u/AdShot3573

I (47M) am in an 18 month relationship with my GF (42F), we have been living together for 6 months. After moving in I found out she has very bad anxiety. She told me she takes low dose anti-depressants and needs regular iron infusions due to a medical issue. It didn't seem like a big deal.

After moving in together, she's often anxious, sick and tired. She goes to bed very early, gets up late and sometimes sleeps for hours during the day. We rarely go out on dates, I cook and clean the apartment most nights after work and support her. She has visited the doctor a number of times but all heath checks came back fine apart from the iron. We fight regularly, she gets upset if I wanted to go to the gym, or take time for myself. If I go outside for 5 minutes to get a coffee or put the rubbish out, she messages and calls saying "where are you?" She gets overwhelmed at things such as asking her boss to take one day off of work for a long weekend away for my birthday and regularly speaks to her family who give her bad advice, often putting her down or saying issues are her fault. Her Dad died around 8 years ago and she suffered from depression for a year afterwards, he was an alcoholic and I believe she had a very difficult childhood which has given her anxious attachment issues.

She sometimes picks a fight, says the same thing over and over until I lose my cool and refuses to give me space to cool off. For her birthday, I flew her to a well-known island resort destination for 3 nights and on the second night she had a few drinks on a sunset cruise and got very upset for 2 hours because of "the way I was looking at her". She became hysterical and I couldn't calm her down. She threatened to fly home early but the next morning woke up and was happy like nothing had happened. If we're watching a movie she sometimes gets annoyed if I don't look at her when she talks during the movie, but when I do she says "what are you looking at?".

One weekend, we drove to a friend of mine's house for a BBQ and on the drive home she got upset when I asked her gently to stop drunkenly shouting in my ear while I was driving. I told her we'd talk about to when we got home (I was driving for 2 hours) and when I didn't engage her to fight she spent the whole drive insulting me. After getting home, she ran into the bedroom and slammed the door, I slept on the couch. The next day she apologised again saying I had done nothing wrong.

A few months ago she started a new job and she would come home from work upset or crying about things at work. I'd talk to her about it for an hour or two every night and next night it would happen again. After a while I encouraged her to quit the job. After 3 months she resigned from the job, a week before my parents visited from abroad, staying for 4 weeks broken up by a week and a half break on their own. My parents presence caused her more anxiety and a week before my parents flew home we had a number of big fights mainly over my parents and I told her I was unhappy with the relationship and wanted out. I paid for my parents to stay in a serviced apartment for their final week. She asked for us to work it out. She has a new job, started seeing a therapist and has done the things we agreed but things seem to be the same. She is already unhappy about small things at work despite now having a very supportive boss. Yesterday she called in to work sick and spent the day in bed, this morning she went to work and vomited but refused to come home saying she would be fired if she did.

I love her but I feel conflicted and increasingly trapped in the relationship. I want to support her but I'm losing myself. I feel really guilty feeling this way. I'd love to go skiing with friends this year, but if I invite her along I think she'll get anxiety about taking time off work and then be upset if I want to go on my own.

Has anyone had similar experience in a relationship? I believe anxiety is the cause of most of her behaviour and she is seeking help but so far it has not improved.