Before anyone reads too much into this, I am NOT SAYING I WAS ABUSED LIKE DEPP OR MY CASE IS EXACTLY LIKE DEPPS OR I AM WORSE THAN DEPP. The title clearly states "I can relate to him".

I met this girl when we were 17 (I'm now 22), and fell madly in love with her. She would treat me like a king and I would treat her like a princess.

When we turned 19, things started seeming strange. She started acting a bit cold with me and never trying (or even caring) to socialize with my family. I would stay up with her every night until 4AM on the phone begging her to just socialize with my family a bit more, but she would begin to cry saying "you never think I'm good enough"... so after awhile of me explaining how I love her and that's not true, she would listen to me and promise me. Obviously nothing changed.

Then she started yelling at me in public. She would push me off her, tell me to shut up or get off her ass. I asked her privately "you can't keep treating me like this" to which she would cry saying "I'm not a bad person". So I let it go and hoped she would change. Eventually, she wouldn't care to come with me to my friends weddings, parties or outings. And no she didn't cheat, neither did I.

Eventually things started getting so strange she wouldn't let me put my arm around her and throw me off in public, saying "why do you always have to touch me???". I apologized to her saying "I just thought this was romantic" (we were on a ferris wheel).

By the way, I am in no way shape or form a bad looking guy, clingy, pushover or any other factors that honestly do come off as you read this. I was just overly attached ro her due to the memories of meeting her at 17. And I think she knew that and used it to her advantage.

Eventually she started bashing my family to me privately, after she would be unnecessarily confrontational and/or aggressive with them. To which I defended her to my family... I know.

After that I realized I wasn't sleeping, feeling bad about myself and feeling like a pushover 24/7. So I broke up with her when I was 21.

Here's the part on why I feel I can relate to Johnny Depp. About 4 months later (I'm 22) I was ready to start dating again, and I met this girl who I believed was perfect for me. I took her out and I had the greatest time.

But by the second date with her, I realized I have trauma. Whenever I tried to hold my ex in public or private she would yell at me and push me off of her (no she was not a victim whatsoever) and call me clingy. She would call me other names as well.

So I was internally scared to be intimate and to even hold her hand, to which she actually noticed. She stated "you're a confident guy but you're very closed off". Eventually at the end of the night I opened to her, let my guard down and was holding her (even though I asked her first) but I wasn't able to kiss her, still due to thinking "I don't want her to think badly of me". And I know that offended her, because she gave me a signal but I'm just not psychologically out of this stigma.

By the third date I took her to a dinner and got her flowers. I really liked her. She hit everything on my list that I wanted. But things got weird. She was being cold, distant and strange throughout our date. Until she started being even more strange with me on our date and mentioned my ex.

She tried being subtle about it, just bringing up her name. After that date, she wouldn't reply to my texts. Would be strange when I asked her out again. And much more. Eventually I broke up with her because she just stopped giving me attention and I knew there was something wrong, but I didn't care to look into it anymore. I was really heartbroken.

I'm not going to get into details, but i learned later that my first ex was going around making up lies about me. She would tell people how I basically emotionally abused her and would constantly put her down. This destroyed me internally, because not only is this ruining my chances with other girls, but I continued to defend her to family and friends post breakup. I also saw that my second ex and her were friends on Facebook.

She probably spoke about awful things regarding me to her friends and family. Which is fine, because she was angry with me. But I don't get why she would make things up about me, when I gave her everything.

I can relate to Johnny Depp because everyone now thinks I'm a terrible person while I'm suffering from psychological torment and scared to be open or intimate. Yet, I still won't say anything about her unless I must. Now when a girl hits on me, I ignore them scared of what they think of me or might think of me. I lost confidence in myself as a man, thinking I'm garbage.

And for anyone thinking I did abuse her, this post is anonymous. I could say wtvr I want with no fear and get away with it. If I abused her I would say it. I opened reddit just so I can talk about this.

TLTR: My ex would constantly abuse me and eventually after I left her she started going around saying I abused her.