I am struggling with intense feelings of self-blame and anxiety caused by the silent treatment of an ex.

We began dating last year after knowing each other for around a year at university. For the year that we knew each other, she would often play hot/cold - one moment she could be highly engaging with me, the next she would not respond to messages and avoid me in person, which I found really confusing and didn't understand. At one point, she messaged me after four months of silence - which was when we began dating.

She was always very explicit in the fact that she was frightened of intimacy, worried about hurting me/being hurt herself, that she was (in her words) a 'witch' who would eventually destroy anyone she was in a relationship with. She spoke openly about how she was mean to an ex partner, and would shout at him and be spiteful during arguments, that she had anger issues.

During our time dating, she became quite critical, and all around abusive emotionally and mostly psychologically with gaslighting, projection, anger, silent treatment, etc. She broke up with me on two occasions - the first time was when I hadn't responded to a text message because my battery had died. She wouldn't believe anything I'd said and called me a liar, untrustworthy, etc. She then didn't speak to me for three weeks - during this time, I later found out, she'd slept with someone else.

We then got back in contact after that and began dating again. She was acting towards me as if nothing had happened, she was highly infatuated with me again. She promised me that when she began feeling temperamental that she would take a step back and calm down, which she seemed to manage for a while.

The break up again came when she'd taken me to her sister's house and was convinced that I was in a bad mood on the way there - I wasn't. She began walking faster and faster, shouting back at me that I should go home, that I wasn't welcome in the house, that she could "really murder" me she was so angry.

Once we arrived, the sister's boyfriend asked us how our journey had been. She stood up and erupted into a rage about how I'd ruined the day, how bad my mood was, etc. Then she turned to me (I was sitting in silence on the sofa, stunned) and said I needed to leave because I was making her angrier, that she was going to call the police on me if I didn't leave there and then.

I left and she broke up with me an hour later via message. We then had a phone call where, for the first fifteen minutes, she was silent and I was begging her to speak - I mean literal silence, she wouldn't speak or say a word. When she eventually did speak, she was ranting and angry with me, told me I needed to apologise to her family, that I'd "fucked things up". She then said to leave her alone for a few days while she calmed down, which I did.

After a week, I messaged her and asked her how she was. She said "I told you not to message me" - which confused me as she said a few days, which it had been.I didn't respond.

After two weeks, we'd seen each other at uni and she had said she wanted to be friends at uni only so I tried to do this, but I was finding everything highly overwhelming. I messaged her and asked if I could talk to her - my plan was to say that I wasn't ready to be friends, etc. She became angry and threatened me with silence, started swearing, etc. This was before I could even say what I was going to say. I had a panic attack and had to sit in the uni building for three hours to calm down.

Later that night I called her to try and talk, and she was still angry. She began ranting again about everything that was wrong with me and I tried to calm the conversation down but she just couldn't control her anger. She kept saying things like "you're not even interested in what I'm saying, are you?" and I eventually just said that it was hard to be interested in someone attacking me, and she just said "good.GOOD."

She then became even angrier and hung up, messaged me saying she was blocking me and then did block me.

The next morning I messaged her apologising for the argument, and asking to be unblocked. She messaged back and said she'd unblock me which she did, and that we could forget about all of this and be friends.

That was the last thing she said to me. She has since avoided me in person and hasn't responded to anything I've said. This was all a few months ago, now, but I'm still anxious about all of it. Why didn't she respond to me after having said that?

The only conclusion I can come to is that I must have said or done something to cause the silence, and the self-blame I am feeling is so intense that I wake up shaking and I am convinced that this whole thing is my fault. I feel disgusted with myself most of the time and I feel sick at the thought of going back to university where she'll just ignore me again.

In fact, I feel sick at the thought of this being 'it', and having to move on without any real understanding of why she didn't respond to me and maintained this silence towards me.

(We are both female)