Sometimes when I think back I feel bad. Was I wrong for abandoning my ex boyfriend?

No. It’s not like he is going to file a human rights complaint
That would be weird if one could. He could take it badly, and raise a stink or harrass you.

It sounds like you are developing healthy boundaries.

I’ve been dumped and it hurts. However I would have liked to find out that we were incombatable early on
before I had my life entrenched with my ex-girlfriend. I would have liked to have a chance to save the relationship, instead of being ghosted, and cops called.

Men and women ideally should have the freedom to pick
, and choose who they date. Some men, and one woman that I know get physically violent with those who reject them.

Sounds like you dodged a bullet.

Nope. Don’t feel bad. The guy was not straight up with you in the beginning. He was trying to use you to likely be mama #4.

When he wanted to move in and have you support him, you were under no obligation to do that even if he was straight with you up front.

For him to get mad at you for not letting him “no” and to try guilt tripping him tells you a lot about him. He was a manipulator and a user (uses people). Not to mention that by saying he saved your life so you owe him shows that everything he does has a string attached.

He made many choices along the way that brought him to the point he reached. You were not a part of any of those choices and should not be responsible to make life nice for him so he doesn’t have to own up to his own mistakes. Walk away, don’t have anything more to do with this person, and don’t buy into any guilt…you have none.

He sounds like a user to me. If he lost his job, he should have found another. I go through my town and there are help wanted signs everywhere.
Lots of people hold down two or three jobs to feed their kids.
Never feel responsible for someone else’s actions or inactions. You indeed dodged a bullet.

three kids by three different mothers is a RED FLAG.
“Used to work a job” is a RED FLAG
“can I live with you or I’ll go to jail” is a RED FLAG

I think that says enough. The next question would have been “will you pay this child support so I don’t go to jail”
Then it goes down hill from there and you’re baby momma #4 with no hope of getting child support.

You can’t save people from themselves. They make their own choices.
You made a correct choice.

Sounds like a narcissist. But if he helped you, you could also have helped him. I can see both sides, and don’t know the full story.

I have a rule about people staying at my house for a reason, people tend to try to take advantage of kind people. I think you made the right decision, based on the info here.

Not jumping on you @KNOWITALL, but people should help others out without expecting anything in return.
He sounds like he expected a return on his kind act.

Guilt is a tough emotion. It’s something that lingers, or can linger, for a lifetime, and it can come on and off.

I agree with @filmfann Wow did you ever dodge a bullet! I can’t help but imagine your life if you’d let him stay with you and suspect that your life would have been basically ruined.

There’s a part of you that may always feel some guilt because we’re taught to care about and help others, especially those less fortunate. We’re not as readily taught to take care of ourselves first.

@Blackwater_Park “three kids by three different mothers is a RED FLAG.
“Used to work a job” is a RED FLAG
“can I live with you or I’ll go to jail” is a RED FLAG

I think that says enough.”

YES, yes it does.

I’m more concerned that the OP is even asking the question. it seems like her red flag radar is completely miscalibrated to even come close to feeling any emotion other than relief at not getting sucked into a toxic situation. I think she’s got a thing for handsome scumbags. I would encourage her to break out of that mindset ASAP!

NO…you were NOT wrong!!! HE chose to get 3 different women pregnant…you didn’t. It sounds like he had meant to make you his 4th baby momma. Had he moved in, he would have expected sex. He wouldn’t have had a job & I bet he wasn’t looking for one. So, you would have been the next single momma to NOT receive child support & he would have moved out. It also sounds that he had been lying to you a LOT!!! You made the right choice. He was a narcissist who was using you for his own selfish reasons. It was HIS choices that put him in jail so STOP feeling guilty!!!

@chyna I get your point but I also believe people can change and it sounds like he was honest with her about his issues. That goes a long way with me.

A few weeks on the couch to help him out of a jam, especially if they were dating, doesn’‘t sound like a big ask.

On the other hand, how could he get caught up without a job, even if she had helped him? Too many variables to be sure.

^^ She cared about him and he was ‘charming’. He wouldn’t have stood for just a few weeks on the couch and I predict she would have given in, especially since they were dating.

As far as honesty, he let her fall for him, trust him and care, then was honest. I’m sure he used that ruse frequently. True honesty would have been telling her at least some of his past and troubles within a few dates. He was using the ‘poor me’ hook.

I agree that people can change, too, but don’t believe he had it in him or wanted to. He wanted to be taken care of until the next best thing came along, at which point he would have left the OP also. He obviously didn’t give one shit about the mothers in his past or his own children.

@smudges You could be right.

Perhaps, but you’ve enslaved yourself to a past event you choose to torture yourself with instead of simply accepting it, learning whatever lesson might be obtained from it and letting it go.

You’ve even gone so far as to develop a story about it.

We love our stories.

We mature emotionally when we drop our stories and endeavor to make more responsible decisions (if necessary) should we find ourselves in similar situations.

“You choose to torture yourself with instead of simply accepting it, learning whatever lesson might be obtained from it and letting it go.”

This is probably the most important skill people need to have mastered in their adult life.

@SABOTEUR – Someone needs to make posters of what you wrote and hang them everywhere. Maybe more people will realize its truth sooner than I did, and that can only be a good thing.

”...accepting it, learning whatever lesson might be obtained from it and letting it go”

I agree, and feel like I’ve accepted and learned from my past events, but they still bring up emotions, and I imagine, always will. Glimpses of shame, humiliation, pain, embarrassment, regret (that’s a big one). And feeling those emotions doesn’t mean I haven’t let go of the event.

But it often takes a person months, if not years, to accept the event, learn from it and let it go so that it doesn’t interfere with our lives. One of the best things we can do is talk about the event. Each time you do, you’re evaluating, analyzing and feeling the appropriate emotions for you regarding the event. Each time, you release it a little more, and releasing is accepting.

@smudges My life went off the rails in my early 20s. (I’m 66 now). So much so that I ended up in a psychiatric ward.

My wife left me and I got kicked out of the service for “suicidal gestures”.

Probably the best thing that could have happened to me. “Rock bottom” forced me to “man up”. During my involuntary confinement I realized I’d done more harm to myself than whatever outside influences I blamed. This realization appeared as an epiphany:

“If I’m as smart as I think I am…how the hell did I wind up here*?”

Our so-called thinking is the core of our problems.

We think we know everything.

We think we understand everything.

We think we can fix everything, including ourselves, and when that doesn’t work we think criticizing ourselves and dumping our misery on other people will make us feel better.

None of that “thinking” works (for very long) but we never pause long enough to see the misery we create for ourselves.

It’s not necessary to label everything.

It’s not necessary to analyze everything.

It’s not necessary to understand everything.

The only thing you absolutely have to do is eliminate everything in your life that blocks the joy within you that you naturally are.
———

Peace of mind
Is the only thing you have
That cannot be taken.

It can only be surrendered
Or exchanged
For “angry ghosts and demons”.
———-

That’s it.

Drop your stories, your “he said, she said”, what somebody did or didn’t do or said or didn’t say to hurt your fragile feelings.

Drop your negative self-talk.

Drop all of it.

None of it is necessary.

The sooner you come to this realization the happier you’ll be.

@SABOTEUR So true, and many of us never learn these lessons, or do so late in life. This is a Stoic philosophy and we all naturally come to it when we learn to let go. Put simply, it is not the events that happen around us that cause mental pain but it is the perception and thoughts we have about those events that does.

@SABOTEUR My life went off the rails in my early 20s. (I’m 66 now). So much so that I ended up in a psychiatric ward.

We could be twins! Same thing here, and I’m 66! what month were you born?

Yes, releasing is accepting.

@smudges LOL…March.

@SABOTEUR Ahh…October here. Pisces fits you.

“A traditional Pisces is creative, empathetic, emotional, giving, and fickle. A water sign, just like Scorpio and Cancer, a Pisces goes with the flow and follows where the universe takes them. This accounts for their fickle nature; since they are open to change, they are willing to alter their mindset and trajectory, which may make them seem unpredictable to onlookers.

A Pisces cares deeply about the people around them. They are gentle with people’s feelings and will give others whatever they need. They’re one of the astrology signs that will give the shirt off their backs to make sure someone else stays warm.”

:) Very interesting.