Dear Anne,
My girlfriend met another guy and split up with me after we both got into a depression when our baby girls were born prematurely and died. She lacked affection and apparently found the perfect fairy-tale guy to give her everything she needs. I have stopped every contact with her so we both can get on with our lives, while she goes on holiday every two months to see this guy. Every time she comes back she contacts me like crazy and wants me to comfort her. My future plans are to get away from all this completely while her idea to get on with her life is to have a baby with this guy and also spend as much time with me as possible. I think she needs serious help but is it me who has to help her? Led
Dear Led,
First of all, my condolences on the death of your babies. Neonatal death is tragic and extremely painful for the parents. Commonly it leaves unnecessary guilt and emotional imbalance in its wake until the parents come to terms with it.
While they are still grieving people can make some very strange decisions, as your girlfriend has. However, recovery is likely to be much quicker with a support group or other experienced and trained help. SANDS (Stillbirth and Neonatal Death Support) run a helpline on 020 7436 5881. Their website is at www.uk-sands.org. If your girlfriend, or you, believe you may be suffering from depression I urge you both to go and talk things through with your GP. If appropriate, medication + a talking therapy combine to form the quickest and most effective way to overcome depression. If at any point she's desperate she can ring the Samaritans day or night on 08457 909090, or email them via www.samaritans.org.uk and they should get back to her within 24 hours. You could write this information down for her. After that it's her decision whether she gets in touch with them.
Right now your gf has things arranged to go some way to meeting her needs while ignoring yours. You, however, are perfectly entitled to point her towards the professional help available and to say that while you'll always care about her, you're not the best person to help her fix her problems because you don't have the training or the experience. She's the one who chose to leave you and you're entitled not to let her pick you up and put you down at her whim. You can make your own boundaries clear. You might decide not to prolong conversations when she contacts you, explaining that she has the support organisations and her boyfriend to help her. You might decide whether or not to see her at all. If you do, you might make sure that it's only for a coffee for an hour or so in a public place and only once a week, tailing off to once a fortnight and then once a month. If she's not happy with that, that's her choice. You're the one who decides what you'll offer her. In which case you may go on to say that she's a lovely young woman who deserves happiness and you wish her well, but you're grieving too and you need to move on with your life which will free her up to move on with hers. You don't need to have her pushing you away and then pulling you back. It's not healthy for either of you. I hope too that you won't let her emotionally blackmail you into anything that's uncomfortable for you. If she threatens self-harm, stay with her while you send for her parents, the police, her religious leader or an ambulance, and then make the break. You have no reason to feel guilty and you're not responsible for her feelings even if she tries to invite you to take such a responsibility.
I sympathise, and wish you (and your gf if she chooses) the courage to seek the help you need and to make the new, fulfilling lives you need. Good luck.
