“Dear Arden,

It’s been over a year since I ended things with my boyfriend. He wasn’t doing the best mentally and he dumped all his negativity onto me. When we were together, I felt less like his girlfriend and more like his therapist. Now, he continues to still message me with his life problems even though I’ve expressed to him that he needs to get professional help. I feel bad for his circumstances and I want to help, but I don’t want him to start relying on me again and I also don’t want to unintentionally lead him on. Some people have told me to just block him, but I’d feel bad if I did. What should I do?”

–Aggravated Ex

Dear Aggravated,

Let’s start with something positive: you made a good decision in breaking up with him. You recognized that you were in a bad situation and extricated yourself from it. Great job! Now I’m going to need you to do that again.

He is not your responsibility. I know you think he is because you think that, morally, the right thing to do is to help him, but he’s not the only one in this situation that needs help. Let’s take a step back here and look at what you can control in this situation.

You have no control over your ex’s life. You can’t make his situation any better, and, most importantly, you can’t make him any better. What you can control is your response, and, in that way, you are able to help one person in this situation: yourself. You are saving yourself from someone who is clearly making you miserable. And before you say, “Isn’t that selfish?” No. It’s not. If you had a friend who was in a situation that was making them miserable and you had the power to get them out of it, you would choose to get them out of it. Well, think of yourself as one of your friends whom you are getting out of a bad situation. 

Now, if he has said things that could potentially result in something dangerous, then you need to report that to the proper authority figures. Once again, this is not your responsibility to fix or change – all you need to do is tell someone who is actually qualified to help. You say that you’ve expressed that he needs to seek professional help but this doesn’t seem to have worked. You want to know why it hasn’t worked? Because he has no incentive to go to a professional when he has you.

And so, my final advice: tell him you can’t do this for him anymore and that he needs to speak with a professional. If you have a contact to give him, I would do so, but, once again, it is not your responsibility and you are not obligated to seek help for him. Then, cut off all communication with him. The sooner he stops relying on you, the sooner he can figure out who he is without you, and the sooner you can move on.

You’ve got this, I believe in you,

Arden

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