Why would an ex read your old 'love' emails?

[confusedInDenver]

First let me start with this preemptive caveat; I am/do not actively track friend/lover emails. I have a biz account I do track reads and link clicks for promotions I send off. I met this woman a couple years back via a business acquaintance so we started our initial discussions on the biz email. Soon we started spending every day together and speaking in person or communicating via phone/text. So the tracked emails referenced in this thread are from later on when I returned to emailing her a few times post break up from the only email I had.

 

That said.

 

We had a horrible break-up during what I realize was a melt-down or episode on her part. Much/most of the relationship was dealing with serious emotional issues/limitation she had, I'd been used to being pushed away and dealt with it fine but this was just a cruel desperate night precipitated by her. I later discovered she may suffer from Bipolar and/or Borderline Personality Disorder, both of which are characterized by rages where they push the very people they love the most by attacking them mercilessly with the things they learned about them.

 

I did not respond well and struck back cruelly as well, to my everlasting shame. But I'd had enough of over a year of being pushed away and distanced for many months and the things she said that night were horrible and meant to invalidate me and us, everything we had, everything I was, everything I did.

 

I am supposing she expected me to be 'the strong one' and once again reach out and say some beautiful healing things but I did not. I ignored her. I calmly walked out of places when I saw her, I walked by her in the street, I never texted or called again and if mutual acquaintance asked how I was I always said find so glad to be gone from her.

 

Clearly she had gone into a freefall based not on just how she went off on me but how she just disappeared from mutual social circle/places, I heard she was seen stumbling drunk from bars, she started dating some slime bag using her for money and more than happy to let her destroy herself drinking (a girl who can have whom she wants).

 

So I got worried after a couple months and reached out with a letter apologizing for my words during the horrid night and letting her know I wished her the best. I did make clear I'd moved on and would not reach out again so gave her no place to reach back.

 

I ended up in fact reaching out 3 more times over 4 months, all the same gist; non accusatory, no pining, just letting her know I had and always would care for her. Mostly because I got she was not doing well and don’t' want her to think on top of all she was dealing with that I too hated her or that she'd lost my caring which I knew was important to her.

 

So

 

Recently I accessed my Read Receipts Folder to check a recent campaign and there are dozens from her. She has read everything I sent over and over. In fact one email I sent when we were seeing each other which she sneered at when we broke up she had in fact read 20 times in three days when I sent it. By doing some backtracking I could see she’d opened some old ones after we broke up when I passed her on the street w/o a word. To reply? To remind herself of how I felt? She felt?

 

The most recent nice “thinking of you and hope things turned out well”, she read 3x in the wee hours when I sent it, again 2 weeks later from 11am to 5am over and over after I’d again passed her on the street. The next night she stopped in to 'our' place where she'd not been for months only to just miss me. Then she read it over and over until 5am again.

 

I get I should NOT know this yet it become impossible to not put the pieces together once they were in front of me. Pandora's Box.

 

So

 

I am greatly conflicted. As hurt as I was by what she did and took her horrible words to heart, part of me always felt she just freaked out and pushed me away as hard as she could ,like a person drowning and never expected my initial reaction or for me to go cold turkey no contact on her. I think it pushed her over the edge (ended up with the slimey guy right after the first time I walked past her like she didn’t exist). But she never reached out, never apologized and never replied. So then I assumed I was wrong and yes she meant ever word of it.

 

Now I’m utterly confused because it seems very possible I was right in the first place. I know she won’t reach out, she had almost no ‘agency’ when we were together and couldn’t even initiate affection unless I did and couldn’t make any move which made her vulnerable. So I’m quite sure after the things I said and ½ year+ of my acting like she didn’t exist, she would reach across the gulf or even reply because, among other things, it would be an admission on her part of how she feels and risk further rejection (my friend pointed out to me later how painful it must have been, even though she pushed me away, to see me walk out of places she walked into).

 

I turned off the read receipts for her account so I don't have to torture myself and since it is supposed to be just for business. Yet Pandora's Box is open for me now.

 

If you are a lady would you open caring/loving letters from a guy you dumped/broke-up with 1/2 year later? Not once but over and over into the wee hours of the day? Am I just grasping at straws here or does this means something?

 

Somehow I still care greatly many months later even though I mainly went NC and moved on she still lives in my heart and from what I can tell I live in hers. I can’t reach out again even though I want to more than anything in the world, partially because I want her to show some agency here and partially because she might not be reaching out because she doesn’t want to reconnect and I want to respect that. And she won’t reach out even if she wants it more than anything in the world too because she simply can't.

 

Thus I am Confused in Denver...

Edited September 2, 2019 by confusedInDenver

[FMW]

I would only read messages over and over if I was still interested in the sender, and if I was a little obsessed about them.

 

She is who she is - you can wish for her to "show some agency", but the reality is, as you have stated, it seems unlikely she will.

 

So you have to decide if seeing if there is anything worth fighting for is worth it to you to be the one to put yourself out there. But it seems like there are some really good reasons to just let it go. She's unlikely to change so unless you're ok with how things were in the past I would just work on putting her behind you.

[Art_Critic]

My guess is she knows you can see she read them and she is trying to provoke a response.... the problem is that if you hit her up she is liable to blow you off, she also maybe grieving the relationship and trying to get over you...

 

I wouldn't do anything but that doesn't mean you should.. if you want hit her up, not an email but a text or phone call.

[confusedInDenver]

Thank you for the reasonable reply. Maybe all I am/was really looking for (and inadvertently found) was some evidence what we had was real and the implosion was just that. I'm not someone who gets obsessed with other people who don't want me the only thing I really ever connect to is... connection.

 

So I spent quite a while in utter confusion as that is what we had, and to this day I still feel it. Thus the implosion night in which she did a hard 180 confused me for months. As did her never replying to me as I figured even in a normal relationship with some time two people who really connected deeply would make peace (if one of them hadn't cheated, betrayed, stolen, etc) since at our core we had great affection/caring (we both said it was one of the 2-3 great connections of our lives we are both in our early-mid 40s)

 

Maybe you are right and I'll leave it where it is at; I guess I have pretty good evidence she is/was just as connected since 6 months later someone who didn't have those feelings would probably have blocked me or ignored the email or maybe opened it once and ignored it after.

 

If she HAS changed and has some agency and/or it is important enough she'll find a way to circle back and then we'll see.

 

She did "coincidentally" show up at our "old place" on a day/time I'd normally be there right after reading the emails the night before. I was late that night so in fact literally bumped into her on the way out and we both smiled and said 'hi'. I didn't push it as it felt like a nice first possible step and the first civil/affectionate exchange in almost 9 months.

[confusedInDenver]

My guess is she knows you can see she read them and she is trying to provoke a response.... the problem is that if you hit her up she is liable to blow you off, she also maybe grieving the relationship and trying to get over you...

 

I wouldn't do anything but that doesn't mean you should.. if you want hit her up, not an email but a text or phone call.

 

She definitely does not know. And if she did I doubt she'd do the 2an, 3am, 4am, 5am readings. It is clearly her pattern even with the emails I sent when we were together (as I found out).

 

I think she has made a couple efforts to put herself in my line of site or places I go which lets her not put herself on the line. As mentioned she did manage to do so recently which resulted in a passing and smile and 'hi' which neither of us pushed. Given the horror of the last time we spoke (January) and the fact we both went NC in hurt and confusion it seemed a nice first step (if that is what it was).

[confusedInDenver]

...she also maybe grieving the relationship and trying to get over you...

l

 

That is what makes this so strange. First that I am doing so second that she is. She is 'seeing' someone for 6 months (I think), I've been on some dates. But we have not communicated for over 1/2 a year and other then 1/2 dozen impromptu sightings (again where I either picked up and left or walked by as she did) we've had nothing to do with each other. Just my 4 emails. Yet here I am still feeling enough nostalgia and caring to reach out and she enough to read in bed at night over and over and over. Sounds less like grieving on both our parts. I'll let it rest and see what transpires...

[Rayce]

Maybe she is feeling the connection too... who knows what moves us to get up in the middle of the night to dwell on a lost love. do you know what caused the implosion? If it is meant to be then it will be. Maybe there are too many obstacles in the way. Maybe she doesn't know what to do or how to proceed. Lots of maybes... I hope it all gets sorted out for you both.

 

Peace

[confusedInDenver]

Maybe she is feeling the connection too... who knows what moves us to get up in the middle of the night to dwell on a lost love. do you know what caused the implosion? If it is meant to be then it will be. Maybe there are too many obstacles in the way. Maybe she doesn't know what to do or how to proceed. Lots of maybes... I hope it all gets sorted out for you both.

 

Peace

 

Thank you for the good thoughts Rayce.

 

The problem is I sort of know what moves her to read these things and it is killing me:

 

1) When she broke up she sneered at an email I sent a week or two back about a night we spent together. Yet it turns out as I find out 7 months later she read it 3x the night i sent it, 3x every night up to the time we broke up and then opened periodically after we broke up. Sneer indeed.

 

2) My other emails were read after we bumped into each other w/o fail. Once when I bumped into her with 'new guy' and walked past them a mutual 'acquiantance' reached out to 'see how I was' (turned out he did this each time we saw each other) and when I said 'great happy on a great date' vs grumbling and pining over her, she read EVERY email I ever sent her in a row an hour after that conversation

 

3) The post-break-up ones are read over and over days in a row and the latest was read yet again after she saw me in the street, and then, when hre return to 'out place' resulted in our first 'hi' ever she read that over and over until the wee hours

 

Who knows? Sounds like she is as bad as me :|

 

I dont' know what the meltdown was about. I know she was in a horrid spot before we 'started' and said things like 'I wish I hadn't met you when I was like this' and "I wish you knew me when I was myself' and "I finally met someone and now I have to deal with this' none of which sounded like BS (wasn't wining and dining and vacationing her). Connection was amazing to me, she siad was to her and independent 3rd parties corroboarted.

 

Some acquiantance I had came up and introduced herself to my 'fiiend' when we were together and next time said 'oh my god you finallly met 'the person' and when I said 'how do you know I'm even dating her' let alone 'the person' (since we weren't touching, making out, etc) siad 'really? you can tell across the room it is true love". Many similar stories including strangers who would say to us 'how long have you two been married?' even when we were sitting with other people/friends and, again, not touching.

 

Yet on her freak out night (when we were on our way to visit one of her childhood friends as a couple) she denied all of it; the special connection times meant nothing, she never liked me, my support meant nothing, my emails (the ones turned out she read 20x) where 'a joke'

 

I think she ran realzing what we had and knowing she could not do it. Otherwise 3/4 of a year later she'd just see the email and say 'oh that loser' and never open it. Not read over and over until she falls asleep.

 

I dunno. Not a kid and I've had one other woman look at me in my life like she does and the fact she still reads my stuff tells me I'm not off her.

 

The question is as always; what to do? Any my gut goes back and forth beteeen 'let her come to me' and 'reach out because she cannot'.

 

Man love sucks...

[Foxhall]

Personally if I had your thoughts process I would reach out to her,

 

what is stopping you, is it pride,

 

In fairness you are trying to understand and not feel bitter over her criticising you,

 

take the next step and go for a full reconciliation.

[confusedInDenver]

Personally if I had your thoughts process I would reach out to her,

 

what is stopping you, is it pride,

 

In fairness you are trying to understand and not feel bitter over her criticising you,

 

take the next step and go for a full reconciliation.

 

Well. She didn't 'criticize me'. She near eviscerated me and it was one of the worst and most traumatic nights of my life and i have dealt with a LOT of real trauma in the last 10-15 years of my life.

 

I have put any anger/bitterness behind me thus the nice letters but yeah that last night plus the lack of reply has me skittish beyond belief.

 

When we were together it was confusing as could possibly be imagined and the break-up was no less so.

 

So I appreciate the thought but it is not pride, I threw that out the window when I reached out to her w/o a shred of acrimony or blame.

 

Fear perhaps. Of being ignored or reamed maybe. Almost more so of reconciliation.

[Rayce]

eviscerated... I had to look that up. Pretty harsh... If I put myself in her shoes... sometimes my mind/tongue is sharp beyond belief especially if I feel slighted or backed into a corner. Some of the things that come out can impact me and others for along time. In those cases guilt will keep me from reaching out. Maybe she is embarrassed about it all and doesn't know how to say she is sorry.

[confusedInDenver]

eviscerated... I had to look that up. Pretty harsh... If I put myself in her shoes... sometimes my mind/tongue is sharp beyond belief especially if I feel slighted or backed into a corner. Some of the things that come out can impact me and others for along time. In those cases guilt will keep me from reaching out. Maybe she is embarrassed about it all and doesn't know how to say she is sorry.

 

HI again Rayce. For the heck of it I looked it up too and I liked this definition as it fits to a tee what she did:

 

"deprive (something) of its essential content."

 

It is in fact a hallmark of Borderline and Bipolar, especially the latter (Bipolar Rage). I've read hearbreaking admissions by women with BPD or BP about what they've said and lost, and in large part because their senses are so attuned to the people they attach to that they can use those insights to rip you to pieces like no one else:

 

"“Our keen perceptions and hypervigilance we applied when we were learning about you, becomes the double edged sword of a tongue we will lay you open with. Every kind thing, turned into a litany of how it's all your fault."

 

and

 

"That's what makes BPD so tragic. It's what makes you think I conned you. I was conning myself. When it turns dark, it feels like it's a shrapnel bomb, and you can't believe what you're seeing. What you're seeing is who I never want to see either, but, have to learn to love anyway, before I can ever hope to be loved genuinely by you"

 

 

That night could not be described better. Made my heart go out to her more than I can say. Like watching someone drowning in quicksand.

 

It is one reason I kept reaching out without blame or pressure or need, to give her that door and let her know there was no anger just caring.

 

I'm hopefully not hopefully assuming that last week's "appearance" alone at my place and her actually having the courage to say 'hi' was as much as she can do. I won't bore you with details but there was another incident weeks back when I was with a friend and we sorta but not sorta bumped into her and he said 'clear as day; she was putting herself in your path because she just couldn't make herself tap you on the shoulder and say hi. You should have let her off the hook'.

 

She's a strange and self-protective cookie (abused as child by her dad among other things). A few months back I actually included in my email 'if you feel like saying anything to me I'll be at such and such a place on such and such a date'. Probably too soon and out of the blue given my stonewalling her for months.

 

She read that 10 times over 4 days and showed up such and such a place a few days later. With 'the guy'. Not sure if they are dating but very much like her to protect herself. If she actually is with the guy then why show up of the millions of places to go otherwise 1 hour after yet again reading the letter about me being there? To let me know she is happy and moved on? Happy and moved on wouldn't even open the email yet alone read 20 times and show up right?

 

But this is what I mean about lack of agency. She couldn't show up alone because it would admit she read it and wanted to reconnect and was actively taking a step to do so. I guess when your Dad beats you and tells you are you worthless crap it is hard to reconcile a man that kisses your hands and tells you you are amazing and you only know one way of getting the attention you want. Make daddy mad. Very sad I took the showing up for what it seemed to mean; the letter meant something to her as do I. How she handled/handles it is up to her.

 

As I read my own words it seems likely my best bet for my own sanity and happiness is to let her get her s*** together or not and then make a choice or not. Stepping back in otherwise is madness. And I just finished sewing my guts back up

[Foxhall]

Well. She didn't 'criticize me'. She near eviscerated me and it was one of the worst and most traumatic nights of my life and i have dealt with a LOT of real trauma in the last 10-15 years of my life.

 

I have put any anger/bitterness behind me thus the nice letters but yeah that last night plus the lack of reply has me skittish beyond belief.

 

When we were together it was confusing as could possibly be imagined and the break-up was no less so.

 

So I appreciate the thought but it is not pride, I threw that out the window when I reached out to her w/o a shred of acrimony or blame.

 

Fear perhaps. Of being ignored or reamed maybe. Almost more so of reconciliation.

 

People can lash out in a moment of rage at their nearest and dearest,I am talking about in a verbal sense of course,

I often feel the injured party writes them off too quickly and does not show enough of a forgiving nature or show more understanding towards what the individual may be going through themselves that caused them to lash out,

 

You have acknowledged her condition though and shown you may be prepared to reconcile, and while that may present some difficulties as you allude, I feel you are up for the challenge.

[confusedInDenver]

People can lash out in a moment of rage at their nearest and dearest,I am talking about in a verbal sense of course,

I often feel the injured party writes them off too quickly and does not show enough of a forgiving nature or show more understanding towards what the individual may be going through themselves that caused them to lash out,

 

You have acknowledged her condition though and shown you may be prepared to reconcile, and while that may present some difficulties as you allude, I feel you are up for the challenge.

 

More absolute terror than rage. And I had forgiven a lot for months and put aside a lot of needs to take care of her. Even to the point of understanding she couldn't sustain a relationship and just telling her I was there for her however she needed. Would have taken a saint to forgive at that point without her reaching out this one time and yet she continued to spiral and escalate.

 

That is what led me to researching and to the Bipolar Rage and Borderline Personality 'devaluing' because it made. no. sense.

 

I really still don't know which 'her' is real; the one I didn't recognize that was screaming "I'm not attracted to you don't want you none of those magic moments you mentioned [which everyone else commented on] meant anything or anything to me you are a fool for thinking so your help [which almost killed me] didn't help at all or mean a thing to me your adoration of me is pathetic your love letters are stupid [the ones it turned out she read over and over during and months after the relationship] everyone knows all this except you [decidedly untrue most people commented on the connection]".

 

This after months of basically 'you are the one' and 'wait for me' and my taking it on the chin believing that... let's say forgiveness came hard And reaching out harder. And making an effort at reconnecting? Near impossible.

 

About a week out from her ''coincidental" appearance and less than a week from her wee hours re-readings. I guess I have some time to mull.

 

I do appreciate the caring advise and insights very much though.

[Fekenaws]

I was the dumpee in my last relationship but I re-read old letters once or twice. It's usually nostalgia or when I missed them deeply, but all they did was provoke tears and more emotions. There is no real reason to re-read old messages, I think people should avoid doing so.

[confusedInDenver]

I was the dumpee in my last relationship but I re-read old letters once or twice. It's usually nostalgia or when I missed them deeply, but all they did was provoke tears and more emotions. There is no real reason to re-read old messages, I think people should avoid doing so.

 

Hi Fekenaws do you mean the dumpER? I am the dumpee here (even though I walked away after she tore me apart dumping me). I've reread emails from her as the dumpee, that I get, and it makes sense as much as it hurts (and can sometimes provide closure). But when doe the dumPER read old emails and new 'love' emails over and over and over months later. Is that what you mean?

[Rayce]

You said you "think" she is bipolar. Why bipolar or borderline? Could her behavior be related to some other mental illness? When you say bipolar rage do you mean that she became physically violent?

[confusedInDenver]

You said you "think" she is bipolar. Why bipolar or borderline? Could her behavior be related to some other mental illness? When you say bipolar rage do you mean that she became physically violent?

 

I know for a fact BP she told me (well into dating of course :| ). Borderline sort of fit the relationship trajectory/arc and they are often co-morbid (yeah I know more about this than I should now). But BP for sure.

 

Bipolar Rage is sometimes violent but that is not the hallmark; it is generally when a person with BP comes out of extreme depression (check) and is hit by Mania and they often lash out at loved ones with all of the observational skills they bring to relationships and destroy them. She wasn't physically violent at all she just systematically attacked and destroyed... everything. Not just like she was trying to hurt me and us but to destroy my view of her. She did a great job :|

 

A quote from a BPD/BP person I spoke with when I said it was like leaving someone behind in quicksand when you can do nothing except die with them:

 

"I know the feeling of 'quicksand'. I have also been told, ‘I can't come back for you anymore.’"

 

Heartbreaking.

[Rayce]

Thank you for your reply. I am sorry that does sound heartbreaking.

[confusedInDenver]

Thank you for your reply. I am sorry that does sound heartbreaking.

 

Yah the only reason I reached out and reach out. If it were "just" a woman who got mean/flipped-out I'd have burned her in effigy long ago with emails and texts and never looked back or thought of her again.

 

The very fact she reads/re-reads etc months and months later and seems to dip her toe into physical contact leads me to believe the whole manic episode/rage is spot on. I mean if she MEANT all that stuff my emails would be un-read.

 

Thanks for the empathy and concern. From both of us

[somanymistakes]

re-reading old letters can be for many reasons.

 

sometimes it's to remind yourself why you broke up with them.

sometimes it's to try and figure out what went wrong.

sometimes it's like a kind of emotional masturbation, briefly revisiting those old feelings, remembering the excitement, possibly even remembering the excitement of breaking up and the feeling of power over someone who loved you

sometimes it's to compare an old relationship to a new one

sometimes it's because you're pining over a lost love

 

just saying these options so as not to be TOO certain that you know what it means. people are weird.

[confusedInDenver]

re-reading old letters can be for many reasons.

 

sometimes it's to remind yourself why you broke up with them.

sometimes it's to try and figure out what went wrong.

sometimes it's like a kind of emotional masturbation, briefly revisiting those old feelings, remembering the excitement, possibly even remembering the excitement of breaking up and the feeling of power over someone who loved you

sometimes it's to compare an old relationship to a new one

sometimes it's because you're pining over a lost love

 

just saying these options so as not to be TOO certain that you know what it means. people are weird.

 

Hi if I were too certain I wouldn't have posted

 

I think the timings (whenever she'd see me) are interesting for sure.

 

And the latest one(s) aren't old emails. They are new very caring/nostalgic emails wishing her well. Those she reads over and over. The last one she read 3 times when I sent, then saw me the next week and visited 'our place' (I came in and left not sure if she saw but likely since she had not been in weeks) the she read them over and over that night, caome BACK in same place and saw me briefly and said hi and re-read over and over that pm (at least 4 likely several times that from 1am to 5am).

 

Could she be enjoying the fact she still has power over me? Knowing who she is sure, she has some twisted views of love (even talks about having 'the upper hand' in relationships). It just somehow doesn't gibe; it is over 1/2 year later getting such a nice email that totally contradicts the last things I said and reassures I have no animosity only caring. If it were 'I pine for you I've not stopped loving you take me back' maybe some hidesous person woujld get off on it. It's just .... caring. Which was the hallmark of our relatioship, one reason she'd say how safe she felt or able to do ABC for the first time or reconnect to her old self with me.

 

Yah I have noooo idea why. I just know it means SOMETHING and A LOT and they've both been instigated by seeing me and driven her to see me.

 

I'll stipulate that knowing anything about her is impossible I've never experienced ANYTHING in my life where multieple contradictory scenarios can ALL Be explained by the same actions.

 

The sorta consensus by people who knew uf/of us was that she never expected me to strike back and walk away. It took me months to reach out after a pretty endless series of rebuffs (walking out, not contacting, walking by her, making mutual acquiantances think I was happily moved on, etc). So whilst I don't know for sure seems like she is trying to convince her self my reassurances are for real. I dunno man. I'm sure there are far easier women to love in the world!

Edited September 4, 2019 by confusedInDenver

[LivingWaterPlease]

I'm sure there are far easier women to love in the world!

 

You're right. There are.

 

After reading your first post with the description of your relationship and then the description of her lashing out that night at you I figured she was either bipolar, had a borderline personality disorder, or both.

 

There's no way to know exactly what she's thinking as she reads your emails. But, you are so wise, IMO, not to reach out to her again.

 

Probably she lashes out at most people she gets close to, given the time.

[confusedInDenver]

You're right. There are.

 

After reading your first post with the description of your relationship and then the description of her lashing out that night at you I figured she was either bipolar, had a borderline personality disorder, or both.

 

There's no way to know exactly what she's thinking as she reads your emails. But, you are so wise, IMO, not to reach out to her again.

 

Probably she lashes out at most people she gets close to, given the time.

 

On the reach out, yeah, that is why I went utterly No Contact, ignored her in person and didn't contact. When I finally did it was with no expectation/hope/desire to reconnect in person. I get she is deeply damaged and likely no amount of therapy or self-awareness will ever fix the issues. I simply can't help having formed a really deep bond to and with her.

 

FYI I don't think she is prone to destroying things with people the way she did with me, she has long-term friends, male and female and is quite high-functioning/successful.

 

My belief is when she met me she'd decided to, because of a recent calamity, turn her life around and have a real non toxic caring relationship (which she used to but gravitated after towards toxic narcissistic controlling passionate relationships). We had a great connection and she tried but I think she couldn't sustain it and knew it and felt herself pulled back to her old ways and lashed out at me either in fury or maybe even to protect me. She had once said 'you should run from me" and I think maybe the lash out was her way of making sure I did.

 

In any event it leads to my supposition that, snce she found herself back in that life and with that kind of guy again she reads my emails late at night and after she sees me in the street (when I don't interact) as a way of touching that part of herself again or that it is possible to her.

 

I'm pretty astonished I'm still so connected. Maybe seeing she read and when just made what we had all that more real and honestly I'd spent months believing every horrible word she said about me in her fury/terror. Hearing a woman you love sneer at your love letter (wherein I simply promised to be there for her however and whenever she needed) and then find out months later by accident that she in fact read it over and over and over again when you sent it and then many times after you broke up is a push-pull on your heart and soul it is hard to describe.

 

Onwards!

[confusedInDenver]

...possibly even remembering the excitement of breaking up and the feeling of power over someone who loved you...

 

This is so alien to me. The entire concept. Who wants power over someone who.... loves them? Your power comes from them... loving you. Loving. You. I get it can make you feel good, it should. But where does it turn into power and upper-hand and how? I can't imagine the damaged view of self and love it would take to feel you have 'power' over someone who loves you and more to the point in having exercised that power to hurt them. To me it honestly sounds like as good a definition of evil as I've heard (not aiming this at you somanymistakes just the concept you pointed out).