I am struggling with great feelings of insecurity...

[b4jinthenow]

I've held it together for a long time now hiding my feelings of insecurity, I didn't think my girlfriend of just 3 months knew about these feelings I had, but she now knows that no matter how much she shows me that she wants to be with me, likes me and cares about me it isn't enough to make me feel secure in our relationship and it's finally coming to the point where these feelings are threatening my relationship with her, someone who I have come to care about deeply and have great hopes for my future with - and I am very afraid.

 

I need help, I need to explore myself and figure out exactly what made me like this and fix this issue so I don't lose someone of great quality and continue on with the same fatal patterns.

 

I am first going to detail how this relationship started out and how I felt about this person and then go into some of the crazy thoughts and feelings that have began to take precedence in my relationship with this woman.

 

Then real briefly I am going to detail some of my past relationship and family history which could explain why I am this way.

 

Then I am going to detail what just happened today in my relationship to lead up to this point with my posting on a public forum asking for help.

 

Then I am open to anyone who wants to tell me how crazy I am and offer some meaningful helpful advice to get me on the right path to recovery. After all we're all in this world together and there is a ripple effect with every positive or negative action we take.

 

I met this girl 3 months ago and we were at an event, she was making eye contact with me pretty heavily, I was ignoring her for the most part, I went to the outside area and she came up and approached me and began speaking with me. I found out she was a college psychology professor with a lot of great qualities I appreciated. I asked for her number and called her that week to ask her out on a date. The date when well, the chemistry was right, we both felt very comfortable with each other and in our own skin and our feeling for each other began to grow quickly.

 

Before meeting her I had been single for a year or two, very content, no baggage, no issues (or so I thought). It was easy for me to not be engaged in a relationship because it allowed me to focus on myself and what I wanted to do.

 

As time went on it took more and more work for me to be in this relationship but I found the benefits of working on developing my relationship skills.

 

As both of our feelings grew to a very strong point (between 2-2.5 months), I began to have feelings of insecurity in our relationship. To make matters worse I inadvertently discovered that she was on a dating website, while sitting next to her while she was on her laptop. The very same night, I was helping her change the sheets on her bed and found a used condom on the bed sheet, granted it was probably mine, but the thoughts ran through my head that it was some other guy.

 

The same night she asked me about a pill that she found on her bathroom floor and wanted to know if it was mine. It wasn't. I asked her who's could it be and she said that another mother from a carpool with her daughter used her bathroom a week earlier. Whatever the case I began having thoughts running through my mind that there was another man in her bathroom.

 

These thoughts and feelings began to grow and every time I would go to her place I would find myself looking for clues of someone else being there while I was not. I tried to ignore these feelings and seemed to get a handle on them just recently. But evidently not at all.

 

I asked her about the dating website that she was on and she told me that she wasn't dating anyone else and it was a membership that she had before we met and she just didn't cancel it. I was okay with that. She told me last night that she was going to cancel her account which made me very happy.

 

I've done a good job at ignoring these feelings and focusing on my gut feeling and trying to stay in touch with reality. When I think about those things I realize that she would never do the things I am thinking that she could be doing.

 

This obsessive thinking also gets translated into how I interact with her via text or email. I find myself obsessing over the text messages that I send her and the ones she sends me. I find myself reading over the messages that she sends me and then reading my response to her. Then I am obsessing over the amount of time it takes her to respond to me. The same goes for the emails that we correspond with. I became bitter when she wouldn't send me a response in a short period of time or if it takes her longer to respond than it took for me to respond to her. Eventually I would even time my response with the same distance of time in between that she would use to respond to me messages to try and get even. Crazy I know

 

I realise this is crazy but I can't figure out how I can stop it. I am a programmer by profession and this obsessiveness is one of the things that makes me good at my work, but it's not good for my relationship.

 

Everything she did or said that was positive I would think there was a hidden message to it and turning it into a negative thing and I would become suspicious of her for saying it.

 

But I need to say that I think that there is some strange unique chemistry with me and her that encourages these feeling of suspicion and doubt even if they aren't true, she does some things that trigger this in me where other women would do the same thing and I would have no similar response.

 

 

My girlfriend is very perceptive and as good as I have tried to hide these feelings and obsessions from her, she can pick up on the energy and it has begun to wear on her.

 

Now before I go into what happened tonight I will give a brief snapshot of my past relationships and family.

 

I grew up being the youngest of 3 older sisters. My mother and my sisters had a special bond and I was often left to myself. I was often neglected and they didn't seem to care or pay too much attention to me. I'll leave it at that. Also, in a big way she kind of reminds me of one of my sisters.

 

As far as my relationships go. There were 2 women that I have fallen in love with, the first was in 9th grade, she ended up leaving me for another guy in our class. I was devastated. The second was when I was 26, she began dating other guys on the side. This relationship history is very disturbing to me to know that the 2 girls who I really fell in love with broke my heart the most. You can see my urgency to get the the bottom of this issue now before this relationship repeats the same tragic fate.

 

So tonight, or today I should say she went up to NY to for the weekend for a class reunion, she was going to stay with a girlfriend. It is supposed to be a fun time for her enjoying time with her girlfriend and other friends. The day started out normal for me, she sent me a sweet text message as her plane landed, I texted her back. She said "lets connect later".

 

I started out my evening fine, I was thinking about how much she meant to me and all of the sweet things she has done. Then the feelings of suspicion and doubt began to creep in, I began thinking about "what she was really" doing up there. So I decide to have a few drinks to take the edge off. She sent me a txt message at 7pm saying she was off to the reunion dinner. I sent her one back saying "have fun, call me when you get back". So I went to bed around 10 without hearing from her, figuring I would call her if she didn't call me when I woke up in a few hrs to use the bathroom. I woke up at 11:30 with a terrible feeling and decided to call, she didn't answer, I sent her a txt message, still no response within about 10 or 15 mins time. So I forwarded her message from this morning about "lets connect later", and about 5 mins later I get a txt message from her asking "did you just forward me a message?" I decided to just call her and see if she would answer. Meanwhile I'm having all of these feelings of insecurity rushing through my body, it was a horrible feeling. I was hoping she would answer and at the same time I need to sound normal and not like a suspicious boyfriend without a cause.

 

And that's when it all came down.....it's as if she knew exactly all of the thoughts that had been racing though my mind and all of the intense feeling of insecurity and doubt and suspicion that I had been having. She seemed to be coming to the brink of our relationship saying "i can't do this" repeatedly explaining to me that no matter how many signs she gives me letting me know that she wants to be with me it's not enough for me to feel good about us.

 

I tried to argue with her and hide the reality more and try to make her feel like she had it all wrong but it didn't work, she was right. These thoughts I've been having have become so strong that I couldn't hide them anymore.

 

We ended the conversation with me telling her that I was going to listen and think about everything she just told me. I told her that just for circumstance sake that we should go the entire next day without any communication, text or email so she can enjoy her trip. When we got off the phone I cried like a baby for the first time in years, I was afraid, and afraid of myself, it is real and powerful.

 

At this point I am very afraid, afraid to lose a relationship that I had worked so hard with. I had done so well in other areas that I am really proud of but now one of the areas that I haven't worked on is coming to haunt me and threatening to drive away the woman I have grown so close to.

 

I don't know what kind of help I will get on this board, but I am in desperate need for some help from anyone who can share some insight into my problem and help guide me on the right path..............please.

 

B

[RainbowBlue]

OK, so firstly I am really sorry you are going this. But a really positive thing is that you are in touch with and recognise your issues. That is a the first really important foundation to resolving the issue. She does not sound like she is fooling around on you, and I personally think a Psychology Professor is less likely to be like that - they understand people too much to do that. Also people that mess around usually have some issue they need to deal with too.

 

I think you need to be honest with her. If I was her, and if I really saw the possibility of a future with you, I would absolutely try to help build your trust. As a person with her profession she is a great sort to help you through this. But I admit, it would be tough for her and you would have to work hard at it. She is obviously an intelligent woman. Women like men to be strong and sure of themselves. Don't let that freak you out though, because women also men who know themselves, who are honest etc. And you are that.

 

Also, I know finding the condom and the pill were disconcerting for you, but I think that would be a bit the same for many other men too. Maybe just to not quite the degree of impact it had on your thoughts.

 

I would find some professional help with a therapist who specialises in insecurities. I know you posted this because of your relationship, but just to take it back a step... you also need to be happy with yourself, regardless of this relationship. I mean, the fact is that oneday this relationship may not work out, and it may be some completely other reason. Either way, with or without the relationship, it would be so great for you as a person to be able to deal with your insecurities. You see, once you are happy with yourself and who and how you are, then you will handle whatever life throws at you. You are not all that different to alot of people, with you its just more...bigger....almost to the point of being obsessive about it. Thats ok, alot of people have issues, you not only recognised your issues, you have also figured out where they come from. That is great. And rejection is a very powerful and negative experience. All of us going through breakups here, stacks of us are dealing with rejection. I can assure you that I am strong successful confident woman, but my breakup shook me to the core and occasionally I get so down I have through about not living anymore. That is completely insane for a woman like me to be like that - but my point is that I want you to know that we all have issues and rejection cuts us and damages us deeply - even the most confident and successful people on the earth.

 

So good for you. I wish you so much and send you a big hug. I searched on google 'coping with insecurities and I found this. I bet there is a slot more as well - try different searches and also get a therapist. See what self help books are out there too.

 

http://www.marconews.com/news/2007/jul/23/mind_matters_coping_insecurity/

 

Let us know how you go. You can get through this. Make sure you tell her how much she means to you and you want to get better.

[b4jinthenow]

Rainbowblue, thank you so much for your reply, and you're right - women do like a strong confident man and with other women that I didn't care much about it is so easy for me to be that way, but with a woman I really love it hits so close to home that I feel weaker and vulnerable and I think that leads into the insecurity factor. I have had my strength and weakness in this relationship go up and down like a roller coaster. She has seen that I can be the confident, bold and assertive man that she is attracted to, but she has also seen me week and defeated. So I am aware of this and realize that at the core of this, I have a problem that If I can resolve it then it would solve the problem of me lacking my confidence.

 

I really thank you for your response, it was clear and concise and made sense and helped me feel a little better about my situation.

 

After I went to bed last night I had done a lot of thinking and even this morning and came up with a few ideas about my problem that may stick.

 

These things I know to be true. My mother was very neglectful to me. Neglect is clinically proven to cause anxiety, anxiety leads to depression. Neglect also causes insecurity in a child's world, makes the world around them feel unstable and unsafe. Neglect leads to mistrust in the caretaker which also creates more insecurity. So I think the core of the problem is the neglect I faced as a child, this neglect branched out into all of these other issues that all revolve around being "insecure". This seems to be the root of the problem and if I could focus on this albeit very painful and tough and time consuming problem then I could probably eliminate some other symptomatic issues related to being insecure and have the ability to live above these insecurities.

 

Something else I thought about is that (and I think you are right too about my gf that she is not cheating) when I really focus on reality and what my gut is telling me, then I really truly believe and feel that she would never do any of these things that my mind is thinking about. I am also cognisant of the things she says and does to show me how much she really cares about me, and how much she is putting into this. I've had these thoughts be present with me automatically and sometimes I have to force myself to remember these things to keep my sanity in the relationship.

 

The last thing I thought about is that I may also be experiencing some symptoms of OCD, at the rate I check my cell phone or email, it really makes me think it's not just me feeling insecure about my relationship, and a lot of the times I am feeling very secure about my relationship with her, but for me to be checking my email and cell phone like to do it really looks like some symptoms of OCD and that could also be a psychological effect of being neglected, anxiety, depression etc. The OCD symptoms could be

encouraging the insecurity feelings and visa versa.

 

 

I still think the root is the root and I need to focus on the area of the neglect I experienced as a child. I'll be looking into some online stuff and the book store to try and get a handle on this before I become the reason for the failure of my relationship. I would have a hard time forgiving myself for awhile if that happened.

 

I welcome more responses to this topic because it helps so much to get other peoples perspective on this issue and I hope that we can all benefit from a discussion like this.

 

B

[CommitmentPhobe]

 

I need help, I need to explore myself

 

No what you need to do is stop exploring yourself, and everything so rigorously. Go and do some sport or something and be human and enjoy yourself instead. You're not a computer program.

[prettybaby]

Good Lord. I'll be honest: I didn't read the whole thing, but I scanned through it, and all I can say is that you might wanna start by looking for some books on the subject.

 

I was personally struggling with feelings of jealousy a few years ago (turns out my suspicions were right and he was a jerk, but hey, that's a different story). So anywayz, I found some awesome self help books on Amazon back then, and although I can't even remember the exact content (lol) I do know that they helped me a lot at the time. I learned to put things into perspective and basically build my own confidence. I don't think this forum can help you as much as a few good books could, so I definitely advise you to browse through Amazon when you have time

[BlossomingLotus]

Well, I just posted something in the marriage board that would almost make you sound like you were my boyfriend. Maybe you should go read my post (click here) to see how your girlfriend may be feeling... I am going to keep watching both of our posts to see what kind of advice we both get.