Working on our issues but would like advice

[togo1004]

My fiance and I are working on our issues. I’ve posted here previously and he’s been helping more around the house which is really helping.

i have a worry that I’m making him sick. He’s been losing weight, and he won’t eat a lot anymore and says he full after a few bites. He doesn’t seem as positive as he used to be lately.

we seem to get along for a day or two and he acts insensitive to my needs and we have a fight. For example, today he asked me to do him a favor. He said the water filter person is coming tomorrow at 1pm and he has to go help his grandmother file some taxes so he won’t be around until 3pm. He asked me to open the door for the water filter man and if he has any questions, he can call him. I didn’t answer him right away and just froze. I have some social anxiety and sometimes it’s hard to even meet the delivery man to receive package at the front door. I told him why can’t you reschedule? He said babe just open the door for the man to do his job and call me if he has any questions. So I told him my anxiety is bad and I’m afraid he will start a conversation with me. He said why would the water filter man start a convo with you, you will be working on your computer and I’m sure the man just wants to do his job and leave. I started crying because he was being insensitive to my feelings and didn’t feel validated.

then he pointed out a fact that I went out to meet a stranger for coffee and dinner last week, and spent the entire evening with a new friend (his friends and he knows I have no friends and I often complain that I have no friends so his friend met someone outside who wants to learn Russian, I happen to be Russian and I wanted to learn Korean, she happens to be Korean so he got her number so we can chat and become friends). He said if you can do that you can open the door for the man and let him do his job.

he told me he doesn’t understand me. He said how can you be an introvert, but love going out with my friends to bars and clubs meeting new people to make friends but cannot open the door for the filter man?

he says he’s introverted and if he hangs out with his friends he needs alone time to recharge. He thinks that I’m not introverted, but extroverted but just has some social anxiety.

I eventually apologized to him because I realized I was giving him a hard time. This man does a lot for me, so I felt I needed to apologize.

he said he’s super tired of fighting over small things.

how do I stop fighting with him every few days? I’m having a hard time dealing with his insensitivity and feel that I can’t bring anything up with him.

If he tried to make you feel better every time you have anxiety, you will never learn to manage your anxiety and fears.

The best way to help a loved one with anxiety is to help to build their confidence and capability around their anxieties. Expand their capacity.

Which it sounds like what he was doing - showing you how you have been capable in a similar situation, and if you can do it then, you can also do it in this situation.

Constantly pandering to your fears and anxiety only reinforces it and doesn't actually help you.

It sounds like there's a lot of issues going on.

Neither of you are right or wrong all the time.

Specifically relating to when you're having a panic attack, you need to decide a strategy with him beforehand, such as you signalling you're having a panic attack and therefore the discussion is suspended.

Ideally he would help calm you in that moment however it's possible he is wound up himself and also disregulated, and may find helping you difficult in that moment.

So you could emove yourself to a safe place to calm yourself down, with the agreement that he will not follow you unless he is able to help you.

“i often ask him would you rather be right or make the relationship work? Then his response is always “I need to live in truth, so I stick by the truth and cannot accept anything less than factual truth”

I found this part of one of your posts particularly disturbing, OP. You want him to jump to your every call, no matter what, to ‘make the relationship work.’ But what do you give in return? You can’t always have everything your way, even in the very best of relationships. What you describe sounds almost controlling, to be honest. And, in the end, like with jealousy, it drives the other partner away.

I know how awful anxiety is. I’ve suffered with it for 40 years, but I’ve learned ways to feel more in control over that time. You might benefit from CBT, to help you with similar techniques, see the situation causing the anxiety (or the way you respond) in a different light.

I truly hope you aren’t using your anxiety as a way to control your fiancé, though.

I’m sorry, OP, it must be hard to hear all these comments, particularly if you are feeling hurt and sensitive after your disagreement.

I think it’s really important to appreciate that going to therapy isn’t some admission that he is ‘right’ and you are ‘wrong’. Generally speaking, I think something like anxiety needs to be explored away from a relationship dynamic. Yes, your boyfriend could add context for the therapist but I’m pretty sure most therapists would encourage you to seek therapy alone as a priority after a couple of sessions. The same would go for your partner. He would gain way more from individual therapy first before you come together and work out how to work as a couple. Relationship therapy, for me, is a total waste of time if there’s a load of personal issues clouding the issues. Better off healing as an individual first as that’s the most important thing.

You speak a lot about needing to be the priority (including above any future children), about your partner needing to make you feel happy or safe. Again, it’s hard to hear but you are ultimately responsible for feeling safe or happy in life no matter what challenges you have faced and continue to face. By this I mean, if you are unhappy in a relationship and you feel unheard or unseen, you leave, if you don’t feel happy in life, you look inward and seek professional help. You cannot make someone else responsible for this because that isn’t fair on them. It sounds like codependency may be something for you to explore.

Putting the work in to heal is a lot of effort and your partner should be there supporting you every step of the way. But the work is yours to do not his. He may, of course, have his own issues to deal with but that doesn’t change the fact that you need support and help and a trained professional is who you should turn to, not a loved one. They know what to say and how to help because they’ve had years of experience helping people in a similar position heal.

You are bringing some major baggage to this relationship for your partner to deal with OP. Anxiety is not just hard for you to deal with it’s also hard on your partner. If you weren’t doing everything you can to improve your mental and physical health by getting support for your anxiety and eating healthily and taking exercise then I think a lot of partners wouldn’t be willing to accept that. Definitely have counselling solo as a first step.

Hey thank you. I just signed up with an individual therapist for first session soon.

my partner actually came and spoke to me today about my anxiety and issues and after about a 3 hour conversation and many tears I’ve decided to go for it.

In a relationship it’s never 1 persons problem. It takes 2 to tango

I also give him love, hugs and we get along quite well most of the time.

No, you're definitely the problem.

This is where I disagree. All feelings are valid and must be validated otherwise you are being disrespectful.

he said the same thing to me that why does he need to validate things if it’s wrong. But it’s right for me at that moment so it must be validated

Well that's a load of utter bullshit.

Husband hits his wife. According to you that's as much the wife's fault as his.

A wife cheats on her husband. Must be equally the husband's fault according to you.

Woman refuses to take steps to help herself with her mental health issues, yep, must be your poor fiances problem to solve, not yours.

Those aren’t chores FFS. Those are baseline relationship expectations. Christ, you’re really scraping the bottom of the barrel now.

This is absolute insanity.

That is an astounding level of delusion you've got there.

I hope therapy helps you fix your views or you won't be in a relationship for much longer.

In fact I don't even believe you.

I think you're being emotionally abusive and controlling toward your bf. That your anxiety is not to the degree you're trying to make it out to be (as pointed out by the example your bf provided with you being comfortable meeting strangers).

You're using it as an excuse to always have everything on your own terms and then play the victim when he reasonably points out your contradictory behaviour.

This babble about needing to feel validated even when you're in the wrong is an abusers mentality.

I get it totally, I would avoid being in my house with a strange man anytime I could and I don't have social anxiety...being in a public space is very different from someone coming into your home. I dont think this is complicated and anyone with concern for you wouldn't either.
Its a simple rebook for when he can handle it

I think I'd be advising him to LTB to be honest

OMFG….. 6 pages of telling you that you are being ridiculous, hard work and basically a total fruitcake….. but you won’t have any of it…

I hope, for his own sake, your fiancé calls it a day.

You need therapy - lots of it. And that’s just for starters as you are clearly totally self-focused and unable to understand what being in a loving relationship actually means.

I also clean up and get him stuff from stores also. We do things for each other

My anxiety has been this way for a while. I always felt the world is really unfair to me.

my uncle tried to steal my inheritance from my grand mother and I had to fight for it long ago.

then covid hit and Russia sanctioned locked up my entire brokerage account and now my entire net worth I have no access to.

this is where it all started and gotten worse.

i just want things to be fair to me

How’s it insanity? If for example, you feel sad today thinking something happened, but it didn’t, does it make your feelings invalid? It was real to you at that time, and it must be validated. I’m not saying it was right but the feeling was real so it’s valid

this is abusive if not

That is hardly your partner's fault, is it? You are being extremely unfair, unreasonable and demanding to him and the day may well come when he has had enough. I hope therapy provides you with some clarity.

That’s really great news, OP. It’s such an empowering first step and I hope you’ll quickly see how important/valuable a therapist is vs a loved one when it comes to mental health needs. Remember that the first therapist you meet might not be the right fit - that doesn’t mean you should give up on therapy. You just need to find the right person. The right person will listen and challenge you when necessary so don’t give up if every session doesn’t feel ‘good’.

I wanted to also mention the idea of validation and feelings. I think it’s important to feel heard and understood by your partner. I think that is key to a happy and healthy relationship. I think validating feelings takes it a step beyond that - you have to not only listen and empathise with my feelings but also agree with them. The issue with this is that it can disregard your partner’s feelings if you are in disagreement. It also assumes all feelings are rational and ‘okay’’. Questioning or challenging someone’s feelings in a gentle way can help you understand where those anxieties come from or why they are impacting your behaviour. It’s also important to keep in mind that your feelings, whilst important, are not always helpful. This is especially true when it comes to anxiety. It’s important to question and explore the anxiety or feeling not just accept that that’s how you feel. Get curious rather than defensive. For example, when my son says he is afraid in the dark, I don’t tell him he’s right and the dark is scary. I ask him what he worries might happen in the dark or what might help him feel less worried. I wouldn’t ever tell him he’s being silly because I have to acknowledge his fear but I can be inquisitive as to why he has those feelings and what can be done to help.

Good luck with your first session. As I said, it can be such an empowering moment.

They are valid TO YOU, no one else. But let's spin this warped thinking around... your partner is clearly communicating his feelings to you about about the affect your issues are having on him and the relationship, he is asking you to seek help... these are HIS feelings and experiences... are they not valid too? Or do your feelings only count here as needing constant validation?

You can't just pin all of this on your partner and want everything your way.