My F27 boyfriend M28 overthinks and puts a lot of weight on the relationship. How do I get through to him?
Using a throwaway since my partner knows my username.
My partner has no friends outside of me and struggles with self-esteem. I’m basically his entire social world. He overthinks constantly and sometimes constructs situations that aren’t real. One example: I once mentioned I wasn’t really into fantasy shows, and for nearly six months he stopped suggesting anything to watch because he’d decided I was judging his taste as a person. I hadn’t been but that’s how it landed.
He’s told me our relationship is the one area of his life where he feels like he’s doing well. So whenever I raise any issue, it hits him as a verdict on his character rather than just… a thing I want to talk about. He’s broken up with me over problems he never even mentioned to me before. I feel like I have no room to be a normal, imperfect human in this relationship.
I have friends, a life I’m genuinely proud of and I sometimes wonder if that’s part of it, like he spirals when he sees that and starts building stories in his head. I don’t know. And he never talks to me about his issues? I feel like I’m losing my mind. How do I get through to him?