Anyone have any tips for not constantly “checking your feelings” for someone you are dating in the early stages? I find it hard to be fully present and actually feel emotions because I am constantly thinking. Thanks!

Hey guys, recently I’ve been struggling with always checking in with my emotions. And it gets very tiring right now I’m dealing with some suicidal OCD and I constantly check for negative emotions or depression. I’ve noticed it’s very hard for me to stop checking my emotions cause it’s something I’m used to doing because I have mental illness. Any advice on how to stop checking. Thanks 🙏

I’ve dealt with ocd themes for as long as I can remember, POCD, HOCD, false memory, the feelings of having to confess something, washing certain body parts a specific amount of times, all of it I am still pretty young and I just got into my first relationship. I always knew ROCD existed I just never had the chance to have an experience with it 😭 and here I am. I really do think I have an anxious attachment style. But it’s also like I constantly worry if I’m too much or if i should not be in a relationship or if I rlly love my partner like I tell him. I am sensitive and very communicative so when things bother me I like to communicate them but then I worry that I do too much or I worry that it isn’t normal to find this many things wrong so early in a relationship. I also worry if he doesn’t like me or if he Will get tired of me, but those thoughts are easier to get by. The hard thoughts r the ones where I doubt my feelings for him. My mind feels like a MESS! And it’s harder because we only see eachother once a week. This may be heaven compared to other ppl who struggle with real long distance but for me the time in between gives me a lot of time to nitpick things that aren’t even real problems and create a sense of a toxic relationship that isn’t even real! The only times where I feel like maybe it’s all in my head are when. I see him and the days after, but when it gets long it gets rlly hard. I rlly do love him and he gives me reassurance when needed but I can’t help but focus on the negatives when little things bother me, especially when we are apart from eachother and jsut texting. Texting is hard because then there is the obsession over waiting to see how long he will take, not knowing the tone of texts, and being able to over analyze every conversation we’ve had. I also do mental checks to help me reassure myself that I love him 😭 like when’s the last time he made me laugh, what are some nice things he’s done that I rlly liked, and jsut trying to actively acknowledge everything he’s done so I can stop panicking abt the fear that I don’t love him. It’s literally only been 2 months of us dating so the fact my ocd is so early onset annoys me so bad because I rlly do feel like I am still in the crucial stages of a relationship where we are learning how to love eachother, so there should be some ups and downs and minor arguments while we get over this phase… but I can’t help but wonder what if these little things just mean I hate him? It’s extreme but I worry and the reels and tik toks I see about people realizing they don’t love their partner make it all bad!

I’ve recently started dating a guy. It’s been a little over a week and I’m already questioning my feelings for him. Our first date went pretty well, but since then I’ve been obsessing over the fact that my feelings for him aren’t strong enough and that they’re sometimes flat. This is very distressing because I dated someone last year for 3 months whom I never really developed much feelings for, and it was very traumatic for me because I felt like I was leading him on (which to be fair, I never told him my feelings were up and down until 3 months in). The amount of guilt I hold over that is tremendous. But fast forward a year later, and I’m dating this new guy who I seem to like and want to continue getting to know, yet here are those same doubts and loss of feelings. It’s so discouraging. The only difference this time is the thoughts aren’t as distressing, and I also never left the first date questioning my feelings for him. Looking back at my relationship from a year ago, I feel like I never really formed a connection, both emotionally and physically. It was very slow paced and I really wasn’t that interested in him. With the new guy, I have interest and I do like him, but these doubts and dull feelings make me not want to see him—they create so much anxiety and dread. He will text me good morning and I don’t get excited but instead bad anxiety (which to me seems abnormal especially when first dating/starting a relationship, but I could be wrong). And so I’ve been led to believe that these doubts and feelings MUST mean I’m not interested in him, and any further interactions are purely me forcing myself to like him. My question here is—and I must admit this is me trying to seek reassurance—there must be a difference between GENUINELY not being interested in someone and then OCD TRICKING you into thinking you aren’t into someone. Where and how is that distinction made? I’m seeing him later this evening for a date and have been feeling nervous. There’s excitement underneath, but it’s very hard to feel with all this anxiety. I’ll be giving him a letter I wrote explaining how OCD impacts me in relationships. He already knows I have the disorder, but doesn’t realize its extent. I know I’m ritualizing by giving him this letter, but I personally feel I owe it to him out of pure respect. And especially after that last relationship where I told the guy 3 months in that my feelings fluctuated.