Welcome to Gaia! ::

1. I joined when I was 14, and it became the primary medium of communication with some of my friends, so I just never left, even when I outgrew it. (And even after they quit Gaia, I had already joined this guild, so now I just come here to hang around with you guys.)
2. My ex cost me my job, drove away all my friends, spent all my money, and caused a relapse in my depression. So now here I am. Being bored, broke, alone, unemployed, and depressed. Huzzah. : /

I'm gonna be cheap and steal a question.
Why are you on here?

I actually just texted the illustrator a few weeks ago about commissioning an addition to the picture. ; D Sadly, he (like all my other friends), is not pleased with me right now, so it'll have to wait until I can get back on his good side. : /

Not much of a story, really. I let him get away with anything, and I got what I deserved for it. He ******** up my life, just like he constantly ******** up his own.
He never let us settle down in one place for more than a few months, so of course I couldn't hold down a job. Hell, for a while he had us crossing states every week. Somehow I guess he thought life would be less miserable somewhere else, and he was too stupid to realize that it wouldn't work, no matter how many times he tried. Only reason I managed to keep him in one place for more than a couple weeks, is because after a while the money ran dry (my money). And every time I managed to get more, he'd take it from me and spend it on weed. Or even worse, buy the weed on a promise, and then I'd owe his dealer money I didn't ******** have.
He compulsively antagonizes people, so it didn't take him long to piss off the people I introduced him to. I learned though, and stopped introducing him to anyone that could be avoided. But avoiding them cost me more friends, because I couldn't go anywhere without him. He was so insanely jealous and paranoid. Kept me from seeing my friends. Eventually, they stopped trying to see me. The biggest contention was over Arkie, partially because he was my best friend and partially because he has a Y chromosome. : P At first, when I'd try to make plans to hang out with him, Tommie would say it was okay, but then throw a huge fit right before I was supposed to leave and demand that I stay home with him. (Yeah, because anything short of literally every second of my life, was not enough "quality time" for Tommie. rolleyes ) But I gave in. Eventually Tommie gave me the inevitable ultimatum, him or Arkie. That wasn't hard. I just pointed to the door and told him to get the ******** out. I love Arkie to death. (Of course Tommie backed off afterwards.) But at that point I had already canceled on him three times in a row, and now he won't speak to me. I even leave presents on his doorstep. I got one text saying "Thanks, but go eat a porcupine.". -_-
On top of it, every time I tried to make friends with one of Tommies friends he would just demolish his own friendship and cut them out of our lives.
And that covers about 5-10% of the problems with our relationship. So you can see why my depression is relapsing, after a year and a half of that. : /
The End.
Now go to bed. : P Tomorrow storytime can be about my neurotic mother. Ooooo. And if you eat all your vegetables, I'll even tell you about one of my adventures in the psychiatric hospital. : P

Fiercely independent, yes. Controlling, no. I let it happen, because.... I don't even know. Emotion makes people stupid? : / One of my greatest weaknesses is my instinctual response to people I care about being in need. I just can't turn my back on them. He made every day for a year and a half, the worst day of my adult life. But I just kept telling myself I was strong and he was weak and he needed me. (And that we'd break up eventually.) None of it untrue, but that's hardly the point. It never broke me until we got engaged. For the first time ever, I really, seriously considered spending the rest of my life with him. And in that moment, I was suicidal, for the first time in many years. And that was that. I care about him far more than I should, and I desperately want to take care of him, but it was my life or his, and ******** that.

You psychically knew that his name was Tommie?

lol You really wanna hear that s**t? XD

I mean, he was pretty attractive, but it wasn't just that.
Nobody can understand until it happens to them. If I went back and told this story to my 21-year-old self, I wouldn't have believed it. It's just so not who I am, in every imaginable way. But s**t happens.
You're afraid of relationships because of an incident in which you did not get into a relationship? XD Wouldn't it be more applicable to be afraid of rejecting people or to be afraid of aspies? : P
Hardcore hide-in-bush-with-binoculars kind of stalking, or the petty kind that desperate weirdos do where they just won't leave you alone?

Alright. : / My mother is a neurotic and boderline paranoid/narcissistic. I never really noticed when I was a kid, because my sister and I were raised by our stay-at-home dad, and my mother had long hours at work and about one overseas business trip every month. (At the time I thought it was mandatory, but she later told me that she volunteered for all those trips to get away from us. Didn't even have the balls to say it to my face. Said it to her therapist while I was sitting right next to her. rolleyes ) When I was a teenager she and my dad got divorced, and since she's the primary money-maker in the family, I stayed with her. But that's when her problems became really apparent. During the divorce and for several years after, she would have screaming fits pretty frequently. Sometimes randomly leave the house late at night, without saying a word, and not come back until early morning. She'd throw things, and break things. One time I woke up at three in the morning to this weird pounding sound, so I went downstairs to find that she'd taken a hammer to the portuguese tile on the fireplace. : / A lot of dumb s**t like that. That didn't bother me so much. At that point in my life, having been institutionalized a number of times, I was already a great connoisseur of strange behavior. : P It was the more directed emotional outbursts that were the problem. She'd often find reasons to make her misery about me. Once she came barging into my room at 7am, hollering and ranting and waving around a hand towel, calling me a number of unseemly names... It took me a couple minutes before I realized what she was on about. A tiny hairdye stain, about half the size of a penny, that I'd gotten on the towel. -____- Gee ma, I don't know what to say. Because your hairdye stains aren't all over the ******** bathroom.
During those couple of years, she would inexplicably burst into tears about two to four times a week. And since I was the only one there (My sister was at college, thank god. She could not have handled that s**t.), she'd expect emotional support. And being the complacent person that I am, I always gave it. Always. I'd sit there and comfort her for hours while she cried and whined and ranted. Those were the years in which I learned to contain my own problems. One of the few good things that came out of it all. There wasn't enough room in our family for two psychotics. XD Though one time, when I was about 16, after I'd been comforting her for hours, she asked how I'd been doing lately, and I actually had the gall to answer her. I told her I'd been depressed. She acted all surprised, which should have been enough of an insult to encourage me to keep my mouth shut after that, but for some reason I didn't. She said it would get better. I said it didn't feel like it would. And that was all it took. She started screaming to high hell about how I'm an ungrateful b***h, and I have no right to burden her with my problems. Literally. That is what she said.
The fits aside, she's really just a intolerable person. Just the way she handles relationships. Nothing is ever her fault, everyone is out to get her, and no one is too good for her criticism. For four years after I stopped saying "I love you" to her, she still hadn't noticed, so I brought it up in a fight once, and she completely brushed it off. Said it was a "childish phase" I was going through and that I was just blaming my problems on her and when I matured I'd realize what a good mother she is and that I do love her. Ooooo, I wanted to punch her in the face, so bad. >.< Same with a time when I was 14 or so, one of the absolute most insecure times in my life, naturally. I'd put on some weight in middle school and I was trying to lose it. My mom was always badgering me about it, saying people are disgusted by fat people and asking if I really wanted others to look at me that way and judge me. (Bang up parenting, right there. : P ) One time when I mentioned trying to lose weight to Arkie, he shoved a shish kebab in my face and told me I was perfectly fine the way I am and shouldn't try to change (something no one had ever told me in my entire life), and I was so happy that when I got home I told my sister and my mom about it, and my mom said, as I should have known she would, "Oh Liz, don't be naive. He's just saying that because it's the only way he's ever known you.". neutral
Her temperment has improved tremendously. Especially since my sister and I moved out and we both stopped calling for the most part, because she realized that she's gonna die alone. : P She still has her moments. It wasn't so long ago that I referenced an inside joke with my sister, and she started hollering and crying about how we're so rude and we hate her because we "don't include her". rolleyes But for the most part, she keeps her s**t together. Now she's just paranoid, selfish, and leaves a constant air of lingering tension, wherever she goes. My poor sister has been living with her for six months, after coming back from Korea, and she's already begging me to take her on an extended roadtrip, to get away from mom. lol Some people just shouldn't have kids.

Again it wasn't just that. Though when I say attractive, I am refering purely to his looks, as nothing about his personality was attractive. I just mean that I grew emotionally attached to him for reasons that I don't understand.
Yes, it is. Though I'd call it something more along the lines of, "you will never understand bad decisions until someone has made you stupid". : P

It doesn't bother me in the least. I'm way over this s**t. The only reason it bothered me then is because I had the raging hormones and minimal wisdom of an adolescent. : P
And thank you. But I'd lived through plenty worse before she lost the last of her marbles, so I was prepared. It really wasn't that bad.

Plenty worse. Ouch. No wonder you're such a badass. : P

There's not really much to know. What happens happens and you learn while you go along. Are you afraid that a significant other might have expectations that you aren't aware of, or something?
Stronger or not, getting stabbed is getting stabbed. I only suggested pepper spray because I'm sure you're not allowed to carry a knife in school. A blade is a lot more versatile, and if used properly, a lot more effective.