Lately I’ve been realizing I’m not as “leveled up” as I thought. This weekend I had a whole break down and just realized I have been letting one particular person drag me on a periodic basis for the past 10 years. I know that’s it’s been 10 years because I have always kept a journal throughout life. I am moving and I went through my old journals. I felt happy bc my mindset has improved drastically from the needy young woman I once was due to lifelong abuse from my family but I started to romanticize an unrequited relationship. Anyway when I met this particular person, I put them on a pedestal because I felt like they were good. He represented how I wanted to be seen by others and he was nice. We had a really nice infatuation period but it was ruined because a former very toxic romantic partner r*ped me and threatened to have me jumped if I told anyone. I went to this man and explained to him the best I could what happened without saying much. I remember it well because the conversation started with us holding hands and he immediately pushed me after I told him what happened. We were both kids at the time but that’s still no excuse. Anyway until graduation I basically spent 2 years begging/trying to prove that I was not a whore to this person. I grew up and “got over it” once we graduated. I’ve tried to date this person a few times throughout my adult life, it seems like we’re always in each others lives for a few months once every 1-2 years. Since graduating he always tries to have sex with me immediately which turned me off and I never gave into it. So then he decided to be chivalrous one evening when we went to the bar and were very drunk. He was saying everything I needed to hear about the past. Saying he understood and he felt bad about the way he treated me at that time. Foolish me felt like this was sincere since he admitted this unprompted. I’ve never really told him what really happened and I don’t want to tbh anyway that night was maybe 4 years ago and it seems like ever since then whenever I meet with him; he does everything to show that he’s disgusting. It’s crazy because I know he was raised right; he just doesn’t feel that I am a woman that deserves respect. I had an ugly thought that maybe he is still punishing me for what happened when we first met. It made me cry because I really have a Scarlett letter on my back from dealing with that toxic person and I felt like I was being punished for something that wasn’t really my fault. I felt ashamed to even admit that some stupid dude that I had a crush on at 16 managed to smash my heart to pieces again at 26. I just blocked him on everything because he was breadcrumbing me and using me as an ego boost. It gave me an ugly feeling and brought me back to a time when I felt extremely disrespected and violated by everyone I knew. Idk I probably need to go back to therapy but lately I’ve been feeling like people are only interested in me for sexual reasons even though I’m not very sexual. I don’t even post sexy pics. I’m just not sure why I keep getting treated like this by everyone. I feel like nobody cares about me unless they are looking at me lustfully. It makes me feel very....subhuman. Ugh.