Being in a relationship with a partner as loving and supportive as mine has made me realise just how AWFUL my exes were to me. They say that hindsight is 20/20 and that could not be more true because how on Earth did I not realise it back then? Sure, I knew some of them were treating me badly but it gets worse the more I think about it. I also can’t help but wonder if my neurodivergent traits made me an easier target. I will preface this post by saying I do not blame myself at all for how these people treated me but I do feel like I was easier to manipulate when I was younger and unaware of my traits.

For example, when I was 17 I had started seeing one of my closest friends from college (rookie move. I know.) and I thought it was great because he was such a good friend! Surely, he’d be a great boyfriend. Right? He was nice to me and made me feel special. Not that it took a lot, I was fresh out of school where no one ever made me feel pretty or worth any attention so my self-esteem was pretty low. The bar? Even lower. So, when he showed me attention, I took it and ran. Eventually we became a bit more intimate. But we weren’t official! I set a boundary and told him I didn’t want to sleep with him (or anyone) if we weren’t together officially. He had every opportunity to end things then and there if he wasn’t interested in a relationship but he made it official! However, he loved to remind me a lot that he ‘almost didn’t ask me to be his girlfriend’ that day because I said something ‘so horrible to him’ and me being forgetful and quite known for saying the wrong thing quite often without meaning to, I believed him. I constantly asked him what it was that I’d said but he never told me and I just kept apologising anyways not knowing what it was that I was apologising for.

It was after we’d broke up that I realised he was referring to my boundary. The ‘horrible’ thing I’d said was “If you want to be with me, make it official. If not, we’re just friends. We won’t sleep together.” that’s it. To refer to that as ‘horrible’ was bad enough but to hold it over my head and use my guilt against me, to manipulate me was awful! He was a terrible boyfriend, we’d barely go on dates, he never ever prioritised me, he’d embarrass me, and it was always me who apologised even when he was at fault! Anyways, he slept with someone who I considered one of my best friends in college (who was friends with us as a couple) and then tried to gaslight me into giving him money in our first year of uni purely because he’d blown his student loan. He was a pretty shitty person and, for other people’s sake, I hope he’s not like that anymore.

That ex is my best example of someone using my traits to manipulate me. He openly described me as anxious and gullible and he was right! I was anxious and gullible but that gave him no right to use me the way that he did.

A lot later down the line, I started a long-distance relationship with someone I’d met on Tinder. I’d only just started to question if I had AuDHD at this point but I was still very unsure because I didn’t know anything about Autism or ADHD. He’d not long been diagnosed with ADHD and was considering becoming a mental health professional. He seemed cute, funny, sensitive, exactly what I wanted. But when he came to visit me in Sheffield for a month, he became someone else entirely. He got mad when I said I was considering being assessed for ADHD. Said how everyone thinks they have ADHD now that he’s been diagnosed. It was as if he was the only one allowed to have ADHD, that everyone was just copying him. I told him that we attract people that are similar to ourselves in friendships and relationships so it’s not that his friends were copying him but that they were simply like him. Now, a lot of people with ADHD tend to feel emotions so deeply and that was true for both of us. But it felt like only his emotions were allowed. If he was sad, I had to be sad with him. If he was happy, I also had to be happy. I was never allowed to be upset or happy or even tired when he wasn’t.

One incident I remember was when he’d had a haircut. It’d been a while since his last one and he went a lot shorter than he was used to. We got back to my share house and I wanted to take a nap since I hadn’t slept much. He was sulking about his hair and was just in a really shitty mood but I told him he just wasn’t used to it yet! I’d had long hair, short hair, pink hair, ginger hair, blonde hair, and brown hair so I understood that initial ‘Ah! What have I done?! I don’t like it!’ feeling all too well. I tried to leave it at that and get some rest but before I knew it, he was screaming at me. He was hysterical basically mad at me for not agreeing with him. Called me a liar for saying the haircut looked good. It was so strange but I backed down anyways. It was quite scary! Months later, when I was back in my hometown, he broke up with me because ‘he couldn’t handle my mental health problems’. I was struggling but I never spoke to him about it much because I never felt safe enough to. I just cracked a few jokes. But I was constantly expected to listen to his problems. Terrifying to think he might be a mental health professional now.

He was the first person that I’d ever been in a relationship in where my friends have said “I’m glad you’re not with him anymore”. My best friend shared the house he’d stayed in with me and was there for the whole month he visited. She heard and witnessed the way he treated me. And she was (thankfully) not shy about sharing her relief with me when we split up.

Luckily, after a few other messy relationships and situationships, I’m now one amazing year into a relationship with someone who takes the time to understand my needs, helps me in anyway he can, does his research on neurodivergence and what it means for me, allows me to feel my big feelings without taking it as an attack, and is overall just so lovely to me that I sometimes can’t believe he’s real.

To my ‘Wave’, I’m so incredibly thankful for you. I know you have to put up with my meltdowns, my fussiness, my exhaustion, my RSD, my bursts of emotion, my impulsivity, my low-energy days, my high-energy days, and my everything. I won’t apologise for it. I know you’ll just say “Babe, there’s nothing to be sorry for.” and I’m learning my lesson. But thank you anyway. And thank you for teaching me that I shouldn’t be ashamed of my traits. I love you.