Early Christmas Gift

Christmas is only three days away!  This year blew by.  I had a dream about Ex Guy.  I'm going to look at this positively.  It was an early Christmas gift reminding me of what an assh*le he turned out to be and how to avoid it in the future.  He hid his assh*le tendencies so well.  I didn't talk about him very much on here because I saw no reason to dwell on depressing things, but I'll share more now.

I've had time to see it for what it was, a toxic relationship.  The highs were so high, the lows were so low.  There were many games.  I gave him the benefit of the doubt and thought he was just a bit socially inept in romantic situations, not that he was playing that role to gain the upper hand. He was incredibly good at being a "nice guy" in the beginning and when he needed to.

More than half of the time I was with him, I was angry.  I almost broke up with him several times and he'd weasel out of it by doing and saying whatever was necessary to get me to change my mind.  Well, that should have been a red flag, but of course, I didn't notice it until the third time.  He was so convincing or perhaps I believed him because I really wanted to believe him.  He's most likely lied about SO MANY things just like he did with his ex wife.  I wanted to believe I was immune to this behavior.  I wasn't.

And, towards the end, I also saw that he wanted to control me.  He wanted me to be a quiet submissive woman who just went along with his wishes.  The last few times I saw him, he attempted to tell me what to wear and what to eat.  No, that did not go over well. LOL.

I accept full responsibility for letting this go on for too long.  I'm not trying to sort through what was true and what wasn't; it doesn't matter.  I'm trying not to be angry when he randomly crosses my mind.  It takes incredible strength to not be angry; no, I haven't completely mastered it.