Estimated reading time: 13 minutes
Dear Dr. NerdLove:
I need help not fucking up my relationship the way I have before. Every time I’ve been with someone, my anxiety rages out of control and I act out and either my girlfriend breaks up with me because shes tired of putting up with me or I end up pushing her away.
I’m with “Charlotte” and I love her madly, even though it hasn’t been very long. She’s kind, supportive, incredibly smart and talented, caring and loving and has never given me a real reason to doubt how she feels about me. I know part of the problem is that I know she’s out of my league, and I’ve watched guys hit on her while I’m with her. That makes things worse because we’re a classic introvert extrovert couple. She’s close with her friends and loves to go out to dinner or see movies or go see bands play, while I like quiet nights at home or at a friend’s house playing boardgames or watching movies. I just don’t like loud bars or crowded events, they make me incredibly uncomfortable. But I know Charlotte loves them and I don’t want her to feel held back by me, so I always tell her I’m ok when she has plans to go out with her friends. But then I spiral and get anxious when she doesn’t respond to my texts right away or takes longer than usual to reply.
It’s not just when she’s out without me though, it’s all the time. If we’re texting during the week and she replies three or four hours later, my mind starts filling in the blanks. I start thinking that she’s upset with me, maybe I said something wrong, she’s losing interest and she’s pulling away. I check my phone, I reread messages, I check her socials to try to confirm things. I become a mess until I hear back and it’s like a knot unties and I feel relief until the next time it happens.
I need to be real here, I know this is my problem, not hers. She’s shot down guys who hit on her, her friends are completely trustworthy and I like them too. I just can never shake the fear that she’s about to get tired of dealing with me and my crap and that’s going to be the end of it.
I don’t want her to be my therapist or make her feel like she has to keep telling me that it’s ok. I know how that ends, because it’s happened before. I also don’t want to keep living in this anxious loop where my mood depends on how quickly someone texts me back. I recognize that this is my problem and it’s not rational, but knowing that hasn’t made it easier to stop.
I need to make this stop because this is why my past relationships fell apart. Are there practical ways to calm my anxiety in the moment and retrain my brain not to interpret silence as rejection? And how do I communicate about this — if at all — without making my anxiety her responsibility?
Sincerely,
Hanging By The Telephone
So, there’re a couple of things to work with, HBTT, but before we get to them, I want to ask you a question: have you ever been tested for ADHD or autism? I ask because the doom spiral you mention sounds a lot like rejection-sensitive dysphoria, which is often co-morbid with neurodivergence. With RSD, the sorts of worries of being rejected that everyone experiences on occasion not only become more frequent but get dialed up to 11 before snapping the knob off. The sort of unreasonable and uncomfortable roads your brain goes down are precisely the same things I struggled with before getting my ADHD diagnosis and starting treatment. It may well be worth your time to talk to someone about the possibility of getting tested.
Now admittedly this sounds like it could also be a symptom of an anxious attachment style, where you don’t feel secure or safe in your relationships. That is also something that can be managed, but it requires time, patience and working with a counselor or therapist. While that’s not necessarily going to help in the short term, I do think that’s something you should look into.
But hey, that’s not going to help when it’s Saturday night and the anxiety weasels in your brain have done a couple bumps and they’re ready to party like they’ve made a warlock pact with their patron Andrew WK, firing off eldritch blasts straight into your panic centers.
The first thing that is going to help is to understand that you don’t need to force these feelings away when they come up. What you do need to do is simply hold tight and lock your shit down until the moment passes. Because it will pass. The thing we often never realize is that it’s hard to feel a specific emotion for very long; on their own, moments of strong emotion tend to pass after about 90 seconds or so. It’s when we focus on those feelings that they hang around like someone trying to sell you on a roof inspection you don’t need. When you are focusing on those feelings, even when you’re trying to make them go away, you’re giving bandwidth to it, feeding it with the limited resources of your attention. You’re making those feelings stay front and present in your mind, which forces you to pay attention to them, dwell on them and give them fuel.
So instead, you want to starve those feelings by making sure you have other things to focus your attention on. The easiest way to do this is to have things that require your attention and focus, but in such a way that it’s easy to lose yourself in the process. Personally, I recommend games or puzzles that engage analytical thinking. Tetris is a great choice for this – the deceptively simple and repetitive nature of the game makes it addictive and easy to focus on, but still requires you actually pay attention as you line up shapes, plan how you’ll complete lines and fill in the inevitable gaps, canyons and imperfect solutions. You could also play logic puzzles like Clues By Sam, which require that you piece together increasingly complex layers of conditions to figure out who’s innocent and who’s a criminal. By the time you’ve finished, you’ll realize that the moment’s passed and you’re doing ok.
But here’s another thing that I think you should consider: have you told Charlotte about these anxiety spirals? I realize you have said that this is your problem to solve, but a relationship is a partnership; the whole point is that you’re in these together. While it’s admirable that you’re trying to go this alone, you’re not only making it harder than it needs to be, but you’re also missing an opportunity to set precedent for how the two of you can resolve issues together. Anxiety shared tends to mean feelings spared after all.
The key is in understanding the problem and the need. You get anxious when you haven’t heard from her in a while, but you also don’t want to make her feel like she needs to check in with you like you’re her parole officer. That’s admirable, but that doesn’t mean you have to suffer alone and in silence. In fact, that’s part of why things go badly; the suffering and silence makes things worse and amplifies those uncomfortable feelings until something bursts. So ask Charlotte for some help. After all, Charlotte does care for you. She wouldn’t want you feeling horrible while she’s out having a good time.
So what I would suggest is that you have an Awkward Conversation with Charlotte, where you lay out that you have these anxiety spirals, that you understand the irrational and capricious nature of them and how you’ve been trying to manage them. Then – and this is the critical part – ask for her thoughts and suggestions on what sort of support might help or how the two of you could make things a little easier. There are a number of ways that the two of you could solve this dilemma that don’t impinge unfairly on her time or energy, many of which are simply about setting expectations or making a minor change in how you go about things.
Signing off a text with “have to focus on work, talk later when I’m free,” for example, instead of just trailing off until she can respond makes it clear what’s happening: she’s busy and she’ll get back to you when she’s free to text again. It’s setting an expectation in your brain that everything’s fine and you know you’ll be hearing from her later. It’s a small thing, but it can go a long way towards settling those anxiety weasels down like you dropped a little valerian root in their water bottles.
The same with when she’s out. She doesn’t need to check in with you, but a quick “hey, having a good time, probably heading home around $TIME, xoxo” or “Just wanted to say ‘good night’, see you on $DAY,” can likewise make it easier to accept that everything’s fine, which helps break that doomloop in your brain. It sets up a reminder that you’re going to hear from her or see her in the near future and all is well.
These sorts of gestures of support are helpful; they aren’t impinging on her freedom or making her spending time with friends conditional on your emotional state. They’re just very simple check-ins that help remind you that everything’s fine and give your brain something to chew on instead of increasingly baroque “what-if” scenarios. They’re quick reminders that she loves and cares for you without requiring serious investment of effort, energy or time.
And hey, once you get in the habit of saying “let’s collaborate on how we can support each other or address this need”, it gets much easier for the two of you to deal with all the other frustrating things that come up in every relationship. It reminds you that you’re both on the same team and that supporting each other makes the entire relationship that much stronger.
So have that conversation, open those paths of collaboration… and maybe invest in a copy of Tetris Effect or Stardew Valley or something in the sort term, while looking at addressing the anxiety itself with a professional in the long-term. It’ll make everything a hell of a lot better.
All will be well.
Dear Dr. NerdLove:
I’ve been dating “Jacob” for a year and three months now after we met on Hinge. I know it’s early, but this has been possibly the best relationship I’ve had in years, possibly ever. I took a break from dating after a string of boyfriends who lead me on, cheated on me, gaslit me or just treated me like crap and then on a whim, I checked my profile and saw his message and we just clicked. Jacob has been the sweetest, gentlest and most considerate boyfriend I’ve ever had. He makes me laugh, he remembers little things I mention I like, he makes an effort to learn about the things I like because he wants to know me better.
But almost all of my friends insist that I could “do better,” or that I shouldn’t be with him at all. At first, my friends were supportive, but the longer Jacob and I’ve been together, the more they have started to tell me that they don’t like him. They say that they could understand why I might want a rebound or something different from my last boyfriend, but that he’s not in “my league” and I’m wasting my time on him.
I will be the first to tell people that Jacob’s not typically handsome. He’s a little shorter than I am, he doesn’t have a gym body or movie star looks. If anything, he’s got a bit of a belly. He’s got some acne scars on his cheeks and his face is a little pudgy and he already has a widow’s peak where his hairline has been receding. He’s not rich, but he does well for himself doing tech support and repair at his job. I honestly don’t care. I think he’s incredibly hot, and I love that he’s so at east with himself. The only way I can describe it is that he knows who he is and likes who he is and that is so different from so many of the other guys I’ve dated before.
He has a smile that makes my heart flutter and he can give me a look that makes me melt inside. He makes me laugh like nobody else does and he seems to know when I want him to do something or when I want him to just listen to me when I’ve got a headache and I’m stressed from work. When I come home and it’s been a bad day, I know he’s going to be waiting with a glass of wine and that comforting smile of his and then he’ll tell me dirty jokes until I can’t breathe and I forget everything that was bothering me.
My problem is that while I know my friends are telling me how they feel from a place of love, hearing the same doubts over and over has started to make me question my choices. Most of the time I can brush their comments off but there are still times I wonder if they’re right and I hate myself when I feel that way.
How do I tell the difference between outside perspective that’s meant to protect me and what’s just noise? How much weight should I give to the opinions of people who care about me, when my own experience of this relationship is so different from what they say?
I don’t want to ignore red flags—but I also don’t want to betray my own heart just to meet someone else’s idea of what I “should” want. What do I say to my friends about this? Do I give them a chance to get to know Jacob the way I do? Do I tell them to shut up and let me live my life? Is there a possibility that they’re right? Please help.
Cupid’s Last Shot
This one’s easy, CLS: you need better friends.
Just because something comes from a place of love or concern that doesn’t mean that it’s good or even necessarily in your best interests. This is especially true when your “friends” (and I use the term loosely) are ignoring that you’re happy and in a loving and caring relationship and are instead, shitting all over someone you care about from a great height because… well, because.
Now, I am presuming that your friends know the broad brushstrokes of your relationship history, and how so many of your classic-looking Prince Charmings weren’t even frogs in disguise (because frogs are often adorable) but were, in fact mostly ambulatory slime mold and the occasional snapping turtle. The fact that you’re with someone who treats you well and makes you happy should matter to them far more than perfectly sculpted cheekbones and an ass you could bounce quarters off of. You did what so many people should do: you realized that your usual “type” was, in fact, more about repeating negative cycles and so you decided to take steps to break that cycle. You found a guy who’s not like the other dudes you’ve dated, not just in looks but in behavior and attitude and realized you found a winner. Face it, Tigress, you hit the jackpot.
So why aren’t your friends happier for you?
Well… possibly because they’re more invested in the aesthetic than the reality of it all. Some people are that shallow and prefer partners who are more decorative than substantive. God knows there are people who think it’s better to fit into a particular mold and meet certain looks than to be, y’know, happy and fulfilled.
Or it’s possible that your breaking the cycle threatens them in some way. The reason why people in our lives may give push-back when we’ve made positive changes is that staying the way we used to be – even though it affects us negatively – is that your former status-quo benefits them. Toxic “friends” may prefer that you stay miserable because it gives them leverage over you, or keeps you around so that you fill a role for them. Frenemies love having someone to kick around; trying to get away from them angers them because how dare you try to have a life outside of your use to them?
Now, it’s possible – unlikely, but possible – that they simply haven’t gotten to know Jacob and only see you dating someone who isn’t as aesthetically similar. If they think you’re dating someone to get your ego back in shape, someone that you can be “in charge” of because you’re hotter or what-have-you… well, I could understand the concern. It’s sketchy as fuck that their objection isn’t that you’re using a person as an ego-fluffer but that you’ve stayed with the ego-fluffer for too long, but I could understand it. A little. If I squint. It’s still not cool, but I could understand it.
So, if they haven’t had a chance to see how happy Jacob makes you, I’d suggest arranging a get-together or double date and see if that changes their minds. But if they have and still think he’s not worth your time… well, that’s when you may want to consider if your friends are in “your league”.
Because from where I stand? They aren’t.
Good luck.
