# Background
I am going to try to make this as concise as possible without leaving too many important details out.
So my girlfriend (F24) and I (M24) have been dating for about a year now. Our past includes that we were friends before we started dating for about 5 years and that during that time we were both dating other people for about 3 years each. During the 2-year interval of us both being single, we drifted apart and didn’t speak much.
I decided to experience college and go through a “sleeping around phase” where I slept with about 20 people. I felt that at the end of that experience it made me appreciate being in a relationship much more than sleeping with random people, and I still feel that way today.
She doesn’t sleep with anyone unless she knows them for extended periods of time. Her total body count is about 5.
We eventually came back to talking at one point, and we started dating soon after because we were both ready for something serious.
# Main Issues
# Time
Fast forward to today, she is constantly busy with her school taking roughly 21 credit hours per semester (equivalent to about 80 hours of work per week), and I am taking normal loads of about 15 credit hours which gives me more free time than her. I work out every day, spend time with my friends, play video games, take jiu-jitsu courses daily, go to the beach on weekends, and try to have dinner with her when she has time for it. Her daily schedule includes her waking up at 5 and studying all day until 8 and resetting. In the rare situation when she has free time she almost feels guilty for not studying because she is constantly so busy. Weekends are the only time we can spend together and we try to make the most of it by spending all the time together.
She thinks that eventually, I will become bored with her because she doesn’t do enough stuff with me and I tell her that she is being ridiculous and I will always love her. She doesn’t believe me.
# Trust
When I came out of my “sleeping around phase” and spoke to her about that experience, she couldn’t understand it. She couldn’t understand having a one-night stand with someone she just met, because she can only have sex if she is in love with that individual. I told her that after going through that experience, it’s comforting that she doesn’t feel like that is a possibility for her, so I have absolute trust in her. After that phase, I don’t speak to any of those people that I had relations with, or even keep their contact information (not only for her sake, but also I don’t want to have any female friends that aren’t my girlfriend unless they are part of another couple). We look at each other’s phones and have no issue with that because we have nothing to hide. I also stopped watching porn or masturbating because I felt that it would be a problem for the relationship.
She constantly thinks that I am going to cheat on her if I go out with my friends for a drink downtown without her during the week (because she doesn’t have time!).
# Conclusion (TL;DR)
Her trust issues in me are incredibly infuriating because I give her absolutely no reason to think that I would cheat on her. She says that my past makes it so that I will still want other people and that eventually, I will cheat on her. I just don’t understand how she can think that if I never gave her a reason to assume that. She also thinks that because I do so many things without her that I will find someone more fun than her and leave her. I always tell her that I love her always after every argument and she responds with questions like:
1. Do you think I’m high maintenance?
2. Do you wish you were with someone else?
3. Am I the problem in this relationship?
4. Do you want to go on a break?
There are quite a few more but I can’t think of them at this moment…
Anyways my question is what should I do about this? I keep hoping that with more time in the relationship she will eventually have full trust in me if I continue to never give her a reason to think that I’m cheating on her (or straddling the line). I also think that it’s something deep-rooted in her personality that won’t ever change, and it’s getting on my last nerve. I really love the girl and we get along great together… until we don’t. I also know that there are a plethora of other variables in this relationship that I didn’t get to input because I don’t want to make a book, but these are the main ones. So, is this a normal thing or something I should be worried about?
5 comments
>Her trust issues in me are incredibly infuriating because I give her absolutely no reason to think that I would cheat on her.
Here’s the thing you must understand: HER trust issues are about HER. You dont have to give her any reason to doubt you. You could have all the time in the world and be a virgin and she’d still have these issues, because they dont come from YOU, they come from HER.
Quite honestly, it sounds like she doesn’t have the time to actually invest emotionally in the relationship the kind of work that would be required for it to be healthy and for her to feel secure. as long as she feels left out, she’s going to be insecure. There’s simply nothing you can do about this. SHE needs to work this out. Frankly, it sounds like she needs to not be in a relationship at all right now, and like she MAY need to do a little work on herself before she’s secure enough to be a good partner to anyone.
What is she doing to work on her anxiety?
She has an intense amount of guilt, anxiety, and jealousy. It sounds like she has low self-worth and is sure that because she isn’t good enough in some way or another you will wander away to someone else.
And that’s the thing. All of these are her issues. There’s not much that you can do and you have done a lot on your part to try and console her. But there is nothing that you can do to tame these mental health monsters because that’s not how Mental Health works. They are her issues. She needs to go to therapy. She needs to put in the time.
It sounds like she does not have time to go to therapy right now with how dense her course load is, perhaps next semester she will have time.
I suggest that you tell her how she is making this relationship uncomfortable, how she is creating all of these troubles that don’t actually exist, and how she is stressing herself out about things that don’t exist and won’t happen instead of spending her energy towards the things that really matter like her school work and the few rare hours both of you can spend together.
If this does not stop, she will burn herself out of the relationship probably within a year, maybe within 6 months or so. These anxieties are very costly and mental health and an energy and time, and all of these things are places that she is very short in already.
It is such a shame that she is destroying this nice relationship all by herself.
Edit: it looks like she is in therapy and is starting on medications. This is very good. Please give her some extra slack as she starts to ramp up on the medications. It may be that the medications she starts on aren’t quite for her and she needs to switch or adjust, give her some extra slack for that time as well. Psych needs cab mess with your head while you are getting adjusted.
> she doesn’t feel like that is a possibility for her, so I have absolute trust in her.
Sounds like if it was a possibility for her then you wouldn’t trust her either. Not sure if you meant it that way, just saying.
Are you considering breaking up with her?