How toxic do you think my relationship was? It feels like it cost me 3 years of my life. (20M)

Let me start by saying that before this relationship, my life was in a really good place. I was a talented track runner, had lifelong friends, and was genuinely happy. But things changed the summer before my junior year of high school. I was struggling to move on from a yearlong relationship with a girl who was kind, attractive, and part of my friend group, which made it harder.

One night, I was at a friend’s house, and we all got drunk. A girl I kind of knew told me she had feelings for me, and about a week later, we started dating. I wasn’t too into her, but it felt like a way to get over my ex. (Looking back, I know this was emotionally immature.) Over time, I realized she was really into me, and I began to question the relationship. She would get jealous and worried about other girls constantly.

At a party one night, my ex ended up in the hospital with alcohol poisoning, and I was really worried. She FaceTimed me, crying and scared, and asked me to come to the hospital. So I went to support her. The experience affected me deeply. My girlfriend wasn’t happy about this, which I understood. Unfortunately, I feel like she took advantage of me throughout this very vulnerable time. At a party about a week later, my girlfriend was setting my ex up with some other guy and spent the whole night rubbing it in my face. I think she wanted to get my ex out of the picture, and it worked because they started dating. But I was very hurt by the experience. After that, things just kept getting worse.

She started talking shit about my friends, got mad when I hung out with them, and would guilt me for not spending every minute with her. But when I got sad about not hanging out with them as much, she would encourage me, only to get furious afterward for “leaving her alone.” I started pulling away from things I loved. She wasn’t interested in anything I did, like playing guitar, and would be annoyed if I ever played. Even my main passion, running, began to suffer. My race times dropped, and I thought it was performance anxiety, but it turned out I was just depressed and anxious in general.

She didn’t seem to care about what was happening to me, and things with my friends got even worse as she started fighting with them. I pulled away from everyone—friends, family, even my brother. I wasn’t happy, but for some reason, I stayed with her for two years. Throughout that time period she would make me feel like I wasn’t worthy of anyone. She called me a twink and other names I can’t remember. However, her affection made me feel like she was the only person I had. When I finally left for college, I broke up with her. She didn’t take it well and blew up my phone for months.

Even after that, I had really bad codependency issues and jumped into another relationship. She was a great person, but I was emotionally unavailable and isolated myself again, with no friends. Eventually, I realized I couldn’t keep living like that, so I broke up with her at the end of the year to focus on fixing my mistakes. We are still friends to this day, and after I opened up to her about my situation she has been one of my biggest supporters. I spent the whole summer trying to rebuild relationships, and I’m glad to say I’ve made some progress. I’m close with my people back at home again and things are looking better.

When I went back to college, I still didn’t have any friends, but I put myself out there every day, and now I’ve made some close friends. I feel like I’m becoming myself again. I’ve also started processing the relationship just recently because I think my brain repressed a lot of the memories. I’ve been grieving the time I lost and trying to understand what happened. I still get nervous about seeing her when I go home, and I feel emotionally scarred by the experience. It’s like my brain just shut off for those three years, and now I’m just starting to remember everything.

That being said, my future is looking better. I’m at a good college, making friends, and focusing on healing. Interestingly, my everyday processing has improved and I’m starting to do better in school. I would like to get better at setting boundaries and becoming a more secure person. I’m not going to date anyone until I’m emotionally available again and I think it will take some work. I might edit the post if more memories come back to me. It’s really weird because I completely forgot the experience at the hospital and the party afterwards ever happened. I only remembered it about a week ago and more memories are starting to come back to me. If anyone has advice, thoughts on the situation, or kind words, I’d really appreciate it.

tl:dr: I experienced a toxic two-year relationship that caused me to lose touch with friends, hobbies, and myself. Despite realizing early on that the relationship wasn’t right, emotional manipulation and codependency led to stay. After the break up, I have struggled with emotional scars. I’m focused on healing, setting boundaries, rebuilding relationships, and not entering another relationship until I’m emotionally ready.