I just got out of a really complicated year long relationship. I've been in a few other relationships, but this was just the cherry on top of them all. I spent the most of our relationship paranoid out of my mind. Luckily this time jealousy wasn't an issue because I'm sure that would have manifested itself in the most god awful ways (as it usually does). 


I spent the majority of the relationship playing victim. My ex was not very nice, he was blunt, he was insensitive and he sometimes was just straight up rude. This provoked me into thinking negatively about us, and about our relationship but especially about him. I would get so paranoid that he was gaslighting me. If something was misplaced, I immediately would assume he moved it with the intension of making me feel crazy. 

A lot of the time I would ask him about the missing object and he would sometimes be able to offer explanations and sometimes not. Neither instances would deter me from my crazy delusions. I am somewhat thankful I wouldn't express all of my paranoia to my ex, out of fear of potential embarrassment or him thinking I'm even more crazy.


So a lot of it would stay internalized, I would keep thinking these things, over and over again, let it eat me alive until I couldn't take it anymore. I basically gave up on our relationship because I was so convinced he was trying to manipulate me. He inevitably broke it off because of my mental health. He said I was toxic and paranoid, but at the same time barked back at me a lot my weird paranoid thoughts (that I had not even expressed to him) and putting me at fault for everything wrong with our relationship. 

I sit here now bewildered, what is going on here? He called me a liar, cheater and stealer, and said a lot of things. He said things I thought of him but now he thinks that of me? He said every day I am a different person, when I put on makeup it makes it even more obvious I'm not trying to be myself. He said that its painfully obvious I have a personality disorder, that I couldn't hide anything from him. 

This whole situation had me faced with a huge question: was I the abuser in the relationship? I had myself convinced that I had a control over the paranoia and as long as I wasn't expressing to him directly what I was thinking, he and I would be safe from those delusions. I know I wasn't able to hold it ALL back. I know deep down how false these thoughts are, but for most of our relationship I genuinely thought he was emotionally abusive. Now I cannot tell what is real and what is in my head, and that scares me so much, especially with intimacy. I don't want to be in a relationship ever again if it truly was the case that I was abusing my boyfriend. 


I don't think I'll ever really know, and I feel like I shouldn't trust what my ex says, but I really don't know what to believe anymore. 

