I'm terrified he's moved on and everything I wanted him to be for me, he's going to be for her.

this is the crux of your regret and the root of your fear, and it is all based in fantasy. he'll be the same damn guy with the next girl and the next girl, he will always be the same guy. you created a dream of what you wanted your relationship to be, let it go. it had nothing to do with reality. you can create the relationship you want with someone else, later.

you sound like you are in the throws of some heavy co-dependancy issues, and i hope you have found a wonderful therapist to help you through that, because you have forgotten how amazing you were before this guy and how amazing you are after. if reading a list of the crappy things he did is keeping you depressed make a list about yourself.....what your strengths are, what your hopes are, what your future will look like....you are young and will have a lot of men in your life but the true love affair begins with yourself. don't put pressure on yourself to feel anything for someone who hits on you and don't be in any relationship if it doesn't feel right. your instincts are telling you to be alone for a while, listen to them. when you can be happy alone you will be happy with someone else, but until then you are vulnerable to get into something desperate and needy and you deserve better.

you have lost yourself. this is the perfect time to start fresh and create who you are from the ground up, and you can totally do it. isn't that great?

I am sorry you are in so much pain. I know this might sound forward, but whenever I hear things like

"I really just want this pain to stop, I can't keep living like this....... I'm pretty desperate here"

I have to ask, do you have any plans to hurt yourself? If so, please don't, please reach out for help with any of those kinds of thoughts. Things can get better with time-I've seen it over and over again.

Vernacular is right-you are mourning the death of a dream. Your heroic and tragic struggle after this piece of garbage messed with your head and your heart I am guessing was begun long before you met him in your childhood and he just brought it all to a head. Again-I don't mean to be forward and assume-I just know the feelings you're wrestling with all too well. Have you gotten any therapy yet? DV services can possibly help set you up with some if you can't afford it. It's okay to get help, if your family and friends aren't equip to deal with what you are wrestling with that is about them-not about you. You are worth getting the help that you deserve.

You cannot go back to him. He put you in the hospital? He is dangerous, your safety is the most important thing-nothing else matters w/o that! How much more can he escalate, and he will if you go back after trying to leave-because that's the way it works-that's the pattern.

If you need to talk about what's swirling around in your head, borrow strength, get support-we're always here.

Fortunately, I absolutely do not want to harm or kill myself. Really, I just want to be happy again and I'm entirely clueless how to do it. I feel like I'm taking one step forward and getting thrown three steps back. The relationship was the biggest part of my life, we lived together for a long time and established a lot of things together. I would even go as far to say that we were codependent, especially me. I did get sick of the abuse, I got tired of walking on eggshells, never knowing what his reaction would be that day, letting him trash everything I owned, and I didn't know how to make it past the fact he did punch me. hard, I'm going through revision plastic surgery so I look normal again. I haven't forgiven him for it, but I my heart wanted to take into account that he did go through drastic measures to try and show me he wouldn't ever do that again, that's honestly the only thing he ever changed about himself for the better. I still have to see him on occasion...which really sucks. Then the whole aspect of being entirely alone now just adds to the stress. One of my friends even went as far as to say I was being retarded for being depressed over it and when I got some sense into myself, then I can go talk to him. I know I should feel better, I just don't. I did love him, very much and I've never been great at breakups in the first place, it was so much harder being the one dumping someone I truly didn't want to, but needed to. There's so much popping up that I'm now dealing with, this on top of all the other stress I now have, some (a lot) of which he legitimately caused (I won't elaborate this entire mess here).

I just feel like I want a beautiful, happy life...I just don't know how to get there or even start getting there. My mind, heart and soul are all torn to shreds and drained. I put so much of myself into the relationship and trying to work with him because I truly loved him, I ended up letting him stomp on me entirely. He even totaled my car, the first one I bought brand new on my own. Since he fled the scene of the accident and the cops impounded my car, I don't know when I'll get it back to start any insurance claim. I'm still livid about it, but I forgave him since we were still together at the time. I looked over so much, and all I'm left with is having to pick up the pieces by myself, heartbroken.

I'm really so torn between hating him, wanting nothing to do with him and missing him entirely, still in love with him. I feel like I'm going insane or over reacting.

Hon -----

First and foremost. . . . .

please, please,
PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Find a therapist whose
specialty is recovery
from abuse and trauma!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Time, alone, is not
going to heal these wounds.

Your life has a very, very
slim chance of getting better
without your ACTIVELY
pursuing a therapeutic intervention.

He totalled your brand new car. . . .
then LEFT the scene of the accident,
leaving you without the car.

And then, he attacked you physically,
so BRUTALLY that your face needs
reconstructive surgery?

Your friend who told
you it's "retarded" to
feel depressed over
the end of this relationship
is looking at his clearly
abusive and utterly
criminal actions.

This abuser has treated
both your property and,
even more importantly,
your PRECIOUS SELF
like a piece of trash.

Nevertheless, the friend
who said what he or she
said. . . . . is ignorant
of the workings of the
human psyche.

Again. . . . . I urge you
in the strongest terms
to find a qualified
counselor and work
on getting your
(INNER) wounds
treated and healed. If
you don't, your life ahead
will be unlikely to be better
(and it's quite likely that
it will be WORSE) than
it is now.

Sending you hugs
and healing prayers.

I haven't forgiven him for it, but I my heart wanted to take into account that he did go through drastic measures to try and show me he wouldn't ever do that again, that's honestly the only thing he ever changed about himself for the better.


so, the only positive thing about him is that he hasn't hospitalized/disfigured you for a SECOND time, and you want to take that into account while trying for forgive him? is there a reason you feel pressure to forgive him at ALL? my vote is never forgive him. ever. i certainly wont, and i don't even know him.

have YOU ever beaten someone so badly they had to go to the hospital? can YOU imagine pounding on a face until the bones cracked and only surgery would fix it? can YOU imagine a scenario with a loved on where your only recourse would be to beat them? your man could answer yes to those questions, that's who he is. promising not to do it again doesn't change who he is. nothing changes these things about him.

i'm going to ask you to consider that your feelings for him are not love. they are a mixture of dysfunction, past pain and co-dependancy that are the cocktail of the abused, and they are not anything like the love you deserve and will one day feel. love never puts you in a position of having to run for your own safety, love doesn't leave you confused and unsure.

if your friends are impatient with you it is because you are young and this is complicated, and in general emotions scare people. they would rather blame you than recognize any fears it brings up in them, and so it's helpful to not pay attention to anyone that invalidates what you say or how you feel. you've gotten some great advice about getting your own therapy, please take it. you can feel better and you will get stronger.

I really love all the things Vernacular has written to you and hope that you read (and re-read) his words here very carefully. Especially regarding fantasy.

And I want to send *hugs* and also take this opportunity to ask people to please not refer to other humans, no matter what they have done or not done as "retarded" or "garbage". Thank you from a fellow Human. *love*

I am in a very similar situation and understand your fear of him moving on and being the person who always wanted for someone else. This thought haunts me every day, especially b/c my stbx is seeing someone 14 years younger than him (and 10 years younger than me). I also constantly think about good times and start to miss him. I can tell you that when I give in and contact him, it never fails he makes me feel crappy about myself again. Telling me about all the horrible things I did to him. I really dont think these abusers change and they just find new victims. Even with my stbx, he claims she is so kind and they "click" but he keeps telling me how he wants to get back together with me. In other words, he is treating her like garbage too by leading her on. They don't change and they will never be that "perfect" person for someone else. Try to not let him define you. HUGS!

aral recognize the pull you feel is dysfunction, not love, which is why it makes you do things your rational mind knows to be unhealthy. i understand it is painful to feel replaced. it would bring up every insecurity i have about myself in that situation, so i get that it hurts, but know this for a FACT:

whoever she is, she is exactly like you. she has the correct mix of damage and fear that makes her vulnerable to an abuser, and those vulnerable leggo pieces match his pain-inflicting ones in exactly the same way your vulnerable leggo pieces fit before her. she will be used and crushed, just like you were, and if she's lucky she'll get smart like you did and leave. or, she could allow herself to be merely the pawn and weapon she is now and waste her life chained to the manipulate violent speeding train you narrowly avoided.

don't be jealous of these women that come after you, feel sorry for them. they are not living the life you fantasized about, they are living the life you had and ran from. focus on the beauty ahead of you, create your fantasies there in the name of hope and joy, and don't look back.

Vernacular - the worst part is my abuser has told this girl he hit me and "didnt treat me well." Yet she sees that he is kind to her (they have known each other 3 months) and thinks the abuse was all because I am "crazy."

yeah that's part of the gig. how else could he avoid responsibility? my ex has a woman in his past he "just doesn't like, because she's not a good person." i now know this is what he says when he's dumped because he says that about me. i mean, how can you not like me?

he will use you for all kinds of things, being a good person you give him validity, being beautiful you give him desirability, being absent you give him a story no one can defend against. he really should be paying you a monthly fee for your services, like a social prostitute. hmmm. "social prostitute" is a good band name.

anyway yes, see how much he needs you? see how little he brings to the table when you take away his validity, desirability and a story about a crazy ex? all that's left is a pair of shoes and a pile of dust.

she'll learn the hard way, just like you did, and maybe the girl after her will be smart enough to know that anyone who leaves a trail of insanity behind them is either causing the problems or perpetuating them by not walking away.

Hetaira,

I will try to remember not to call abusers names or refer to them in certain terms, I am wondering if you'd been called names, I know I've been called names, many of us have been called names, sometimes by abusers.

However, I hope you don't mind me saying that it does not change my opinion of them one little bit-I will still think of them that way, and I may get over that someday, and maybe I won't-I don't know yet. I am angry-not enraged, self destructive angry, but the righteous anger that comes from violation kind of angry.

I recognize a lot of what Danilynn is saying-I know what it feels like to think my needs and rights are less important than someone elses, to be so messed up in my head that I can no longer recognize what my own needs and rights are. For me, it comes from a lifetime of feeling like I was the "good" person to put other people first, of stuffing feelings because anger, or sadness or fear made me less of a person-those were the "bad" feelings and I was bad for feeling them. For me to learn to love myself enough to demand good treatment-I had to learn to accept all my darker emotions and thoughts-because they are part of me too and there's no escaping that-anger comes from violation-it tells me that it's not acceptable to be violated. Stuffing feelings also creates a ton of anxiety for me, makes me doubt my instincts because I always "think" instead of feel-in short I've found it is really, really bad for me over the long hall and I'm not going to do it anymore.

So I'm going to be angry for as long as it takes me to work through that, but I will try to craft my responses a little differently.....

cant74deal get out of my head! i spent my childhood getting the message that being good meant sacrificing myself for others, and if my feelings were inconvenient i shouldn't have them and was wrong for acting on them. i also have an ocean of anger that runs through me and when my marriage first started crumbling i was like a hate volcano that erupted into outer space, and anyone who tried to quiet me was vaporized. and everyone tried to quiet me because anger makes people nervous, and i became empowered from realizing i don't give a crap what makes people nervous.

eventually, in great part to writing here and living true to myself without being stepped on, the anger has waned, but i still bust it out occasionally when my ex pretends to forget where my boundaries are. it has been useful to me, and honestly its a lot smarter than i am, so i let it run around in the yard and don't listen to people who tell me i should put it down. i honor it as a part of myself that has been hurt and deserves to be heard, especially when people are talking in a movie theater.

i also feel triggered when told to calm down or how i should verbally express my anger and felt that a little in your post, although i acknowledge the spirit in which it was written and of course this is my issue. however, you did put the phrase 'retarded garbage' in my head and now i have to force myself not to use it even though it describes my ex perfectly.

Thanks vernacular,

Sometimes different people's needs conflict-I this is an area where I still have A LOT of trouble. Hetaira has a need to not hear certain characterizations, that is where she is at-I respect that and especially that she voiced that-but I have a need to express my anger-that is where I'm at. I HATE those kinds of conflicts-very very anxiety producing for me, and I have to find a way to deal with them. Hopefully in life comprises can be made, and Hetaira or any other members that are uncomfortable with certain language will feel this is a safe place and I will continue to feel this is a safe place to say my feelings too.

Feel free to voice your anger however you feel but do remember that as you do, those who may be currently seeking help and/or acceptance for their own issues who may identify, come across your words, you may have to accept that you have caused them to feel like shit and be unable to reach out for help because they know this is how people will refer to them or think about them.
If they have anger issues and abuse issues (like you obviously do), it could cause them to take that anger out on someone else instead of seeking help within a community.

I guess it makes it ok for the "A", "B" and "C" words to be passed around, too. ?

c'est la'vie

Thank you for at least hearing me, as long as my words are in your heads when you feel the need to verbally abuse/humiliate/dehumanize someone out of your own admitted anger, then I know I've done a good thing.

*love*

Danilynn, please also stop reading the lists. I think someone mentioned this already, I want to echo it.

Just love yourself and know you are worthy of being respected and loved and until then, back off guys! and forget about this past guy who made you *feel* like garbage. Let him figure out his own way and all those he encounters figure out theirs. Forget about them.

That's what I hope for you.