My girlfriend has Covid and I’m taking care of her since I’ve already exposed. I am stressed out about it. I have been dealing with the retroactive jealousy themes and feel like I have to be visibly happy and optimistic because she’s really upset about not being able to visit her family, but it’s really hard when I feel this way. It makes me feel like a bad boyfriend. I feel a lot of triple-A (Anxiety about anxiety) rn.

Inability to let go of partner’s prior sexual experience. Also part of why I feel like a bad boyfriend.

@CaptainKierkegaard Ooh. That is certainly more difficult. I’m not with the guy I’m in love with but somehow i experience this so I get what a pain in the ass it is. It literally defies all logic. You’re not a bad bf or bad person just human. Why does her part history matter to you? Does it have something significant like has she cheated in the past?

@Bookworm91 I’m definitely with the girl I’m in love with. We haven’t had sex, but when I touch her or have physically intimate moments with her, I start feeling like it’s really special and then I get really strong, vivid images of her having sex with other guys and I just get this feeling like “so you thought this was special? That’s cute. guess what? there are strangers and shitheads who got to experience much more. This is not special.” I just get depressed and alienated and feel disconnected from her. I’ve been using ERP messaging with it, but my biggest compulsions with it is rumination which is really hard to prevent and yet it makes my life hell. I am trying to just not ruminate like Michael Greenberg says, but it’s hard. I’ve just been terrible with that compulsion lately and it feels like my wheels are stuck in the mud so to speak.

@CaptainKierkegaard I’m so sorry you go through that. I hope I don’t offended you by saying this but it kinda sounds like it has less to do with her and more your sense of self worth. You don’t seem to have a good self esteem. I mean I’m sure you know that you’re smart but I guess I’m just saying that I’m sorry you feel that badly. About yourself, your gf, the entire situation. It can’t be easy for either of you. What do you think she could do to help? Not that it’s much. I’m not trying to attack your gf honest but if my bf struggled with this I’d probably at least try telling him he is special because a relationship is so much more then sex and she chose a RELATIONSHIP with you. Not saying I’d say this all the time but I’d at least say it once so it’s in your head. I hope you don’t mind me asking how old you are

@Bookworm91 I’m 25. It’s partly to do with my self worth. I think self-punishment is one of the compulsions I use to deal with feelings of humiliation, like a way of saving face in front of an invisible audience. But I think it also has to do with my existential themes. It always complicates the other themes by making me chase some ever moving goalpost. I ask if the physicality we have is special and as I logically think through it to try and prove that it is, it says “but is it *this* kind of special?” making for ever more elusive definitions for what I’m looking for. Kind of the same way a person’s OCD might say “Okay, you checked the front door was locked but did you check the back door?” This is why I don’t bring it up to my girlfriend anymore. She has told me plenty of times how special I am to her. But it’s never enough. And even if I am special to her, and she is special to me, is our physical touch special? It makes sense that it would be, but my OCD is never convinced.

@CaptainKierkegaard Well I’m really sorry you go through that. I bet it’s awful. Did you get badly screwed over in another relationship? Is that kind of a driving force that you doubt your own specialness and the specialness of your relationships, romantic or otherwise? also I’ve got to ask, what’s the captain Kierkegaard reference? I feel like the name is familiar but I can’t place it

Oh I knew it had something to do with Star Trek! 🤦🏼‍♀️