Hi Everyone:

  I am so glad this exists. I am so confused. I met the most wonderful guy ten months ago, and we had a whirlwind romance, falling deeply in love. He's 31, and he's started and stopped a lot of things in life. He told me he was depressed in his early 20s, and had a bit of a breakdown back then. But he seemed happy when I met him, finishing off a university degree and playing in bands. And he was a wonderful boyfriend, who listened well, made changes if I asked him to, and tried his hardest.

   But something changed after the "honeymoon stage" was over. He was still wonderful, but I could sense uncertainty. It didn't help things that I got paranoid when I sensed uncertainty and tried to make him say he was out of love with me and break up with me (I am working on that part of myself). But he even after he admitted he was uncertain, he would then would come back saying, "No, I love you. If I can't make it work with you, I can't make it work with anyone." Then he would throw himself back into the relationship with new vigour.

   I was trying to tell myself it was just that stage of a relationship where people become "real." And it's true. It was. But I went away for six days, and he never even said he missed me. I got really upset, and escalated things again where he said, "Well, maybe if my feelings were stronger, I would have missed you. Maybe this connection is not deep enough." Yet when we got together and talked about it after I got back, he cried and cried, and told me he is certain he loves me, and that I am the one he has been waiting for all of his life.

    Once he said that, I started to relax and be more certain. But he then started to isolate himself—from friends, from family, from me. He actually doesn't really have any friends. His behaviour became obsessive, and he would lock himself in his room for 14 hours to practice scales on the guitar. He would barely see me, and when he did, it felt like he didn't want to be there. And a few days later, he broke up with me. He was crying, and told me he couldn't give me the love I deserved. That he wasn't sure his feelings were strong enough. That I need love and he doesn't. That he knew he had to let me go because he was so selfish that he was now thinking, when I wanted to see him, that it would take up too much time. He said I deserved better. I asked him how the guy who said I was the one he had been waiting for could now not have strong feelings? And he cried and said, "Can't you see I'm conflicted? Many things can be true at once."

    I was devastated, but one of my friends, who suffered from depression and anxiety, pinpointed his depression right away, and told me he doesn't feel like he deserves me, or love, and isolation keeps him safe. That depression is driving right now and not him. He came over three days later (he was in visible pain but was wracked with guilt that he had caused me pain), and I told him her story. He was terrified, but recognized the truth in it, and said he thinks his behaviour is 100% linked to depression. He made an appointment with a therapist right away.

   This is my question: we are broken up. I need to heal. I need to take care of myself. I love this man more than anything, and it hurts me to the core that he would be unsure of me. I want to be there for him, but I also want to cut off contact so I can let go and move on. The thing is, I don't know if depression has clouded his feelings, or if he truly doesn't feel a strong connection with me. When we last saw each other, he hugged me for dear life and held my hands, looking at my face and crying, as if he wanted to memorize it. We are both in physical pain over this. So this all leads me to believe there is real love below this.

   But what if I am kidding myself? What if his doubts are true, and there is no strong connection? But then, there's the fact that he tries so hard, fought to keep me when I did things that lead toward us parting, and is now is physical pain, now that we're broken up. I don't know what to do. I don't want to hang onto hope, because what if he starts in on his therapy and realizes, yeah, he didn't actually want to be in a relationship, or one with me, and I get my heart shattered? It's already been through a lot. I hung up notes on my wall tonight about all of the doubts he had, about how he was regarding time with me as a waste of time, about anything negative, so I can grasp that I am single and let go. But I am in such turmoil.

Does anyone have any advice?