I (f19) have been dating my partner (m24) for around a month now and he has expressed that he often feels insecure – the most recent instance of this was when I had seen him over the weekend and he suddenly stated that he felt “emotionally distant” from me.
After communicating with him about the problem, he admitted that he feels as if I’m out of his league and that I could find someone else very easily. I tried my best to reassure him that this wasn’t the case, and I had ended up getting upset before he took me home since I felt extremely terrible for making him feel sad.
I often blame myself for how my partner feels about me, though he’s explained that it’s simply his insecurities and I’m not sure how to help him or the best ways to reassure him. I had questioned him on what would make him feel better at times when he’s going through a moment of insecurity, but he’s very quick to brush off the question.
Other instances of insecurity have occurred when I’ve had to place university work before my plans with him, I had to make him aware that I would have to push our date night back for one day due to having an overwhelming amount of uni work to do. His response to my request for this was mostly negative and he questions my love for him as soon as plans fall through (which isn’t often at all, if ever).
He will ask me questions in order to reassure himself, such as “Do you want to be with me?”, “Will you get tired of me?” and “Do you actually miss me?”, I answer them all honestly and make sure that he knows I love him and him only but I still feel that I could be more helpful.
Before we began dating, he used to be quite upset at the fact that I wasn’t able to see him much during the week as I was only seeing him once on a Saturday. However, this has now become 3 days in a week (Tuesday, Friday and Saturday) as I started university and could see him more often. He seems to be less on edge and more happy now that I can see him more than once a week, which has solved a lot of issues we had prior to dating.
Any advice is greatly appreciated as I just want to make sure that I can reassure him the best that I can and that our relationship will remain to be healthy/happy. I’m happy to answer any questions if needed and thank you in advance! 🙂
TLDR: My partner is often insecure about himself due to how he views me and how much time we spend together.
4 comments
He’s abusive and is working on breaking you down, making you entirely responsible for his moods and actions, and isolating you. Ask me how I know.
It sounds like he’s emotionally manipulating you because he knows a 24yo has no business being in a relationship with a 19yo.
These are flags on the play. Someone’s insecurities are a problem that they have to deal with first and foremost, and this guy is older and more mature than you; *he* should be the one helping you to address his insecurities if he has them and reassuring yours, not vice versa. Plus, healthy insecurities are things that someone will mention proactively and independently of your actions as something that has always bothered them i.e. if they’re self-conscious about their nose or some shit. I’ll give you a small challenge, make a journal of all the times he expresses insecurity and wants reassurance and see if there is an issue he is trying to gloss over, a behaviour he’s trying to inculcate in you, or an action that he’s trying to change your mind about. If you can find a one to one correspondence between what he says and something he wants you to start/stop doing that is perfectly (un)reasonable, you’re being manipulated.
As great as it is to be open, honest, kind, and to want to reassure, you need to develop some perspective, wisdom, and self-protection to make sure predators don’t take advantage of those good qualities; the same qualities that make someone a great person to be around are the attributes that toxic people will prey on and they do so by capitalizing on you not knowing the difference. I’ve been there a time or two, and trust me, the faster you can develop the intuition and capacity to distinguish who is worthy of your investment and trust and who isn’t, the more heartbreak and grief you will save yourself in the future.
Is there anything else that bothers you in the relationship? What do your friends/family think? Is he critical of significant figures in your life? Some more probing questions would make me more or less certain of what’s going on here, but really, blindly reassuring insecurities this early on in a relationship is worrisome because it’s potentially a sign that he can’t regulate his own emotional well-being. When push comes to shove and the honeymoon period wears off, what’s going to happen when you can’t placate him and he gets angry after disappointments and resentments have started to set in? Then you’ve already set the dynamic that *you* are the one responsible, and that you deserve the guilt trips, pity ploys, manipulations, and possibly worse. I hope this isn’t your situation, but, well… Do some due diligence and self-reflection.
His insecurity is on him to fix and address. This is not your issue.