Dear Helen:

You are very welcome. You wrote that you ask yourself before texting him: “do I write him because I want to verify my self-worth? do I want to see him? What are the reasons?”

My thoughts: problem is you are anxious and it is a beginning relationship, not much to it yet, no meeting of the minds and hearts yet, no commitment yet. So when you want to text him, you are reaching out for the kind of relationship you do not yet have.

This is what you definitely want: “a person who wants to really try to be with someone” and a person who is as emotionally attached to you as you are to him (“there is a distortion between my emotional attachment and his”). It is possible that a man will be as attached to you, at this point, as you are to him. That would have calmed your anxiety a lot. It is this gap in attachment that feeds your anxiety.

“On paper”, better get to know him over time, have those small conversations, proceed with cautious vulnerability. But in practice this may be too difficult for you. It may not work out for your benefit because of your specific anxiety.

It may also be that even if and when he becomes emotionally attached to you, it may not be the right relationship for you. You don’t know him well enough, not yet.

You asked: “how to stay focus in the present… no anticipation… does it mean that when he is not there by my side, I should live as a single person?”- I think so, yes. Even he suggested that you meet other men, so there is no commitment yet.

Why not date other men and date him (while not being physically intimate with any man) until there is a mutual commitment of exclusive dating with one man? I would say that exclusive dating commitment is a first step to a relationship that is not casual.

anita