The girl i have been dating exclusively for about 4 months is severely depressed. She talks to a therapist every week and is on anti-depressants, so she is taking steps to get help. She had an incredibly tough upbrining (her father committed suicide when she was 7 and her mother is often depressed and very critical and unloving to her). She ended up going out on her own right after high school and paying her way through college. Her strength is incredible in spite of her horrible upbringing and a few very bad, abusive relationships. She has low self esteem issues as well.

She has taken steps to get over her depression. However, sometimes when she is really feeling down she will be very mean and spiteful towards me, and take everything out on me. I have to walk on eggshells every time I talk to her as not to upset her. I have been as supportive and loving as I possibly could be with her. There is nothing more I can do for her than I already have done. Her constant problems, complaining, occasional rudeness, and overall depression have seriously taken their toll on me. I feel like I am getting nowhere with her, and I almost feel depressed even though I am generally a happy person.

This relationship is making me miserable. I don't want to leave her because I am literally the only positive and loving person she has in her life right now. I think if I break up with her it could put her over the edge. I don't know how to deal with this. I feel like I am possibly enabling her by just being her emotional tampon. Any help would be greatly appreciated.



Holiday

"Emotional tampon." That's really specific and great. I have to remember that.

You've got a tough road ahead, dude, whether you stay with her or not. I've been where you are and there's really no easy answer either way. You really need to get out of it but there'll be a lot of guilt and somewhat unfounded feelings of responsibility.

I was going out with a girl in a similar sort of situation. She wasn't mean to me or anything, I honestly wouldn't have cared if she was from time to time if that meant at least letting out what was going on inside her head. She had a rough life and continues to, but she wasn't fulfilling my needs anymore, because she was more concerned with keeping stuff to herself than discussing it with me and seeing me.

I excused her behaviour for a while because of the things that had happened in her past (I don't think it's something to be discussed on an open forum, so you'll just have to imagine the worst thing that can happen to a girl...multiple times), to the point of not remembering anything before she was 13 and everything after being just as bad.

There comes a point though, when you have to think about yourself. I think you're at that point if I'm not mistaken. She's causing you more harm than good and although you may be the "only good thing in her life" (yeah, that's how I felt too), that doesn't mean you have to throw your life away just to hold hers together. You can't force someone to get better, they have to want it for themselves and truly work towards it for them. Often with another person there in their life, they don't do that, so being in a relationship is often more damaging than helpful.

Hopefully she can cope with it and she's ok. Maybe let her therapist know what you're gonna do, so that he can monitor her and commit her if she's THAT bad. She might have some trouble dealing at first, but if she gets through that, it will hopefully make her a stronger person. Maybe you can even remain friends and help her out some, but I wouldn't recommend attempting that for at least a month after you break up with her.

I won't lie and say it will be easy. I won't criticize you if you take a little while to go about realising that it's the right thing to do for you AND her. I won't even criticize you for questioning whether you can make it work (hey, I did it and I'm not gonna be a hypocrite). It IS the right thing to do though and when you get to that point where you see it and feel it, you're gonna feel more free for having come to that conclusion. Then you're gonna get back on track, get back to sarging other girls and keep progressing and becoming who you want to be, so that you can find a girl that doesn't make you write threads like this, or feel this way, so that you enrich her life and she enriches yours.

_________________
"The 'Brick Walls' are there to allow you to prove how badly you want something!" ~ Randy Pausch

~ Rye

Thank you thank you thank you everyone for the brilliant advice. I now see that depression and rudeness are not linked together. I think I am codependant in the relationship, so I just ordered a book about it. Ther is no point in trying to change somebody for the better and trying to make them happy over and over again when only they can change themself and make the decision to be happy. You can steer them in the right direction, but if you push it eventually they will resent you anyway. I can't make her happy or treat her any better than I do now. I am pretty sure she has a borderline personality and so does her mother. I don't have many options when it comes to dealing with that other than walking away.

How do i go about breaking up with her so that she can stand on her own two feet and get better on her own, without further damaging her and pushing her over the edge and off the deep end? I know there is no easy way to do it, but I imagine there is a better way to word it so she can not blame herself for the breakup.


Thanks again for the help. This is probably the hardest thing I have ever had to do.



Holiday

Given the sheer nature of her problem, I don't believe there IS a way for you to leave in a manner that will allow you to sort of stand her upright before you dash. She's gonna have to crawl out of that hole herself. I don't mean that to sound callous, like an "It's her problem" type of thing, but that the solution to this can't be provided by you or anyone else, and it's not--I guarantee--going to be you or anyone else who drags her out of that pit. Only she can do that. As someone who's spent many years battling depression to finally come out on the other side, I can look back down into that pit and tell you from experience that it's likely all you're doing is enabling her to continue with the way things are. If she's gonna get better, SHE'S gotta make that choice, because nobody else can make it for her, and it could very well be that the BEST thing you can do for her is to leave. In most cases, someone with depression, as with gambling or alcoholism or drug abuse, has to TRULY hit rock bottom before something finally screams to them that they need to turn things around. Don't quote me on it, but maybe your leaving could be the impetus she desperately needs.

In the event that it's not, and she does something rash after you leave, that's not your fault, and you cannot blame yourself, and you especially can't ALREADY begin assuming responsibility for hypothetical bad things you're afraid may happen in the future when you haven't even left yet. Just as she is the only one who can make the effort to get better, she is the only one who can make the choice to harm herself or others. That is NOT on you. It is NOT.

I definitely see some codependency here. Just as she always needs someone to fix things and hold her up, maybe you've developed an issue of always needing someone to fix. There's a movie called When a Man Loves a Woman where Meg Ryan (before she fucked her face up) plays an alcoholic married to Andy Garcia, and when her character hits bottom and enters detox and emerges a stronger, better woman, Garcia is the one who starts losing his grip because they lived so chaotically for so long that he doesn't know how to function without having to constantly control and manage his mess of a wife. Amazingly enough, they end up going to a marriage counselor to resolve HIS codependency on his alcoholic wife. It's a very eye-opening depiction of how when it appears that just one half of a couple has a big problem, both parties can feed off each other in the most unhealthy and invisible ways.

There's no "good" way to break up with somebody. Explain to her that it's time that you leave, and it's something you need to do for her and, more importantly, for yourself. Tell her that you love her and will always care about her but you have lost so much of your life and time and energy to the black hole of her depression and nothing ever seems to be enough to fill it, and you've begun to lose yourself in it. You've become so defined and constricted by this one aspect of your relationship that you're not even sure who you are or what you want anymore, and you need to go away and figure out your life again, and she needs to do the same. She has a very, very serious problem, but SHE has to be the one to take the steps to get over it. Be caring, but firm, and DON'T back down. She will cry. She may plead. DO NOT back down.

If she's not gonna go into counseling and take responsibility for herself (which will also be a very long, hard road), then your relationship is salted earth, and nothing's ever gonna grow there. Take what's left of yourself and leave, and perhaps consider picking up a weekly therapy session of your own to see if you are codependent on fixer-upper gals--because if you are and you don't start working to recognize and resolve it, you will find yourself dating the same girl over and over in many different guises.

You want better than that for your life, don't you? You know what you have to do.

I would listen to Goldeneye.

This is going to be hard. You cannot stay in a relationship trying to change that person. That person is going to want to change for themselves. With you enabling her, you are giving her the power to stay the same. She seeks guys who are going to be abusive because of her chaotic past. You are not, so she is going to be abusive to you to get the reaction she is looking for. You screaming yelling and being rude back to her will give her what she is looking for. By not giving her this, she will become irratable and be more rude to you. You seem to be attached to fixing her problems. Its what gives you that endorphine rush and makes you feel complete in the relationship. I know. I am that guy.

Relationships are tough. Especially one like this. Breaking up maybe tough, but it may be the best thing for both of you.

_________________
success is my only mother fucking option, failure is not.

That's it right there. Two people locked in horrible cycle where neither can ever be happy.

Goldeneye has the right idea, you just have to do it and tough it out, it's gonna be hard, but stay strong. It's just like learning to be a PUA, there's tough shit you gotta go through, like cracking AA, but you tough it out, you go through it and you come out better for it in the end.

I'd say something along the lines of, "I'm sorry, but I'm not getting what I need out of this relationship and I think we should just be friends." Then don't hang out with her all the time, or even for a few weeks/months if you can manage it, cause that's just gonna make it harder for you to move on.

_________________
"The 'Brick Walls' are there to allow you to prove how badly you want something!" ~ Randy Pausch

~ Rye