I’ve been abused myself by a former partner. It’s no laughing matter. 

I (23F) started this relationship with a 20M guy. He’s autistic and has ADHD. This is important because I feel like our communication went awry.

I went to him. When I was with him I felt genuinely happy, which I also told him many times. It was a long time since I felt so at place. When I came back home (he lives in the Netherlands and I live in Belgium), he told me I was very different IRL versus online. Online, I was more sad and difficult to deal with. 

I told him I had doubts I needed some time for. He proceeded to break up with me. This shocked me because I genuinely loved him and didn’t want to lose him. I begged him to stay. He just looked away and told me begging has no use. 

Since then, I can’t really cope at all. I’ve called him up way too many times, tried talking to him out of sheer panic. The panic gets so much at times I start hyperventilating, and makes me do stupid things. I know it would be better to leave him alone but I really don’t want to lose him, it makes me so incredibly anxious, although I already did. I just want him back, I feel like I can’t handle this. And my fear of being left is making me smash my own windows even more. By contacting him when he doesn’t want to talk to me, trying to get answers, trying to beg, trying to make him feel better as well. I just don’t want this situation to be a thing anymore.

I think these behaviors come from a former relationship wherein I was abused and gaslighted, and when he finally left me for someone else, I was so dependent on him that I genuinely believed I wouldn’t be able to survive without him and that I was an awful person, since he told me that. I did all the codependent crazy stuff trying to get him to see that I would do everything for him and was a good person, even went to his house without telling him beforehand trying to get my stuff back and initiate a conversation. Begging and begging and begging to be forgiven. This obviously ended up traumatizing the relationship even further: his house was filled with stuff from ‘new girl’ and he called the police on me. I was completely broken and addicted to a person who didn’t care.

I feel like this response is now hardwired within me. The fear of being left at the snip of the finger is too much to bear, and it makes me act out in ways I end up harming the other person’s mental health too, because I can’t let go at all and blind panic takes over.

A mutual friend between me and my ex told me that my ex sees the same behaviors in me as he saw in his abusive dad. That’s incredibly hard for me to hear since... I do not want to abuse anyone. I want to love and be loved, I want people to be happy. His dad has been the source of most of his mental issues regarding his depression so being put in the same category devastates me. Have I become a monster?

Is it possible I got these ways of dealing from former abuse? How do I get rid of this overwhelming panic? How can I prove to my ex I’m not a bad person? I know I’m incredibly flawed and carry a lot of hurt, but that doesn’t mean me giving him love will end up being me manipulating or abusing. I want him to know I will try my absolute best to not become like his father.

I still want him back and it completely crushes me that I might have fucked everything up myself.

Please help.