Couldn’t find any venting communities on Lemmy, but if one exists please direct me to it. I’m fairly sick right now so I could have just missed one in my dazed state.

I’ve been dealing with a problem lately. Technically not just lately, but my whole life, but for the past few years it’s something I didn’t have to worry about.
I’ve always been a fairly popular person in whatever circles I take part in. People like me. They like my personality. They like my appearance. My friends value me extremely highly. All that’s great. But when it comes to relationships, I always flop on my face.
Some people find me really attractive but don’t want anything serious. Some people do want something serious, but get scared off the second they see what’s hiding under the hood. Others just prefer me as a friend and would rather not complicate that with a relationship. But practically zero people both want anything serious and find themselves able to handle me and my mental issues.
There’s only been one person ever who I ever had any semblance of a successful relationship with, and that was my first ex. We dated for two years, fell deeply in love, but still in the end broke up because of mental issues making being together too painful to deal with.

I’m just so afraid I’ll never find anyone. I found the first person in the world who could handle my emotional outbursts completely unfazed recently, and she just wanted to be friends. Don’t get me wrong, I’m thrilled to have a friend as amazing as her. I’m just living in fear that I’ll never be able to find somebody who can handle and understand me like she can, who does want to be anything more. I just want people to stop leaving because of my over-tuned emotions getting in the way.

And yeah, yeah, I know, “you don’t need a relationship to be happy” and whatever. That’s not the point. The point is I practically don’t even have the option of a relationship in the first place because nobody can handle my deeper issues. I’m on numerous meds. I’ve tried therapy, and am still trying. I’ve done all I can on the road to self improvement and the only thing left I can do is find somebody who can handle what issues remain, and it doesn’t look like that’ll happen. It feels like I got a million romantic options and zero of them are good ones.

I know there’s only one real solution, and that’s to keep trying, and keep looking. I just needed to vent about it because the process of doing so is making me feel like shit and giving up would make me feel even worse, as if accepting that I’m unlovable.

  • rgb3x3@beehaw.orgEnglish
    0·
    8 months ago

    That’s a rare combination to have all in one person.

    It’s also way too much to ask of someone. It’s not fair of you to expect that someone forgoes their own emotional health to take care of yours. A relationship is a transaction, like it or not. There’s push and pull, each person needs to get something positive out of it and if you’re spending so much time telling your partner they’re a bad person, they’re going to leave. Nobody deserves that.

    That’s not to say you don’t deserve love, because you do. But it sounds like there’s a lot of work ahead for you to manage your mental health and get to a place where you can trust someone in the way they should be trusted in a loving relationship.

    Both of these things would seem like obvious things almost anybody could provide, but when I’m crying constantly or trauma is getting triggered multiple times a day, even the best people walk out, or snap.

    This behavior is extremely exhausting for someone to manage. Your partner has their own problems to deal with too. Between work, school, children, planning meals, managing the house, vacations, holidays, healthcare, and many more things, there’s so much work to be done in life. You need to be a productive part of the relationship. Share in the burdens of life to help make them easier on someone, as they do for you, instead of being another chore to deal with.

    My suggestion is to continue spending a lot of time working on yourself. Learn to trust again, learn to love yourself, understand the needs of others, and understand the part you play in a relationship. Nobody is obligated to love you, but (almost) everyone is deserving of love (I say almost because there are insanely cruel people in this world).

    Lastly, ALL OF WHAT I SAID APPLIES TO YOU TOO FROM SOMEONE ELSE. Anything you need from someone is something that someone should be able to provide to you, and vice-versa. Don’t expect anything from anyone that you wouldn’t do yourself, just as they shouldn’t do the same. Find someone who wants to take care of you, the same way that you will take care of them.