[Serious] What event do you think changed the entire outcome of your life?

This sounds kinda stupid, but an instagram dm. I was enamored by this artist's work and happened to be in the same city so I sent him a message that I wanted to be in his pictures. A lot of time and a broken leg happened before he actually agreed. We ended up having this intense organic connection that all happened very quickly.

I had been a little depressed from the broken leg and being stuck inside for a couple months and he stopped talking to me because i was too negative. Fast forward a few weeks and I find out I'm pregnant. We argued, he bailed, I miscarried.

Now I would have not had a baby regardless, but this took me completely by surprise and fucked with me on every emotional level I did not know was possible. We never dated or were together, but after that a very emotionally abusive 'relationship' between us developed for about a year.

Before the mc, I was always a little off emotionally but still lively and opinionated and relatively strong (I thought), and then I had turned into a complete nightmare. With the emotional abuse, my mindset went from stubborn "no I'm not taking this shit," to questioning myself "maybe the mc was my fault, maybe the fights between us are my fault," to completely accepting and internalizing the emotional accusations "I need to just be more accommodating to his situation, I definitely am overreacting, I am a burden, he's right: I am broken, I am fucked in the head, my problems don't matter, my feelings don't matter, I'm too emotional, I deserve this, this happened because I was too easy, I'm crazy, I don't deserve to have him care about me, this is happening because I'm a bad person," to me apologizing to him for basically existing and having burdened him with having had a miscarriage and me being in his life, to me radically changing my behavior to accommodate his and beg him to not dispose of me completely despite my shortcomings, to me changing my outlook on the world to rationalize what was happening "humans are not inherently valuable, we don't owe each other anything, empathy has to be earned, kindness is not a default standard."

We don't talk anymore and I went to therapy. The me before this would be so ashamed of who I became and what I tolerated. I never told any of my friends or family about this because I was so embarrassed. It's good to see this from a distance because now I can analyze it without being under that veil. And I learned that this wasn't an isolated incident, but just a more intense version of similar relationships I had been attracted to my whole life.

It's hard every single day, but if I want to make it through the other side I have to accept that my feelings matter, that I have some value, and that I don't deserve to be constantly told otherwise. I find myself isolated, but slowly getting better, and with a lot more empathy for other people. I am very careful of how I listen and comfort people now, because I understand how vital it is just to feel heard and that your feelings are valid.

/r/AskReddit Thread