- Username
- anonymous
- Date posted
- 4y ago
If you’ve brought this up repeatedly and nothing has changed, it’s likely not going to. She doesn’t want to do the things you want her to (for whatever reason), even if it would mean a lot to you. First and foremost you have to accept that to move forward. Second is that it sounds like you are very much a “words of affirmation” love language style. Perhaps she has a different style. Maybe she even wishes you used her language more as well. Does she exhibit other styles like acts of service? Perhaps you just aren’t hearing her love language the way she feels comfortable expressing it. Third I do see a bit of a boundary issue here. She doesn’t want to talk to someone via text all day and you feel you NEED to. If you have an anxious attachment style and she has an avoidant one, you could be simply overwhelming her with affection and constant contact, when she actually wants and needs more independence and space. If she never has a chance to miss you or feel separate from you, she likely won’t feel or express that sense of appreciation you so crave.
I’ve been in this position many times before. My partner is not very affectionate and used to have a hard time with what I asked as well. What I did in turn was that I became 100% honest with him, and told him that if he does not meet my needs, we will have to take a break or end our relationship. It’s terrifying and not fun, but I was tired of asking so often. The issue was that I never gave him the time and space to grow and show me the love I wanted to be shown, and that he didn’t understand how serious it was to me to feel appreciated. In the end he took it seriously and worked on it slowly, it was bumpy because he wasn’t used to it. The key to fixing problems is time and patience, and the communication of urgency about the issue. I know you can do this and I know you guys will be fine, and hey, if you end up taking a break that is perfectly okay and normal. My boyfriend and I have been on two breaks and have been dating just a bit longer than you :). It’s normal and doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong, relationships can just be a lot of work and sometimes we need to make time for our own self love and individuality. And maybe a break isn’t what you need either! Maybe it’s just some space while she learns to fix these issues that you have presented. Needless to say I hope it goes well and if you need to chat about this, please feel free to reach out:)
Talk to her and tell her how you feel and ask her what's going on
That’s the thing I have brought all this up at least 10 times. Each time she says she’s sorry but doesn’t change.
@takingdownocd that’s not fair to you at all:( you deserve all the love in the world. it’s out there.
If she's not willing to make changes then maybe it's not worth your effort either
^^^ this is very important too. I was very much so like the poster in terms of needing to talk all the time while my boyfriend is more avoidant. In turn I didn’t allow him to miss me or want me as much as he wanted to because I was always anxiously loving him. It took me a couple months to realize this and move around it, because realistically loving through anxiety is a cope for the inside. It really benefited my relationship to take a step back from wanting to always be around him, always want to text etc. and allowed me to learn a healthy attachment style that helped my relationship flourish.
With ocd It seems it’s very hard to keep friends or even have a best friend. I finally thought I found someone who understood me and accepted me for me and yes she is there when there are emergencies, however, she knows that after a traumatic event I talk or text a lot to vent and calm myself down. And while I’m grateful she is my support system, at the same time she makes me feel guilty. I never know what I do wrong or how to fix it. It sucks because she and I have so much in common and I entrust my life with her but at the same time I feel she lets me down and disappears and ignores me and then gets mad when I’m upset. Sometimes I wonder if friends are the greatest things to have or the things that cause more stress/ I love her dearly and don’t want to lose her friendship but every time we are on the same page something changes. Ugh ?
I feel like im in hell. I feel so bad and i feel so doomed. For 1.5 years i fighting with ocd, mostly pure o. 3 2.5 months ago it start to attack my relationship. She is the most precious thing in my life and i understand thats why the icd attack it. Im struggle with maintain love, attraction, emotions the most. In the last days i started to feel very numb and its "connect" me to the idea i dont love her and not attracted to her. It made me to be even more scared to my life when i noticed that ive short breath while kissing her, because im so scared amd ashamed that i kiss her while ive got all of those thoughts. I noticed that i check my emotion stability toward her which make it worse. Also, i read on wikipedia about pure o and they wrote there about that pure o relationship ocd is in most cases lead to break up and it triggered me so much. I dont want to loose her, never, no matter how much im suffer. She gave and giving me the powet to cope with this demon. I know its all ocd and i try to live my life without ocd and my love in my conor and something teying to hurt us and its makes me crazy.
So I'm going through ERP. My partner and I have agreed a hierarchy. One of the items we are tackling is packages coming into the house. I wasnt letting my partner do it so this was the task. I agreed with my therapist that it is reasonable to ask my partner to dispose of the outer packaging and let the stuff thats inside sit in a clean area and that she would wash her hands afterwards and inwoukdnt challenge her or follow behind cleaning up. Or doing any safety behaviours. This is fine buy I just feel that she is so so thoughtless. I told her only yesterday that every morning I wake up I am anxious for about an hour until I come round. on top of that she knows that I am not sleeping, I get about 2 hours from 6am every day. While I was sleeping this morning a package came and instead of leaving it on the doorstep as we normally do she just brought it in and opened it etc. Now I know that essentially what she did was right but it didn't give me a chance to challenge the ocd in a controlled way. I woke up.already anxious and saw that a package had arrived and she just did what she liked. On top.of all that today is the 1 year anniversary of my dad's death. I'm just anxious full stop. She thinks she supports me well but she really has no consideration or understanding for me I feel. I said to her today that whilst essentially what she did was right I had told her that I wake up anxious every morning and it would of been better to wait to do the behavioural experiment when I was fully conscious and I wasn't in already such a heightened state. It took me about an hour to calm down and ti be honest I'm still not calm. I am angry and resentful and I just keep focusing on points where she could have touched with contaminated hands and focusing on all the negatives of her personality and our relationship. I feel alot of the time that I would rather live on my own during this pandemic and not have her triggering my ocd or have tohave the guilty feeling about making her feel like crap and trapped because of the restrictions ocd puts on her. While I was trying to calm down I was thinking about ways that I could just finish things and move out. I know that I would be alot more lonely without her but it would be less difficult to manage my ocd and it wouldn't change things really as I look after myself in the house anyway...i cook, I clean, I do the washing I support and care for myself as she dies nothing except order takeaways and ear crap. She would never eve think of cooking a dinner for us. I might aswell live on my own anyway as the conversation is scant and so is the affection. I know that ocd has affected my mood and I'm.deoressed and anxious all the time aswell as having had preliminary diagnosis of MS. But I feel wholey unsupported and uncared for by her and quite lonely actually. I know she may feel that way too but 8 do TRY ti make her feel.less that way. I cook her meals and try ti be affectionate but the she just doesn't listen. Never hears me. And doesn't even listen or stop to think about ocd and how to approach it with me, as in working the way up the hierarchy in the correct way. I just feel unsupported and there is no way that I can say that to her as she is sensitive at the moment and takes everything as a criticism. I said ti her that whilst what she did this morning was essentially correct it would of been better ti wait considering I told her on waking up im in a high state of anxiety already. She just made a face and ignored me. How can I work with that?? I'm so depressed at the minute and unhappy in every aspect of my life. I know she must feel that way too but I can only manage my own feeling and im not doing very well at that. Sorry to all who reads this for it being a very long post im just very down at the moment
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