This was my last message to you

A little over year ago, my partner of over a year ghosted me. He did a lot of other stuff too, but that’s how it ended. It was right before my sister’s wedding, the one he had been begging me to bring him to as my +1, and while we were in the middle of talks about moving in together.

Then, a few months ago, he messaged me about how much he worked on himself, how he still loved me, how he missed me. But it was all about him, he didn’t even acknowledge what he did, he just said he missed me. I later found out that he sent this after hooking up with and ghosting another woman, only for her to turn him down when he came crawling back to her as well. They only went on one date, but the audacity to reach out to me & telling me he changed right after ghosting and then getting rejected by another woman was baffling. Anyways, this was my last message him. I tried to write it with as much kindness as I could manage because I often feel guilty about being “too harsh”, even though he probably deserved it. Instead, I wanted to communicate just how much he hurt me and what he broke, even though by the time he messaged me I had moved on and was honestly just annoyed that he was trying to pretend he still mattered to me. So, i gave myself some time to write out what felt important, and this is what I said.

[EX],

I remember being curled up on my sister’s couch when I had to fly to LA because my dad’s condition worsened, and crying because the past few years had been so exhausting. I remember wishing you were there to tell me things would be okay, or that you loved me, or anything. But then I realized that wasn’t something you’d ever really done for me. You weren’t someone I could cry to about my life or my problems, or someone who let there be space for my pain and grief, even while I was preparing for my grandpa’s funeral. You even expected me to comfort you for lying to me.

I’m sorry if this is harsh, but you genuinely don’t seem to grasp how much you hurt me. The first date I went on after we broke up, I came home and cried because I spent the whole night wishing the person I was with was you. My heart broke so many times in all the moments of my life that I thought I’d share with you, but didn’t. So if you need to talk about our breakup as part of your mental health, then by all means, but it doesn’t erase or change the amount of pain you put onto me & my life because of your actions.

I really did love you though, and I loved you with everything I had. I used to think about how cute you’d look once your hair went gray, and how lucky I was that I’d fallen in love with someone where everything felt so right. I remember looking at apartments in California with you & wondering what our first place together would look like, then deciding it didn’t really matter as long as it was with you & [dog]. To me, being with you was what felt like home. But then you did a lot of things I never thought you would, and it became impossible for me to ever feel that way about you again.

You repeatedly lied to me and put your well being before mine, even though I tried to encourage you to talk to a therapist, doctors, and loved ones because relying on me to fix things wasn’t sustainable. I did everything from breathing exercises to driving over in the middle of the night to calm you down, all while dealing with my own life and my parents being in & out of the hospital. When I told you I couldn’t keep doing it because the stress started wearing on me & causing my own health issues, you begged me to stay and then ghosted me. You acted like I didn’t matter if I wasn’t of use to you. You can reframe your actions however you want or need to, but at the end of the day it’s still just manipulative and shitty, and mental health issues don’t negate that. I’m never going to think that any of it was okay or justified.

I didn’t want you to be the perfect partner. I just wanted you to be there for me when I needed you - the way you promised me so many times that you would be, but you weren’t.

[EX], you meant the world to me when we were together, and I really am sad that things ended the way they did because when you told me you wanted to spend your life with me, I believed you. But the chance for you and I to reconnect in any way has been gone for a while now.