Law student, pre-bar very bad breakup, my fault, both still love each other.?

I would appreciate greatly any insightful advice that responds to elements of my particular situation.

I have been in a very serious, committed relationship (we always viewed each other as spouses) with my ex-girlfriend for 7 yrs. I'm 30 in a month and a half. She's 29 in 3 months. I have been going to college through this time, and she worked to support us. I helped a little, off-and-on, but surely not enough. Also, there have been times where I had spent days on breaks playing games instead of job hunting or stuff like that.

We never seem able to have a healthy argument about things that really bother us, because she feels that because I argue the point that it means I don't respect her view. Not true, but I've never been good at bowing out of an argument, and sometimes she just can't think of what she wants to say. Then we never come back to it. And she bottles emotions a lot, until she blows her top.

The first time was 3 yrs. ago, and she dumped me over the phone and cut off all contact. I went after her, almost relentlessly. Eventually, I gave her some space, and she took me back.

I made an effort and fixed many of my faults, but not all of them.

For the last 3 yrs., I have been in law school and under tons of stress. I only had a job for one out of 3 years, and lately I've become more agitated, irritable and sometimes distant. I've also said things in hurtful ways that I didn't mean. But it was all just from the stress of my last year of law school.

There were also conversations where we were talking about our relationship and what we wanted, when, and why. I was trying to be totally honest, and so I said that my initial decision to go to school was about me and getting away from my parents, etc., but that when I moved to her town instead of studying in mine, that it was about being close to her. She misheard/misunderstood me, but didn't say anything until the night of this breakup.

Now, she's broken up with me again. When she did it last week, she said we could still talk via text or whatever, and that it's not totally out of the question for us to get back together sometime, but she wants to "grow as separate people," which I translate as grow apart. So she helped me pack up my things and drove me across the state to my parents' house and left me.

She isn't texting me at all, except to reply to my texts - which I stopped sending after 3 days, because I don't want to push her. But in the meantime, she has gone home to visit with her parents, who I fell never really liked me to begin with; I'm too direct and open, while they're more reserved, for one thing. Her dad said I would flunk out of my first 2-year degree. I graduated "magna." He said I'd fail after transferring to another school for a 4-year degree. Same deal. After the first breakup, he and/or some of her friends told her that I'd string her along as long as I need her support, and then dump her. They have no clue how I feel about her.

Anyway, her parents recently bought her a new car (leverage?), and there's this breakup that's been months in the making, now she visited them, her mom unfriended me on FB, and I really don't know what is going on anymore. Is she really gone for good? Does she think I was going to dump her, like they said? If so, how could she think that, when I clearly love her and they've been wrong so many times because they just don't know me? Is this her, or did her parents push her to this instead of having a good sit-down with me to hash things out?

I never cheated on her, and she never cheated on me - I'm positive of it. But she does have valid reasons to resent me, even if some are misunderstandings. But I can't really let her go.

I wrote her a letter that describes a lot of the things I know I've done wrong, and tells her I'm so sorry. In it, I try to clear up the misunderstandings, and I tell her I'm going to let her go because I don't want to hurt her any more. But I really hope she'll take me back.

I've gotten a lot of mixed advice from several people I trust. My dad and an older female neighbor say I should not contact her at all ("absence makes the heart grow fonder," etc.). But my grandma calls BS on that, and my sister, who I had read the letter, tells me that anyone who says I shouldn't give it to her has never read a letter from me.

I know we still both love each other very much, but I can't tell if we'll ever really be able to make it work as a couple. I don't know how to even think about living without her; She's my first and only love, and I can't take this at all.

I need all the help I can get to figure this out and get through this.

Thanks for your time.