Help

Hi I just broke up today with my boyfriend of three years and I am feeling so scared and alone. I am 52 and was married for 28 years before this man and I got together. I am shaking, unable to concentrate and desperate to speak with him even though our relationship was so toxic. I am so afraid I will break down and call him which would not go well. I am a good person with 2 teenagers but I have become a crazy person lately. His texts and our conversations were so hurtful. I want to go on with my life but I am stuck and terrified of being alone. I think I have become toxic too. I have a therapist but once a week doesn't work when u r obsessed with someone who you were with all the time.

Hi Lorraine, I've been through several toxic relationships lately... And I've felt the same way you're feeling after each one ended. I'm actually feeling this way now.

I know you're feeling awful now, but as long as you stay strong and don't contact him, it will subside... I promise. You're a good person who has admittedly been acting crazy lately? That is because this relationship (and him) isn't bringing out the best in you! You are much better off being by yourself and continuing to be a good person than to let him drag you down! The highs of a toxic relationship aren't worth the lows.

Also I noticed you wrote "I broke up today with my boyfriend". Trust your instincts... You knew what you had to do: you made that call and I'm 100% sure it was the right decision. Stay strong! xo

As hard as it is you have to think of a toxic relationship in much the same way as any drug or substance or addiction that you need to get free from. First off, you need to develop the attitude and keep telling yourself that being with someone who is abusive to you in any way is far, far, far worse than being alone. Next you need to focus on why you fear being alone so much that you'd rather have a toxic person who is abusive to you than just to go out and make a good life for yourself. If you aren't addressing that in therapy then there's part of why it's not working. The other part is you need a therapist who will give you assignments and exercises you can do when you aren't seeing them. My best therapists always gave me "homework" for want of a better word to do until our next session. So maybe address that in your next session or look at finding someone better suited to what you need help with.

As to obsession and so forth, there really isn't anything that is going to work beyond cold turkey, I am giving up this addiction and sweating out the DDTs such as they are, until it passes. Stay NC and I mean full NC, no social media, no looking him, nothing, get rid of reminders if you have to. You need the time away from this man to get yourself back, to be able to have enough room to step out of your own way and realize things about him and about yourself.

I had to do the same thing a few years ago and in the end only stone-cold going turkey full-on no contact helped end the obsession. Today some four-five years later all I can say is I don't know what I was thinking to begin with. I've even seen him and it's just a mystery to me that I was so over-the-edge obsessed with the guy, but my life was so full of toxicity then I guess he was the only escape I thought I had. And that's the other thing, you need to face whatever it is in your life that you were using him as a drug to escape from. In my case it was a toxic work environment and several toxic "friends" draining the life out of me. When I ended those relationships along with the one with him I was really able to let go and move on. You might look at whether or not you need to do the same.

Stay strong, no contact, you will get through this too and be far better if you let him go and work on gaining a happy, stable life that you provide for yourself and your family first before you let anyone else enter it.