Am I the problem in this?

[TheAvidLemonSheep]

I’ll try and keep this brief - my partner and I have had another argument lastnight / this morning.

I suffer a lot with my mental health. I have an adhd diagnosis but honestly I feel like there’s more going on. I am really hypervigilant and have a tendency to overthink.

There’s been a few occasions now where I self sabotage my relationship. I convince myself that my partner is going off me / doesn’t love me as much as before etc. this is really frustrating for my partner as he feels I don’t trust him.
we’ve had some terrible evenings getting into arguments about it, and he loses his temper at me a lot quicker when it happens now.

this is one reason why I worry he’s going off me. I can’t see a world where I keep doing this, and his fuse towards me gets smaller, and yet he’s still 100% happy as he claims.

His point always is “if something was wrong I would tell you, I say this over and over and over again”.

Last night I told him I felt worried that he’s not seemed himself around me. I asked him for reassurance (he will say something and I’ll ask him if he’s sure) a few times and he just lost it.

He said to me he thought I had a bad phase of this last week (we put it down to a bad pill which I have since stopped) but I’m doing it again. He said I’ve been not myself and that I’ve been a nightmare.
He said he wanted to go out for fresh air because he “wanted to be away from me” and he went for a walk for an hour.

Afterwards, he said he is sick of me creating problems out of nowhere, and me trying to fix them is the problem. He said I’m trying to fix a perfectly good window with a hammer.
But he also says things that I can’t understand how he’d be happy with me. He said:

• I am ruining things
• i stress him out sometimes
• i make him feel crazy sometimes
• i need to sort myself out in order to improve the relationship - i need to think about me and not him
• he doesnt offer comfort anymore - i was crying this morning and he just sat there coldly
• he didn’t tell me the good qualities about me when i needed comforting
• he constantly tells me how i “have done this so many times”

how does the above equate to someone being “100% happy”? I think this is what I’m not understanding - how can everything I’ve done wrong not have had an impact on him?
he said I don’t need to understand, just believe him.

he also said he is “not a warm and fuzzy type person” when he literally used to tell me I made him feel this way. He said he has moments of this but not all the time.
this made me feel so worried his feelings have changed for me but he’s adamant that they haven’t.

im just so tired

It sounds like you keep looking to him to make you feel better and that isn’t his job. Your pushing him into the role of carer.

You sound exhausting and I'm shocked he puts up with your nonsense. I wouldn't blame him at all if he's had enough and leaves you.

If therapy isn't working, try something else. But you need to make drastic changes before you end up ruining not just this relationship but his mental health.

You are 100% the problem here OP which you seem to recognise but cannot help. Not sure what the answer is as you are already having therapy but most people wouldn't be able to put up with this level of insecurity long term. If you want to stay in this relationship you need to change your behaviour but I suspect you know this.

why is he telling me there’s no issue and he’s 100% happy?

If he told you he’s 80% happy and could get back to 100% if you stop behaving the way you are, what would happen?

Would you say alright that’s fair enough I’m going to work on it thanks for being honest or would it make you completely spiral and get even worse? I suspect the latter given everything you have said.

I think you have a lot of work you need to do on yourself to make this or any relationship work. You’re pushing him away and even if he loves and adores you, there’s only so much someone can take.

Do you work? Have any hobbies? Sounds like you spend a lot of time trapped in your own head.

Poor guy.

He’s trying to tell you to stop trying to control him and his feelings - you need to focus on yourself and your insecurities.

At the moment you want him to twist himself in very specific knots to stop you from feeling bad. But only you can stop that.

Agree with this
(Except the last line which I'm not qualified to agree or disagree with).

3 questions:

1. apart from therapy and meds what are you doing to regulate yourself? Eg nutrition, time outside, exercise, meditation, cold water therapy, avoiding alcohol, creative outlets.?

2. what tools or techniques would your therapist encourage you to use to notice/stop a "spiral"?

3. what are the triggers for you thinking your partner is unfaithful?

It is possible that you need to do some work on yourself and at the same time that your partner would prefer to be with you.

This sounds really tough for you both. I have anxiety too and it is so hard to stop an overthinking mind. I think you are getting too bogged down with the him saying he’s 100% happy when you think his actions don’t match his words. I think he’s using the words 100% happy because he knows you need to hear in absolute terms that the relationship is ok because if it isn’t then for you that means the end of everything. But it really isn’t. It’s ok to be annoyed with each other sometimes, irritated, impatient, frustrated etc, these are all normal feelings that arise during any relationship. Of course he’s frustrated with you at the moment but that doesn’t mean it’s all over. You are looking to him for too much. He cannot give you the reassurance you need because you can’t give it to yourself. He can’t undo all the things may have played a part in you feeling the way you do. So let him be. Focus on working on yourself. I’m sure you are doing what you can but the basics of healthy food, exercise, sleep, hobbies and friends do form a solid basis for any medication to work. Anyway, just some thoughts and I wish you all the best.

You sound like you have some aspects of EUPD (Borderline Personality Disorder). Perhaps have a read of 'I Hate you - Don't Leave Me' by Hal Straus and Jerold J. Kreisman?

You haven't said what you are doing to change your behaviour, OP. You've acknowledged there's an issue now you need a plan to turn things around or at least try.

At the moment you want him to twist himself in very specific knots to stop you from feeling bad. But only you can stop that.

This is very true.

You are looking for something from him that you can only.get from yourself.

There is nothing he will be able to say that puts your mind at rest. You have to find that peace in yourself and, for some people, that looks like staying single.

She sounds like she has ADHD which she has been diagnosed with.

It sounds like you want him to admit there is a problem so you can have more drama. This isn’t normal, OP, and it isn’t healthy. I mean this kindly: Have you been diagnosed with any personality disorder? It might explain your insecurities.

What sort of therapy are you having and for how long have you been doing the therapy?
What does your therapist say about this situation with your husband?

Kindness is a virtue.

Trying to diagnose herself is only going to make her feel more broken. She does need to acknowledge that only she can change this but in the context of supportive therapy.

@TheAvidLemonSheep ....I'm not sure if you'll get what I'm going to say, but I'm going to say it anyway and if it's incomprehensible to you, just ignore it

You don't love your partner. If you loved him you wouldn't treat him the way you do

All you want is to make yourself feel good/happy/less stressed and you'll do and say anything to try to achieve that

It doesn't matter to you how you treat your partner because, at the end of the day, the most important thing to you is to get answers which your anxiety driven brain agrees with and understands....this then calms you down for a while

If the answers you're given don't make sense to your anxiety driven brain, you keep plugging away, stomping over anyones feelings, until you get what you want

Your anxiety is the epitome of selfishness.

In answer to your question - very few people are 100% happy but your partner tells you he is because he is very very weary of being trampled over by you and your need to quieten your brain

I'm not sure what the answer is, but perhaps try using love and compassion for your partner as a tool.

Rather than constantly using the selfish need to calm your anxiety driven brain

He is probably saying he is happy with you in the relationship; but how you are acting is causing a problem that must be addressed. Both things are true at the same time. This is 100% a ‘you’ issue. Your need for reassurance must be dealt with by you - there is nothing he can do here to ‘fix’ this.

Whilst you are busy analysing him, his motivations, his disconnect between words/actions, explaining how you don’t understand etc you are avoiding doing the work on yourself! Acknowledge and accept that you are destroying a perfectly good relationship with your behaviour and choose to address it.

You are in therapy - what are you actually doing to challenge these thoughts; to learn to manage the uncomfortable feelings that are leading you to seek reassurance; how are you promoting a sense of safety in yourself? What hobbies/interests/activities are you giving time to, to build a life outside of this relationship and to help give you perspective on it?

If you’re ‘doing’ therapy by just talking you will be going round and round in circles and are not actually ‘doing’ anything at all. Talking is good, but ‘doing’ leads to change.

Do you have too much time on your hands? That could be why you're obsessing over it and worrying about it. Try working part time and join some hobby groups.

So is honesty.

It's tough for you, it's tough for him.

It's tough out there for all of us at the moment. I'm not surprised people are struggling with life at the moment.

Maybe you need to accept that some stuff is going to be difficult for a while. Keep going with the therapy, get some solid daily habits going to root yourself - a daily routine might help you.

Focus on helping yourself and try to reduce the demands you are placing on him.

As to those saying kindness is a virtue - yes it is, as is empathy but you can be too kind and that can be unhelpful.

I reccommend Paul Bloom's 'Against Empathy - the case for rational compassion'

Not going to vote on this - but unmanaged and unsupported ADHD leads to low self esteem, which is the core of your issues with your partner and underpins your self-sabotaging of relationships. Hypervigilence, anxiety and overthinking are all typical of ADHD. Many medications prescribed for anxiety, for example, do not work well on ND brains and, in fact, make things worse.

We are a family of ND (autism and ADHD) people so manage this every day, but my eldest DD has had significant issues until finally getting to speak to a GP who’s specialism was MH issues and was trained in ND issues. The right anxiety meds were, frankly, a revelation after years of shitty side effects and getting worse which only made DD’s self esteem plummet even further. We also changed her ADHD meds in response to wonderful support from a specialist ADHD parenting forum - for a medication we have never been offered (Lisdexamfetamine) having got no where with uk equivalents of ritalin and aderal and everything in between.

We also found a counsellor/therapist with decades of experience in working exclusively with ADHD people (through her ASD/ADHD clinic). His impact in helping DD reframe her issues, working on self esteem etc and having a safe space to share her fears about not feeling loved has been incredible.

My advice?

Visit your GP and using the right to choose scheme you can insist upon a referral to a psychiatric team and to get counselling. If the wait time is too much and you and DP can scrape together the money then consider fining a private clinic where you can speak to a psychiatrist about medications and where you can find an ADHD specialist therapist (Oxford ADHD and Berkshire Psychology are two clinics down south - they may be able to sign post you to a clinic near you?).

Having an ADHD diagnosis is great and all, but you need specialist support to help you find the best strategies to manage it and help with rebuilding your self-esteem. You can do it with the right team.

@TheAvidLemonSheep I agree with @TheQuietestSpace, if you already have an ADHD diagnosis then this sounds like Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria, a not uncommon ADHD element; extreme sensitivity to criticism or apparent rejection. It’s the reason why many women have been given a diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder/Emotionally Unstable PD that is not appropriate. I don’t know what sort of therapy you are having but they really need to be very well versed in ADHD and structured in their approach. Are you having general counselling or therapy and do you have a choice to find specialist help?

@TheAvidLemonSheep this sounds so awful for everyone involved. Why are you fixated on him being 100% happy? What is happiness? Is anyone 100% happy? Is 90% ok? He’s right you need to think about you. Are you happy? Is he able to support you in the way you need?

also you need to go back to therapy, try and different type and keep trying. Your anxiety is an explanation not an excuse. Good luck.

Can people stop suggesting personality disorders to the OP?

This is what ADHD can look like and she has a diagnosis of this. Armchair diagnoses of something else isn't going to be helpful or constructive.

Kindness is a virtue.

It is but sometimes people need it spelling out to them really clearly for it to cut through the noise in their own head and actually hear it.