I (26M) ruined the best relationship I’ve ever had with my now ex fiance (28F) and I don’t know how I’m going to live with myself.

I have ruined the best relationship of my life with the girl I really thought was my soulmate and I fear I will never find anything like it ever again. It has been about 2 days since we fully ended things. She is genuinely the most amazing and understanding person I have ever met in my life, and for 3 years our relationship was nothing but perfect. It truly felt like a one in a million connection. We vibed on everything, literally everything, we could talk for hours and it felt easy. It clicked like a puzzle piece.

But, I was the toxic one. We were about 7 months out from our wedding, and I had to confess to her that I wasn’t following her boundaries during our relationship. I had looked at old sexts and thought about exes and people I knew from my personal life sexually while I was still with her, I truly disrespected her and I realize I was taking her for granted during our relationship. I impulsively and stupidly chose to do things that I should have known would hurt her, and even worse, I thought it was no big deal when I did it cause she “didn’t have to know” and I told myself it was fine because I wasn’t actually messaging anyone. I consider it emotionally cheating now, and I did that to the love of my life.

That would have been bad enough, but it gets worse. She was still willing to make it work with me, but I was caught in such a shame spiral that I became toxic. I told her things that were cruel, I admitted every single unkind thing I had ever thought about her, it was because I thought she wouldn’t accept me if she saw me for who I was, and I pushed her further and further away even though she was so open and ready to heal. I see now that it’s because I truly did not believe I was good enough for her, and I couldn’t shake the thought no matter how hard I tried. I let my shame take over and I made our dynamic toxic.

Eventually, it all just became too much to bear, and I ran away one day and told her I didn’t want her anymore. I ran like a coward, I wasn’t brave enough or strong enough to fix us. I didn’t want it to be over, but I simply couldn’t handle the shame of it all anymore. Even though I came back later begging to make it work again, I was still toxic, I still said something unkind even then, and from that, she just couldn’t take it anymore.

That was the final nail, and now there is no shot of us getting back together. She is done with me, she cannot accept what I’ve done to her and said to her, it’s just too messy now. Her family can’t stand me now. We are trying to part amicably, but I am so afraid of facing life without her, she has been my rock and my biggest supporter for the past 3 years.

Food has no taste, I can’t sleep. I don’t know how I can continue on while knowing that I screwed everything up, I don’t know how I can face my family or anybody in my life with the knowledge that I fucked up the best thing that has ever happened to me. I do not have any close friends that are as emotionally available and supportive as her, I do not have a good support system, not even my family is as supportive as she has always been to me.

I need to put in the work to be better. I am going to see a therapist tonight, I need to figure myself out, I know that. I don’t have all the answers yet, but I hope with time I will. Even now, I want to hold out hope that we can make it work somehow down the line, I just don’t want this to be over. But, I know I need to at least try and move on, holding out hope is only going to hurt me and her. I don’t know how I am going to do this without her…but I have too now. I have haven’t left myself with any other choice.

How do you continue on knowing you fucked up so bad? How do you keep facing every day with the knowledge that you are the one who failed? How do you find a way to be at peace with yourself knowing what you have done? How do you keep going?