i recently broke up with him and i kind of miss him because in retrospect, our relationship may have actually been healthy. sure, we didn’t have the same interests and such, and he wanted me to pay attention to his but rarely did to mine,

This is the part you should focus on because a good partner will still engage with your interests out of love and respect for them.

but what if he was actually a really good boyfriend?

It seems like you wanted them to be a good partner more than they actually were. You deserve someone who treats you as well as you treat them.

You are still young. You have time and sadly time is the only cure for heartbreak.

It's not so strange to have doubts. We all say things when we're mad, but if you crave a bit 'more' interaction per day and feel neglected if you don't, there's bound to be someone that's more on your wavelength.

On another note, time helps a lot. I don't know how long ago this was, but give your sadness some time and it will soften. Good luck and stay in there.

It’s your prerogative to choose if you want him in your life. The time right after breakup is always the hardest and we often want the comfort of the person who has been the most important to us back in our lives.

Having both indulged and avoided letting the relationship start back up, my personal choice in your situation would be to let it go. Breaking up hurts, but not forever.

People are sometimes hurt and lash out during breakups, and you're right to be skeptical of his words, but sometimes you just have to let people tell on themselves and accept what they say.

as someone who loves video games, i'm not addicted. i don't play every day either. i mainly like my fiancee's interests but there's some stuff i may not like and i still engage if she wants me to.

even when i play games, i still make time for my fiancee and she makes time for me. you can let someone know about your interests and invite them, but don't force them like he did if they say no.

he sounded a bit unhealthy for you anyway, you'll find someone tho.

Hey. I hope you’re alright. I wrote a response to another thread, but I couldn’t post on it. I hope it’s alright if I post my response here. I hope it helps!

Good relationships have availability, responsiveness, and engagement. Why? The bottom of it all is whether someone will be there for us, whether someone will hold us.

You’d think that this means that someone needs to respond immediately to our text messages, but that is not necessarily true. Different people have different sensitivities. For example, some people have more sore spots than others.

What are sore spots? They are painful memories or thoughts of being rejected. They are wounds that we carry with us. Sometimes, when we are close to someone, our wounds are touched, and that can hurt. When our sore spots are activated, some people start demanding in all sorts of ways, yelling or being passive-aggressive. Others withdraw, staying quiet or sulking. Ideally, we can slowly heal our wounds by letting our partners see them and take care of them. This is very vulnerable, and it requires care.

When our wounds heal, we can re-calibrate our emotions. We no longer feel fear of rejection. We no longer demand or withdraw. We can hold each other tightly. We can feel very securely attached to our partner. We can spend a whole day without messaging and we still feel connected. Heck, our partner could go on a business trip, not message us, and we’d still feel safe.

Of course, wounds can sometimes open up again. We are vulnerable creatures. And that’s alright. As long as we know how to heal wounds, we are ultimately safe.

So, to answer your question your question, I’d say most healthy relationships don’t really leave partners on “read”. However, different people have different sensitivities, and what ultimately matters is whether we feel securely attached with our partners.

If you’re curious about this way of thinking and the research behind it, check out Sue Johnson’s Hold me tight.

It sounds more like you miss having a person than you miss having that person. There are others out there who are better suited for you.

I hope you’re doing okay. It sounds like he didn’t have your best interests in mind and that he seemed to change his mind a lot, like one minute he would say he loved you and the next, he never cared. I’m glad you don’t have to deal with his toxicity anymore. Don’t feel bad about breaking up, it’s always hard when you just have broken up but it sounds like it was for the best 🫂