I’m not sure what I need to do to keep this relationship alive

I apologize for the length of this post ahead of time lol

tl:dr – I really love my girlfriend but her anxiety issues and issues with moving at all are causing me to question if we’re meant to be. Is there anything I can do to help fix the situation or are these just signs that the relationship doesn’t have long to go at this rate? Am I possibly just not good for a relationship at the moment?

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I (29F) have been having some serious doubts about the status of my relationship with my girlfriend (28F) for the past 3 months and I just wanted to see if there was anything I could do to potentially fix it or if it’s best we break up. This is the first time I’ve ever been in a real relationship so I’m really not sure if I’m doing something wrong.

I met my girlfriend online during the COVID lockdowns in mid-2020. I deeply love her and she loves me but the distance between us has been a problem since the beginning and has been an element that made us unsure about whether or not it could work. I’m currently in New York and she’s in Alabama. I personally don’t mind a long-distance relationship for now but for her, it’s much tougher. It’s not tough due to trust issues since we both trust each other to be faithful but she’s a very physically affectionate person and needs that element to feel like the relationship is real and relieve her anxiety. Sometimes it seems like no amount of words I say or time I spend with her while away is enough. To mitigate this I’ve traveled to stay with her for several weeks every month for a little over a year now to give her that physical element. She’s there for me in the ways she can provide with her emotional support and love.

While I’m here I don’t know anybody and can’t do anything outside on my own. The bits of the state that we’ve traveled to don’t really appeal to me and the politics of the area are terrible imo. We both agree on all of this so we don’t have issues with our politics clashing specifically. The career landscape for someone in my field (IT) also seems much smaller compared to where I currently live. I’ve spoken with her about potentially moving in with me to New York but the result of those conversations basically ends with her expressing her fear of needing to rely on me (even if only for a little bit) and moving from her family and current friend group which is understandable.

With that said, even when I discuss me moving down and us moving somewhere else several years down the line vs staying in Alabama forever she doesn’t seem to want to even discuss it. She says it’s mostly due to a fear of us moving away and for some reason, we break up and now she’s stuck in a place she has less experience with by herself. In fact, a lot of the issues we have are due to her fear of being in a bad position if we don’t work out. She doesn’t like when I buy her gifts because she fears I’ll use them to control her in the future despite me never doing it. She’s afraid I find her boring so me spending time doing something on my own or spending time with friends comes across as her not being appealing enough to pull me away from those things. As a result, I barely spend time with friends now and try my best to involve her in almost everything I do. Having been a previously more internal person it’s not the most comfortable thing for me to do but I want her to know I love her. She also has huge fears of several other, non-relationship-related things that limit the things we can do together like travel, buying new things, trying new activities, etc

There are other things that make me unsure about this like:

* Our small disagreements or miscommunications become larger fights a lot easier now and are especially bad when I’m not physically there. I used to be a lot more patient but I’m even realizing that’s changed recently.
* My finances have been suffering a bit due to the constant travel and my lack of…extra-extra finances (for lack of better words) also feeds into her fear of moving in with me.
* My ability to work properly is also suffering due to the amount of attention and reassurance she needs during the day (several phone calls and texts during work hours because she’s less busy than I am)

Almost all of these issues are things we’ve talked about and things I thought we came to an understanding about but I’m starting to doubt it. I seriously love her despite the negative parts of the relationship and the thought of separating and hurting her due to something that could possibly be worked on hurts me. I came in expecting to date a human and not somebody to place impossible standards on but I’m not sure if I may have tilted the expectations from being fair to her to being unfair to me instead. With that said I’m not sure if I’m doing something wrong or if I could help her manage her anxiety better. The moments when the issues aren’t a big deal feel amazing and I feel a deep strong love for her but when the issues come to the forefront I feel terrible and being single seems more appealing. Are these just red flags I’m too naive to see or is there something I can do? Am I just not made for a relationship? Thanks in advance.