38. He made himself throw up repeatedly in our shared bathroom as a ploy to get my affection and attention.
“My ex and I had planned a trip to Europe together while we were still in a relationship. We had no large fallout or anything, I just felt towards the end that I didn’t have any romantic feelings for him anymore. I told him this eventually, and we decided to give it another month to see if it was just a phase or something. It wasn’t, and we ended it civilly. We were still in the same social/hobby group so we remained friendly, and he insisted we still go on the trip. I was hesitant, but he was certain it would be fine and we had hung out many times at that point as friends so I said sure—but not to expect me to be clung to his side, as I had wanted us to do our own things on the trip. He thought it was a great idea and had lined up a bunch of plans for himself.
The first night in, he made himself throw up repeatedly in our shared bathroom as a ploy to get my affection and attention. It didn’t work, so he threatened to hurt me. That didn’t work, so he sprung it on me that he would be leaving come the next morning. This left me to pay with the entirety of the hotel and rest of the costs, which I couldn’t afford as we had split all the split-able costs. Not to mention, I was in a country I had never been to before, totally alone, in my teens, and scared/worried/anxious out of my mind. I racked up so much money crying all day on the phone to my dad that Verizon laughed at us when we asked for a break on the cost, ha. I had to get an emergency flight home. His mom lied for him to the airline and said he was sick, so they didn’t change him to move his flight. My flight wasn’t free, and I paid nearly four digits to get home because it was on Christmas Eve that I had to leave.”
39. He traveled all the way from England to stalk me at a show.
“I dated a guy long distance between Arizona and Manchester, England. We were a really toxic relationship, and he was abusive. 6 months after the break up, he had found out that I was traveling to Dallas to see my favorite band live. My current boyfriend flew with me to the show because I had a weird feeling that my ex would show up. While I was parking our car, my boyfriend texted me saying a guy matching my ex’s description with an English accent was in line. It was my ex. He stood eerily close to us during the show, and I was genuinely afraid that he would do something like kill me or himself. The fact that he traveled all the way from England to spook me at the show of my favorite artist stood as the ultimate testament to how mentally abusive he was.”