason why I am still very much attached and dependant to my parents is because I am the one not wanting to take care of myself due to my fear of being alone. It is too hard and somehow scary for me, to just be out there living my life – without any shield and protection.

I think this is also worth mentioning : I was also very dependant on my teachers. Especially my high school teachers. That is why my transition from HS to College wasn’t very smooth because Professors won’t baby you even if you get good grades, you get the same treatment as everyone. I think it shook me up quite a lot back then.

My teachers and parents were my main “shield” from the real world in a sense. Imagine that you are living in a war country, everyone are wearing a bulletproof vests except for you. You won’t survive, right? For me, the bulletproof vests are my teachers and my parents that protected me from the big bad world. Sounds silly, I know.

I would love to hear feedback, Anita. x

-Mina

• This reply was modified 7 years, 4 months ago by Mina.

Anita,

Thank you for the feedback, I really appreciate it, very much.

I think you are absolutely right. I am very scared of being alone. Your responses to my questions explains everything that I cannot explain myself for this few months. My difficulty of letting go isn’t because of anything related to him.

Now that I understand the root of my problem, can you give me any advices to stop having this fear of being alone? To give you a general background, I have a good support system, my family never abused / abandoned me, and I have a tight inner circle of friends, they are all good and loyal friends to me. I do not understand why I am scared of being alone, this fear must have a background or origins for it to surfaced.

My parents spoils me a lot, though. I probably have to mention that. Spoiled kids usually grew up to be really selfish and not emotionally understanding but lucky for me, I surround myself with good friends and good ex boyfriend that grounds me a lot. Can this be the reason why?

Would love to hear your advices, Anita

-Mina

• This reply was modified 7 years, 4 months ago by Mina.