What happens when you just keep destroying the things that matter most in your life?

What does it mean about me that I can see what’s going wrong, can identify the patterns and understand that my actions are causing the effects I don’t like, yet I continue to act out in them?

For years I’ve had this knowledge that if I were to ruin my relationship with this one person, I wouldn’t be able to live with myself. I didn’t want that to be true. It sounds so dramatic, so over the top. Not to mention unhealthy, and overly dependent or attached. Which is just one reason I’ve never talked about it, or even written about it. I wouldn’t – I couldn’t let that thought be heard. So I pushed it away. Buried it deep inside and hoped I wouldn’t have to deal with it. The other part is that, even though it SOUNDS dramatic, unhealthy, and overly attached, I know it isn’t. But I don’t know how to explain that. And because I don’t know how to explain that, how could I enter into a conversation about it? I’d be setting off all these alarms and wouldn’t have the switch to turn them off. Even the other person in the relationship may interpret it wrong, fearing I had too much dependence on this person.

The thing is, the more this person pulls away, the more fear I have around losing that relationship and the more closely I try to hold on. But all it does is push this person farther away. And even though I see that, and KNOW that, I can’t stop. When we were how we used to be, I was ok with less contact and less communication because it felt honest.

But right now I feel frozen – afraid to do anything. Wanting to pause the entire world and just hide. Afraid that each thing I do makes everything worse.

That alone I may be able to tolerate. But how am I supposed to get through the memories and knowledge of what it was once like, and what it is now, and that it’s all my fault? I created this nightmare I’m living in. And there’s no waking up from it. Thinking about it makes my heart hurt. I feel sick to my stomach, and can barely get out of bed. I hate myself so much I don’t know what to do.

This isn’t even a time when I need to call on my tenacious self and prove that I can do what others don’t believe I can. That would almost feel easy at this point.

I’ve ruined the relationship that was the most important one to me. The one I said I’d never ruin. That I was accountable for and to. And I can’t handle that. It feels too awful.

I can’t breathe.