To wonder how to stop overthinking in my relationship?

[Meeeeep05]

We have been together nearly 3 years now! I have ADHD and OCD and I have just started therapy. But I wondered if anyone also had any top tips.

I live with my boyfriend and he is a genuinely lovely lovely man. He treats me really well and shows me love every day. He tells me he loves me every day; he’s very affectionate.
We are similar in many ways, but also very different in some ways - I am very anxious and emotion driven; he is very laid back and logical thinking.

It’s almost like I have a script in my brain about how things should go, and I hate it when it doesn’t happen. I’m constantly worrying that he hates me or is going off me if things don’t go how I expect them to:

• he is part of a sports group and sometimes I go there too, to socialise. If he stays with some of his friends and doesn’t approach me very much then I’ll get upset
• He used to text me really gushing things when we didn’t live together, and I get upset reading them now - he says he still thinks the same things but relationships evolve
• last night I got upset, we went to a singalong cinema viewing and we were belting one of the songs together. But he didn’t really look at me, he was just watching the screen, and I thought we’d sing to each other or look at each other. He got frustrated and said he just wants to exist without being judged or monitored
• I usually fall asleep and he does a sudoku. Sometimes he will leave me a note but sometimes not (I’ll get sad if he doesn’t)

I just can’t help but script everything in my head, and I have such a hard time letting it go. I overthink absolutely everything.

He has said to me that not every situation can always be the same, there’s always a reason for things and nothing ever means he doesn’t love me anymore. He said if he felt differently towards me or he was going off me, he would tell me.
He was so frustrated last night, he said he feels like he can’t exist and also that he’s offended that I don’t ever believe him and that everything he does do isn’t being appreciated.

so how do I get out of this horrible loop please?

Nothing can "make you stop overthinking", except possibly therapy.

What you can do more immediately though, is control your reactions to your overthinking. You don't have to react to your thoughts, or project them into your partner. You don't have to have the thoughts stop before treating your partner better. You can do that whilst still overthinking.

And all that takes is not getting pissy at him due to your own thoughts.

CBT might help. I don’t know if you’ve had this sort of therapy before but I’ve found it brilliant with addressing unhelpful patterns of thinking and challenging the internal voices that tell you things are so much worse than they actually are. It sounds like you need to break those loops of irrational thinking and CBT might be a good start.

Thank you, that’s so helpful. I am starting CBT type therapy which I’m hoping will help.
Social media is another huge one. I have just deleted TikTok and instagram, I get triggered by other couples doing big expensive trips or surprises when we can’t do that because we are saving money 😢

Another thing is if I message him but he doesn’t see it until later, he won’t acknowledge it and just read it. Sometimes he doesn’t even open it but I’ve seen he’s opened other messages (say in shared group chats).
He never used to do this. Is this something stupid to worry about??

I imagine that he knows he may not be able to respond to your message immediately, or is dreading having to, and knows that you’ll give him grief for opening it and leaving it on read just as you will not opening it right away, but the latter at least means the message isn’t invading his headspace.

Honestly, I don’t think anxiety and being “emotionally driven” can be used to excuse this sort of controlling behaviour towards a partner, and you need to address it as a priority.

Thank you, that’s a good thought. I would hate for him to feel that way (although if I ask if he does, he always says no and if he had a problem he would tell me).

Is my cinema example completely unreasonable? I can’t explain why it made me so sad but it did

Yes the cinema thing is ridiculous. You are putting a lot of pressure on him.

OP, you sound EXHAUSTING. I don't mean that in a critical way, but this is some seriously draining behaviour – for you and for him.

You absolutely must take therapy very seriously and throw yourself into meaningful change. Therapy is hard work and you must work at it every day to see a difference.

It’s all unreasonable. Essentially, you expect him to always have you as the centre of his attention in order to prove to you that he still loves you, and tell him you won’t believe he loves you unless he’s doing that. Can you imagine how you’d feel if someone was telling you all the time that you needed to behave a particular way to prove your love for them, or telling you repeatedly that they’d expect you to behave differently if you really loved them when you’d just done something perfectly normal in the circumstances. How you’d be on eggshells all the time in case they decided you hadn’t been paying them enough attention and started picking at you over how they didn’t think you loved them any more? It’s an awful way to live, for both of you.

I’m sorry OP but this gave me the biggest “Ick” ever - and I hate using that word! Never have until now, but could think of nothing else to describe it.

Your DP needs to turn off his read receipts. That’s the advice I’d be giving him.

You’re suffocating him - your behaviour is going to achieve the one thing you are desperately trying to avoid.

Agree

His texts make me think he thinks different about me too. It used to be intense and now it’s cutesy

i read an old message the other day. It said things like “you’re incredible” “I admire you” “you light up a room” “I’m madly attracted to you”

he doesn’t word things like this anymore. It’s more just “I love you”, “I’ll always love you”, “see you soon darling”, “you’re the best”

The poor man just can't win. OP you sound exhausting and you're going to have to get control of this before you push him away and lose him.

You’ve had some really great advice here - but you won’t succeed in acting on it unless you create a life for yourself that doesn’t depend on other people, including your boyfriend.

What are your interests and hobbies and ambitions - what do you do that doesn’t depend on him and his input or reactions?

It sounds a hard place for you to be in but honestly, I couldn't live like you're making him live. The cinema one is ridiculous. Your need for reassurance and checking in when out would drive me a bit nuts. It's great that you're thinking about things and I think the only way to really help yourself will be therapy and boosting your own self esteem. Best of luck.

OP, bluntly, you need to take responsibility for regulating your own emotions. This is not your boyfriend’s job. Work very hard in therapy on this. Agree also with @Enrichetta — what else is in your life?

Gosh OP, I really really do understand that it's hard to control your overthinking because I'm very similar. But you really need to work on putting less pressure on your partner as ultimately you'll end up pushing him away. Then it'll become a self fulfilling prophecy as he will have proved your overthinking 'right.'

I totally get it- I've got low confidence and self esteem issues and quite often panic that my partner will suddenly go off me or end the relationship. The challenge is working out when to voice this anxiety and when to try and keep it inside and swallow it- because you can't constantly be expecting him to provide his love and affection.

Texts to change as relationships evolve- when you weren't living together he probably missed you more but now you're out the honeymoon period and it's a different kind of love. But still just as valuable.

The cinema example is really putting an insane amount of pressure on someone. You can't expect to control what direction he's looking in!

Well done you for trying to address it and I think therapy is a really good idea.

*prove his love and affection

*Texts do change

Sorry- was typing fast and carelessly

OP I’m exhausted just reading your posts, nevermind living this poor man’s life. He’s done nothing wrong, you need to fully engage with therapy, and in the meantime you seriously need to bite your tongue or by the time you come out the other side he will be long gone.

This is going to turn into a self-fulfilling prophesy. You're so afraid that he might go off you that your actions are going to push him to that.
You may not be able to calm your thoughts but you can stop asking him for continual reassurance and stop trying to micromanage his behaviour and reactions.
Relationships change and mature. No one fawns over their partner forever. If you're expecting the romance level of the beginning of your relationship, you're going to be disappointed. No one can keep that up but it doesn't mean he loves you any less.

OP - please disregard this. I understand that you are not in control of your intrusive thoughts and it’s not just a case of “not getting pissy with your partner.” Some people are not able to understand things they have no experience of.

As has been previously mentioned, CBT is a good start, but doesn’t work for everyone. You might want to look into DBT.

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) is a type of psychotherapy, a form of talking therapy, that helps individuals manage difficult emotions and improve their ability to cope with challenging situations. It's a skills-based approach that combines acceptance and change strategies to help individuals regulate their emotions, tolerate distress, and build healthier relationships. Originally developed to treat Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), DBT is now used for a variety of mental health conditions involving emotional dysregulation

OP your ADHD and OCD are not his problem, and you are making him responsible for them. It’s one thing to feel these things, it’s another to act on them and worse, to expect him to act on them. This is your issue to sort out, not his. And relationships are supposed to evolve. Relationships change as feelings deepen-is that not what you want? Do you just want surface-level cutesy nonsense for the rest of your life?

My biggest bugbear is someone getting into a relationship without having developed appropriate coping mechanism for their stuff and putting it all on the other person. He is not your therapist, he was not put on this earth to facilitate your emotions.

Thank you everyone, some food for thought here. I have recently started medication and I am in the early stages of therapy so hopefully everything comes together soon.

I know how I’m acting isn’t good and often I get so caught up in it, but the next day I’m sobbing because I feel so guilty and horrible 😢

Don't beat yourself up, OP, but do take it very seriously and aim for change. There's no need to sit sobbing and hating yourself (does your boyfriend also have to get involved with this too?).

I think this sort of thing can be somewhat difficult because if normal for family, friends, colleagues etc to support us when we're struggling – but there's a limit to that if how it begins to effect them. Especially when they are the target.

We have someone at work who is the same in the way she approaches work and her colleagues. Every conversation, every glance and every meeting becomes a reason for her anxiety, projections and self loathing. It's honestly the most exhausting situation and, sadly, most people have washed their hands of her – including her managers.

It's sad because it eventually becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Stop it before it gets that far.