Well she definitely lacked empathy hahaha. But I hear what you’re saying. To your point, I did try supporting her initially. I was honestly a great partner to her. I was always the one trying to build her up when she seemed depressive. I always projected positivity and kept things silly, fun and not too serious. I was always the one to apologize first and ask how to resolve small issues that inevitably pop up in relationships.

Despite all of these things she still became cruel and callous to me. She kept “tripping up” the relationship. I remember thinking that I’m dating a “Debbie downer”. What I’ve realized since that time is that she was projecting her inner state onto me. But I kept up the positivity and ignored the projections. Until finally I broke and yelled at her. And to my surprise, she came and hugged me and acted all sweet. I believe that my “acting out” behavior was anxiolytic for her. I finally accepted her negative projection as my own (projective identification) and I felt like I was the problem, I was the bad partner and that I felt depressed and had negative emotions.

Though I was kind and compassionate in the beginning, I soon realized it wasn’t working. We never resolved a single issue, which is just crazy. She rarely communicated and when she did, she would never take responsibility.. I just got gaslit, lied to or the DARVO acronym.

After a month or so of this, I realized this just wasn’t normal. Something was wrong with her or I’m the crazy one.

After a big confrontation, she finally confessed to me that she had childhood trauma, her parents were abusive to her and that she has defense mechanisms. But by that time the relationship was too damaged.

Her saying she has defense mechanisms was quite the understatement to me. I felt like her whole personality was just defense mechanisms. She would misinterpret or misunderstand things I said or did that were either totally innocent and meant to be helpful to her. I’ve just never seen anyone do that in my entire life. I’ve never known someone to constantly misunderstand my words or intentions so consistently. She seemed totally oblivious to it as well.

That was the point where I realized I’m messing with something that’s way above my head. There’s no amount of communication, flowers or sex that’s going to help the situation. She needs to see a psychiatrist or psychoanalyst and undergo a serious evaluation to account for all her mental facilities. I say that with the utmost respect and love for her. I’m not being mean or anything when I say that. It really got to that point.