6 Things To Know Before You Date A Guy With Anxiety

If I had to describe anxiety in one word, it would be exhausting. It’s a full-time job being anxious. 24/7. It interrupts your sleep. It makes it hard to relax. It arrives at inopportune moments. 

There’s a component that accompanies anxiety that many don't know about: self-loathing. As anxious people, we know logically that we (more often than not) have no reason to be anxious. Even though we try to reality check, we not only think of the worst case scenario, but we genuinely believe that the worst case scenario will, even must, happen. And if the worst case scenario does indeed happen, the outcome of that scenario will be the worst one imaginable.

So anxiety is exhausting, and I don’t think everyone is built to date someone who has severe anxiety. Dating someone with anxiety can be toxic. It’s difficult for our anxieties not to affect you. It’s even more difficult when we have anxieties about our relationship.

Still, there are people out there built to date anxious guys. I know so because my partner is dating me. But before you date someone with anxiety, there are 6 things you need to know.        

1. We can’t just “stop thinking about it.”
If we could stop, we would. That’s literally what anxiety is. Not being able to control anxious thoughts. It’s the equivalent of telling a person with depression to just, you know, stop being depressed.

2. Don’t say, “Everything will be okay.” Say, “You got this.”
When you say everything will be okay, you’re leaving things up to external factors. Things outside of our control. People with anxiety struggle with handling things outside of our control. Instead of having faith in the situation, have faith in us. Have faith that we can make this work—that we can handle anything that comes our way. We may not stop believing that the worst possible outcome will happen, but we can start believing that if the worst outcome does happen, we will overcome it. We’ll find comfort in that.

3. You don’t worry about the same things too.
Everyone has worries. Everyone has nights where they can’t sleep because they’re anxious. That’s human. That’s not unique to people who suffer from anxiety. What is unique: the duration. With the duration comes the amplification of anxieties. You don’t know what it’s like to be worried for months on end. You don’t know what it’s like to have no worries for a second, and then to immediately start worrying because it makes you anxious that you don’t have any worries. You don't know what it's like to think, "What’s wrong in my life right now that I'm not worrying about something?" You don’t know what it’s like to be addicted to your worries. 

4. We often know what we’re thinking is unlikely to happen.
Which relates back to the self-loathing. I’m often surprised I think the sun will come up tomorrow. Even though it has come up every day for billions of years, maybe tomorrow it won’t. Just because it’s unlikely to happen, doesn’t make it impossible. At some point the sun will explode. Why not tomorrow? This is something I should be worried about. (This is an example of how our brains work.)

5. We will doubt our relationship more than most, even if you’re the perfect guy for us.
Our anxiety makes us second guess everything. That includes you. We need you to believe in us. We need you to believe that we’ll realize we’re being foolish— that we’re just having a momentary lapse of judgment. Deep down we know you’re right for us.

6. We’re worth it if you stick with us.
We know we’re not easy. We know we’re high-maintenance. We know how much we need you. If you stick with us, we’ll be there for you when you need us most. Just like you were there for us. We love you as much as you love us.