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Wellness > Mental Health

An Open Letter To The Boy Who Broke Up With Me For Being “Too Sad”

Grace Miller
Allie Bausinger
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at PSU chapter.

I’ve spent so long wanting to hate you. Venting to my friends about how you screwed me over. How you left me at such a vulnerable time in my life. And while I have no intentions of ever speaking you again, I’ve made some connections. 

Thank you for the day you broke up with me. I was at the beach with a friend, and you texted me that you couldn’t handle dating me anymore because I was too sad. 

Thank you for making me realize that boyfriends aren’t therapists. For helping me understand that I can’t funnel all of my emotions into one person and expect a healthy relationship.

Thank you for pushing me away. Even though I felt like I was drowning, I was actually learning to swim from the world’s shittiest lifeguard. 

Thank you for the poems I wrote about you, some of which ended up in a school project. I still love the way I strung together words, but I disconnected them from you. 

Thank you for teaching me to raise my standards. Now, I know how it feels to be genuinely and wholeheartedly appreciated. 

Thank you for the nights I spent crying in bed. I was sixteen, doubting that I was worthy of love because I was too much of a burden.

Thank you for the hours I spent with my therapist, trying to understand that I wasn’t the problem. She doesn’t like you, by the way.

Thank you for the ongoing trust issues. Before I open up to anyone, I consider that they might leave because I’m too much. Sometimes you win, and I can’t do it. Other times, I win and I build stronger connections with people I love. 

You texted me a week after you broke up with me, apologizing for what you said by telling me that my sadness was “interesting”, and couldn’t we try this again? 

Here’s what I’ve wanted to tell you for so long: my mental health is not interesting. My depression is not entertainment for you or anyone. If you knew me at all, you’d know that I never believed in the “find a boy to kiss your scars” fantasy. Really, it hurt most that you came back with such a twisted misunderstanding of what I was going through.

I hope you’re happy wherever you are. Truly, I do. I hope you found someone you love as much as I love my boyfriend. I hope you treat them better than you treated me. 

After you hurt me, I was able to grow and learn to love myself. I was able to recognize my own worth, apart from a relationship. I was able to recognize that there isn’t always truth in the words of other people. Now, I know myself better than anyone else. 

While I might have been sad, I was (and still am) worthy of love.

Love,

The girl who made it through

Hi, I'm Grace! I am an avid believer in accepting the things you can't change. I am a cat-loving, dream-seeking, accident prone yogi with a sometimes unreasonable desire to make a difference. I'm a Penn State student planning to pursue journalism, so you could say writing is kind of a big deal to me.
Allie Bausinger is a Penn State University graduate who majored in Print/Digital Journalism with a minor in English. She is from "outside Philadelphia," which in her case is Yardley, Pennsylvania. Allie is looking for full-time employment in writing, editing, fact-checking, podcasting, and other areas of the journalism and writing fields.