How can I overcome my depression, and stop thinking about him once and for all?

[vanilla27]

We were together for a year, we're 20. I've hated myself for a long time and when he cheated on me twice and deeply regretted it, I blamed myself. I forgave him but often he would neglect me to play video games, sex was the only time I felt truly cared about. I spent two months living with him trying to rebuild the trust, but just ended up resenting him as I was neglecting myself and my own goals for our relationship. I felt he wasn't putting in the necessary effort. Bitter drunken arguments were often (usually about the cheating or flirty texts he'd sent to a previous crush) and one day I was diagnosed with depression, he broke up with me and said he couldn't take the arguments anymore as they were damaging his mental and physical health. Recently someone told me he'd cheated a third time and when I asked him, he told me I'm paranoid, manic and desperately need help. Despite how horrible he has been, I know that he is very immature, and did indeed care about me. I can't seem to stop thinking about him and stalking his twitter feed (blocking only blocks them from seeing your tweets). My self esteem is at an all time low and I just miss him, but he's toxic for me. I wish he'd loved me the way I'd loved him and given him everything. He said I was great and that he messed up, but that was before he said all the horrible stuff to me about me being manic and paranoid - he was very upset that I'd "accused" him of cheating a third time. What should I do? I doubt there's any chance of us getting back together, but even if I really wanted to, I know it could never work given everything that has happened. How can I feel happy and just move on? And stop thinking about him so often, wondering what he's doing, stalking his twitter? (I've blocked him on facebook). My counsellor thinks I've attributed my self worth to what this guy thinks of me, and I feel dangerously low. I'm not sure what to do. I feel like he was the only one who ever cared about me and that now I've lost that, I have nothing. Please help! Any tips would be greatly, hugely appreciated. Thank you.

[Scoe141]

No contact all the way. Erase every thing that reminds you of him. When you begin to think of him, "change the channel" and immediately think of something else. Take up a hobby, join a gym, volunteer etc.

 

You deserve MUCH better and will find him, just be patient.

 

Good luck and I hope you're feeling better.

[Mischa234]

What your counsellor says is correct, but to put that in perspective a little better: What you think he thinks of you is probably inaccurate and more a reflection of what you think of yourself (and assume he must think). Yes, he said some mean things because he is ignorant. Do your best not to take those personally, he was probably using your words/diagnosis to frame the problem between you because he simply is not capable of looking further than that and helping you understand what's gone wrong in the relationship. He probably has very low self-awareness also and doesn't know exactly where he has gone wrong, hence why the quickest and easiest way to get out of a conflict is for him to tell you that your recent diagnosis is the problem. This is not true.

 

It sounds like the relationship was toxic and it worsened your situation. I would imagine that you probably felt better before you were in the relationship than while you were with him, you may have unconsciously sought out someone who treated you the way you treated yourself because that made sense to you at the time. But reality is that he was bad to you, didn't make an effort to look at himself and grow as a partner, was not ready for a nurturing interpersonal relationship, and brought you down much further.

 

Release him.

 

You are putting all of your feelings and self-worth and hopes in the hands of someone who is completely incompetent. Once you realise this and own your own mistakes in doing this, you will be able to take back control of those. Once you have control, you will be able to redirect yourself down a more positive route. Have you thought about taking antidepressants (if you don't yet)? They have really helped me as I suffer from chronic depression and have done since childhood. I basically can't function without them, but with them you wouldn't know I'd ever had problems as I'm the most rational, positive and persistent person you'd ever meet!!

 

Try to think of it like this: you are on a path to recovery, and he's going to hold you down. It's not about him and a relationship anymore, what you're doing now is stepping out of the darkness and taking responsibility for your happiness and utilising all of the support within your reach to become a better version of yourself who is stronger and more resilient than ever. This should be your main focus right now.

 

Be kind to yourself.