star2sparkle
31-12-13, 07:59
I'm worried and don't know who to turn to for help. I am in love with a lovely, caring sensitive man. I think the world of him, he is everything I dreamed of yet there are these insistent doubts. I suffer from anxiety and have done for 30 years. I also have phobias and mild agoraphobia.
I have also suffered many abusive relationships, survived and become stronger. I never gave up hope of finding the right one for me. I don't for one minute believe in settling, just because your other half doesn't hit you, doesn't mean they are right for you and this is where my boyfriend comes in.
He has mild obsessive compulsive personality disorder. I have a degree in psychology, have researched this, and I know he has it. Done the test. One of the biggest traits of this disorder is the 'sufferer' (they don't actually suffer as it is different to OCD) think they are fine and should just be accepted and I am struggling to work out whether I should just accept him or not...I ask myself that if I truly love him, surely I would...yet I am still troubled by this. Little things accumulate together and really bother me.
Last night he even suggested that I'm trying to control him by asking that he compromises. I am not controlling at all. I know that people who suffer from OCPD say this sort of thing all the time but it makes me feel sad and lonely.
To give you a couple of ideas, we were trying to watch a film last night but he insisted on washing and drying the towels...well, not insisted, he just did it...and you could hardly hear the telly as a result. He folds his clothes perfectly before getting into bed. This was where the 'argument' began last night, I suggested just once a week, to simply put his clothes on the side but he basically asked if I was threatened by his clothes folding?! No...I just value myself enough to know I deserve someone wanting to be in bed with me rather than spending trivial time folding their clothes. One time we were even making love and he didn't continue because of other urgent things that had to be done. That certainly did not make me feel desirable.
These are just a few, very small examples but what worries me the most is the impact on me. Next week he restarts his job...(he has been off for six months) and this brings in a further problem. I am so isolated, I have few friends and no family and I am worried about being anxious on my own and not being able to get out because of the agoraphobia. Added to this, is him. He will return home each evening, but I fear his little routines will again get in the way of anything spontaneous.
If you research OCPD you will find such people to have warm, caring and sensitive qualities and so you can imagine, just saying all this makes me feel like I'm criticising him and in the end I just blame myself. Yet I know his behaviour isn't 'normal' but he can't change it. I have to 'change' to accommodate and accept him. And I love him, so I want to...is this possible? I can't bear the thought of being without him. I have waited a lifetime to find the right man for me and I still believe it to be him but I fear loneliness to be my future.
What can I do?
I've tried in vain talking to him about all this, but he seriously thinks he is normal, that it is acceptable, that it his personal preference, that he doesn't make anyone else do it, so it's ok...at least he isn't abusive, etc, etc...the stuff ocpd 'sufferers' say. He can't see there is an issue at all.
He says no one else has ever said this to him, I'm the first to 'diagnose' him. I don't believe his family and friends realise the extent of what he does/avoids.
I suffer from anxiety and agoraphobia, I have low self esteem. Life isn't always easy for me. He accepts me (and doesn't appreciate why I seem to be unable to accept him as he is) as I am but I work on my anxiety and have tried to see it as a badge of bravery rather than a weakness that inhibits.
So why does this get to me so much? I've been through so much...I just wanted a 'normal' fun loving man who loves me. I don't know what to think anymore. I'm an all or nothing woman, I can't half commit to him to protect myself; and I know that is the advice to someone remaining in such a relationship, to try to look after number one and not get sucked in. But I just want to love him.
Any help would be so gratefully accepted.
I have also suffered many abusive relationships, survived and become stronger. I never gave up hope of finding the right one for me. I don't for one minute believe in settling, just because your other half doesn't hit you, doesn't mean they are right for you and this is where my boyfriend comes in.
He has mild obsessive compulsive personality disorder. I have a degree in psychology, have researched this, and I know he has it. Done the test. One of the biggest traits of this disorder is the 'sufferer' (they don't actually suffer as it is different to OCD) think they are fine and should just be accepted and I am struggling to work out whether I should just accept him or not...I ask myself that if I truly love him, surely I would...yet I am still troubled by this. Little things accumulate together and really bother me.
Last night he even suggested that I'm trying to control him by asking that he compromises. I am not controlling at all. I know that people who suffer from OCPD say this sort of thing all the time but it makes me feel sad and lonely.
To give you a couple of ideas, we were trying to watch a film last night but he insisted on washing and drying the towels...well, not insisted, he just did it...and you could hardly hear the telly as a result. He folds his clothes perfectly before getting into bed. This was where the 'argument' began last night, I suggested just once a week, to simply put his clothes on the side but he basically asked if I was threatened by his clothes folding?! No...I just value myself enough to know I deserve someone wanting to be in bed with me rather than spending trivial time folding their clothes. One time we were even making love and he didn't continue because of other urgent things that had to be done. That certainly did not make me feel desirable.
These are just a few, very small examples but what worries me the most is the impact on me. Next week he restarts his job...(he has been off for six months) and this brings in a further problem. I am so isolated, I have few friends and no family and I am worried about being anxious on my own and not being able to get out because of the agoraphobia. Added to this, is him. He will return home each evening, but I fear his little routines will again get in the way of anything spontaneous.
If you research OCPD you will find such people to have warm, caring and sensitive qualities and so you can imagine, just saying all this makes me feel like I'm criticising him and in the end I just blame myself. Yet I know his behaviour isn't 'normal' but he can't change it. I have to 'change' to accommodate and accept him. And I love him, so I want to...is this possible? I can't bear the thought of being without him. I have waited a lifetime to find the right man for me and I still believe it to be him but I fear loneliness to be my future.
What can I do?
I've tried in vain talking to him about all this, but he seriously thinks he is normal, that it is acceptable, that it his personal preference, that he doesn't make anyone else do it, so it's ok...at least he isn't abusive, etc, etc...the stuff ocpd 'sufferers' say. He can't see there is an issue at all.
He says no one else has ever said this to him, I'm the first to 'diagnose' him. I don't believe his family and friends realise the extent of what he does/avoids.
I suffer from anxiety and agoraphobia, I have low self esteem. Life isn't always easy for me. He accepts me (and doesn't appreciate why I seem to be unable to accept him as he is) as I am but I work on my anxiety and have tried to see it as a badge of bravery rather than a weakness that inhibits.
So why does this get to me so much? I've been through so much...I just wanted a 'normal' fun loving man who loves me. I don't know what to think anymore. I'm an all or nothing woman, I can't half commit to him to protect myself; and I know that is the advice to someone remaining in such a relationship, to try to look after number one and not get sucked in. But I just want to love him.
Any help would be so gratefully accepted.