Broke up with my first girlfriend last week. Not sure how to move forward

Forgive the stream of consciousness, I'm making this mostly just to get my thoughts out and maybe for some kind of vindication. I'm 21M with autism, my birthday was earlier this month. We were together from September to last week.

it was really good at first, but as time went on she got more and more controlling. We would hang out as often as possible, but the second she got home she'd be texting and calling and would get upset if I didn't answer, so I just did.

I didn't know any better, she was my first everything.

I received an autism diagnosis in January, which was when I realized that yes, I do have different needs than most 'normal' people. I need a lot of alone time simply to feel human, which she took personally.

I think she was anxiously attached to me. I lost a lot of friends while we were together (unrelated btw. I learned that I burn myself out trying really hard to keep friendships with people who don't even like me that much, and then I withdraw. It's not a good thing, but I'm at a point in my life where I'm glad to learn more about myself.) My sister F says my ex derived a sense of worth from having a relationship, so when I wasn't around, my ex felt meaningless.

My ex wanted to be around me at ALL times. Like I said, we'd hang out, and then when we went home, the texting and calling would start and not stop for hours.

It's like.. I have shit to do!! She would get upset if I didn't respond within 20-ish minutes. For me, it was never that I was ignoring her, I just didn't have my phone on me at all times, which she disliked. All the calling and texting made me so anxious because I would tell her I have things to do, she'd hang up, and then call me thirty minutes later saying she felt abandoned/discarded because of how we said goodbye.

Goodbyes were so bad with her.. they'd legit take like 20 minutes and she basically had a whole script that I had to follow or else she'd be sad. I never felt like it was a big deal, because we'd see eachother again soon, but she made me feel like I somehow cared less for that.

It go to the point where I'd ask her for some alone time which she would agree to, and then I'd sit on my phone waiting for her to call me all anxious. She literally couldn't go like thirty minutes without texting or calling me. And it made me MISERABLE. I felt like both her caretaker and ward at the same time. She'd micromanage my entire day, asking me to give her a detailed schedule of what I was going to do within like an hour of me waking up.

Which was just impossible for me. I have busy mornings. I'm a college student. One time she got me to agree to start waking up earlier (and I did!) and she called me at exactly the moment I told her my alarm would go off. When I didn't pick up because I had just woken up, she got upset.

It was like she preferred being around me 24/7 even if it made us both miserable. I'd be burnt out from spending so much time around someone, and she'd get sad because I wasn't 100% rainbows and sunshine all the time.

And for the record, I communicated ALL of this. Within the first four months she was calling me her soulmate. She would ask me if I hated her, for no reason. Near the end of things, she would talk about how she can't do this anymore and how tired she is, but then would say how she wants to be with me forever.

That's another thing. She was so unbelievably impulsive. She would ask me to make plans and then immediately go back on them or change them within hours. Never straightforward with what she wanted.

I started scratching myself because the stress of being with her got so bad. One time she was on the phone with me for two hours and I got so hungry I started crying and she still wouldn't let me get off the phone to eat. One time we were on the phone, then we hung up and I went about my day. I talked with my mom for like two hours without checking my phone. I came back to a load of texts and missed calls, about how I was ignoring her and she felt abandoned and how I permanently damaged our bond.

I once talked about getting on a new supplement and she acted like I was a druggie trying to numb himself. For the record, I took edibles a lot from 19-20, but I stopped after I realized they were making me into a loser. I quit them 8 months before we got together, and I told her that because I trusted her. I didn't think she'd use it to control me..

I know all of this is really bad, I do. I'm working on myself. I was (and still am to an extent) a total pushover. I thought I could trust her. I have a hard time picking good people for my life.

We broke up because she wanted me to go on a family trip for a week, the day after my birthday. At first, I felt pressured into going (she never took no for an answer) and said yes, but I told her that how I felt about being pressured into going, and she told me it was okay if I didn't want to go anymore, so I said I'd rather stay home. Apparently it was fine with her that I was so stressed out about it that I was throwing up and missing class, but it was the end of the world when I didn't want to go anymore.

She went back on that within a day, and told me that I was letting my feelings dictate what I did and how that's not good. She would be texting and calling from when I woke up to bedtime, trying to convince me to go on this fucking beach trip. Eventually it got to the point where she told me outright that she was not going to stop trying to convince me, and that I was going on this trip with her.

The last day, I didn't respond to anything. I was just so unbelievably worn out and tired that I couldn't do anything. I woke up at noon and spent three hours crying in bed. She was texting and calling, trying to convince me to go. Around dinnertime she gave me an ultimatum: respond in four hours, or we would break up. She lasted fifteen minutes before she broke up with me over text.

I blocked her on everything. That day I finally opened up to my older sister about what had been going on, and she was helping me realize that I needed to break up. But my ex did it first, I guess.

My problem is that I really don't want to never speak to her again. I sure as hell don't want a relationship. But she was my first everything.

I keep replaying all these beautiful memories in my head. But all of them are tainted, too. We went to the state fair last fall. We kissed at the top of the ferris wheel, with the full moon overhead. But at the same time, when it was time to go, she dragged it out for thirty minutes because she felt discarded when I reminded her that we needed to go- at the time we agreed we would leave.

Believe me, I was gentle. I was nothing but kind and patient with her for our whole relationship, as much as anyone can be with that kind of insanity. I just don't want her to be someone that I never speak to again. That's not the kind of person I am. I blocked her for my own sanity. Everyone in my life agreed that she would've went back on the breakup within like 2 hours if I hadn't blocked her.

I would like to have some kind of closure, even if it's a slammed door. But at the same time, I don't know if it's right. Some of my family think she abused me emotionally. I keep checking my phone while I'm enjoying my hobbies, worried for a text or a call. I hadn't been able to enjoy anything for so long.

But I'm free now, I guess. She can't control me anymore. It's so weird looking at myself in the mirror. I finally feel like I actually see myself now that it's over.

Most days I just feel like a floating head and hands. All of the things I did while I was with my ex, I did knowing that they had to be done without wasting any time because she would be texting or calling soon.

Thanks if you made it this far. Sorry if it's messy. This whole situation has been messy. I'm just muddling through it, trying my best to figure out the next step and reclaim my self. One of my few remaining friends is getting me into manga and anime, which is cool I guess. I'm transferring out to a new college soon. I have my whole life ahead of me. Relatively, I'm having a very normal breakup experience, with a splash of abuse.

Yeah, I was young and dumb. I didn't realize how bad it was until it was over. But like I said, I'm free now. It's done.