u/TheOtherGuy606060

My partner is going on a really long road trip (can you guess about how long?) and I have been in a bit of a mental rut regarding my worth and insecurity lately, so I thought while they were gone I’d put some work into improving myself. I have AuDHD and anxiety so I have a couple things I’d like to accomplish and I’d either like some tips and tricks on the things I plan to improve or some suggestions on things I could work on that I maybe haven’t thought of.

1. Stamina/Working out- he likes to run, and while I am decently athletic, most of what I do revolves around lifting and quick movement rather than endurance so I plan on starting to run a bit in the morning and start swimming laps once my pool is cleared since it just got reopened.

2. Learning to drive- my anxiety makes driving absolutely brutal for me, I’m constantly on the edge worrying I’m going to screw something up and hurt someone, but it makes my life a lot harder not being able to freely travel. It would make it so I can work more than my current part time position and help me with other things I’d like to improve

3. Working on my mental health- this is my first real relationship and my insecurities hit me a lot harder than I expected, and I’d really like to avoid my mental issues getting in the way of my relationship. I’m already working with my provider to find both a therapist and psychiatrist, but it’s taking longer than expected to even be able to start looking for professionals that are covered through our insurance plan.

4. Expanding my social circle- I have one really close friend, a really tight nit family unit, and my partner who I met through an app and we happened to click. I’ve had a hard time finding friends because there isn’t many places or activities near me and with the whole not driving thing I’ve ended up pretty isolated. I’d like more friends and a more developed social life.

If anyone has any advice, suggestions, recommendations, etc. please let me know! I want to be someone my partner is proud of, someone better than I am.

TLDR at the end, this is probably unnecessarily long!

My partner(22 he/they) and I (23 he/him) officially started dating a couple of weeks ago (we’ve been talking for 4-5 months) and it’s great! Nothing about our relationship has changed aside from the title and that’s pretty much exactly what I wanted. We are both transmasc(me on the binary side, them less so) neurodivergent, and less visibly emotional so I find that a lot of our needs and desires line up or overlap in a way that makes each of us very understanding of the other and mesh in a way I haven’t really been able to before with another person.

He is genuinely one of the best people I have ever met and I feel like we’ve know each other forever. He’s smart, talented, compassionate, attractive, dedicated, persistent, open, honest, and so many adjectives that frankly don’t do him justice. He has 4 jobs to support himself and his dog, training to be an EMT so he can support himself the rest of the way through his nursing degree, so he is very decided on what he wants from his future, and it clearly involves helping people, which I find incredibly attractive, especially since being an EMT was something I put a lot of consideration into when thinking about my future.

Now the issue… me! I know I’m not a bad partner, but I can’t help but think about how much better he could be doing, especially when I compare how different we are in terms of independence and capability. I don’t drive(I have really bad anxiety, I want to work on it, and I plan to soon, especially since they said they would help me, but as it stands, currently can’t and not sure when it would be possible), I still live with my parents(I’m the youngest and live at home with my parents and two of my older brothers, things are expensive and my parents have told us they prefer having us stay, or at the very least don’t want us to leave unless we are fully prepared, especially financially), I work a part time job with a family company and feel like the combination of those things doesn’t leave me with much of a chance to grow up and get my shit together. I feel useless and like I’m not doing anything important with my life, that I’m never going to make a difference or do things that matter, but I know being able to be in a position to do that would require so much change and pressure that I’m honestly just not sure I could handle it, and I feel like he deserves someone who has that same drive as they do. I very much want to be better for them, but I honestly don’t know where to start.

More insecurity comes into play when I think about him being with other people, specifically with cis men. He has a friend that he sees who I am pretty positive they have a sexual relationship, shouldn’t be an issue, we are ENM, he gets tested, I trust him. The issue is with me thinking that this other person(who I know nothing about aside from his name, which happens to be the same as mine, his occupation, which is some kind of first responder/forrest ranger, and that he’s a good guy who lives a bit further away so they don’t get to see each other super often) can give him something I can’t which I desperately want to so badly, more than I’ve ever felt the need to with anyone and it genuinely makes me feel a little sick. The idea that I don’t have a dick attached to my body that I can connect us with and have us both feel something makes me so fucking dysphoric I can’t dwell on it too long. It’s not my place to know anything about this guy’s sex/gender status, especially since I would be pretty upset if I found out that was a topic of discussion about me and I got outed like that, so I don’t even know if it’s appropriate to ask or express. It also kinda just makes me wonder if he just would be with this guy instead of me if he lived closer. My partner and I don’t live the closest, around 40 minutes away, but this other guy lives I think at least an hour and a half to two hours away

My partner compliments me a lot, tells me I can ask him anything, make any kind of rules for our relationship, and that they’d do almost anything I asked , that I’m their favorite, etc. but I also don’t want to ask too much from them or let my insecurities be the thing that pushes them away because I really like them and they make me really happy.

I am already looking into getting real mental help, looking for a therapist, psychiatrist, etc, but I’d appreciate any advice anyone has on how to get over my bullshit, approach the topic with my partner, or on how to otherwise improve my situation!

If you actually read all of that, you’re a legend!

TLDR: I’m an insecure mess, especially about my body and not being cis/having a penis, and don’t want it to damage or get in the way of my relationship with my partner, but I can’t stop hating myself and thinking they’d be happier with someone they’re friends with.