Both responses & analyses have helped me more than my 3 weeks of therapy. Everything you are both saying is so spot on.  I can see how I have a lot of unresolved emotions to process. I think I need to find a therapist that specializes in relationship anxiety because I don’t think I am connecting with my therapist the same way the two of you have been able to understand how I am feeling and help me process it.

My physical anxiety comes in waves, but the thoughts are always in the back of my kind and for the few moments that they are not l, I feel really happy. I still have a really hard time combating the anxious thoughts when they come up, but just rereading your thoughts above help calm me down a lot.

When I say that my boyfriend and I have been through a lot I will elaborate a little more because I think I have some unresolved emotions there too.

We first met and we’re friends for a year before we started dating. We were in a friend group of about 9 people, one of them being my best girlfriend at the time. When we started dating, it rubbed a lot of people in the group the wrong way. Even though we tried to handle it in the best way as possible by giving them space, it just let things stew with them. My best girl friend at my the time began to make up stories and lies about my boyfriend and about our relationship. She would share them with the rest of the group with out us knowing. She would even sit me down and try to ask me manipulating questions about our relationship to try and make me thing we were in an unhealthy relationship. (We we’re just fine and always tried to balance our time between spending time with eachother and spending time with the group. But they felt that anytime just the two of us would do something, it was wrong).  She painted my boyfriend out to be a really bad guy and the other members in the group began to treat him very poorly, always put him down and really bullied him into feeling bad about himself.

My boyfriend and I attempted to address these issues as we saw them, with specific examples and every time they all just denied any of it happening. Telling us that we were over reacting and crazy. That we need to not think their life revolves around ours. It eventually got to the point where we decided we just couldn’t not be friends with them anymore. It was extremely hard on us and left us nothing feeling very alone. Due to the majority of our friends actions being put towards my boyfriend, it really effected his mental health. His anxiety spiked to an all time high, he had no self confidence, and just felt lost. He ended up needing to take a lot of time to focus on himself and figure out who he was and what he wanted to do. This was hard on our relationship and made me feel even more alone because he was pulling away a bit, but I knew this is exactly what he needed to do and focusing on himself was the best thing for him. It proved to be true because he has come a really long way and is much better now. He is great at controlling his anxiety and i think it is how he can be so supportive of me right now going through a lot of anxiety.

I used to get really nervous that we were one of those couples who stop being friends with everyone else just bc we started dating. I never wanted to be one of those relationships & neither did my boyfriend, but unfortunately our friends at the time made that decision for us by treating us the way they did. I still struggle with this thought sometimes and sometimes I think about all of the awful things they said about my boyfriend when I am feeling anxious. This makes me really sad because I know they are pure lies but anxiety makes things feel so real.

Over all though, my anxiety journey is moving in the right direction. I am optimistic that I can get through this. I know what I want and how I feel, my anxiety is just a big road block. I have read a lot about ROCD and I think that there is a very very good chance that i have that. It sounds like exactly what I go through and exactly the actions that I take. I plan to make a couple calls this week to find a better suited therapist.