I wanted to speak with people who have general or social anxiety disorder or people whose spouse have the disorder(s). Or really, any comment and help is very welcome.
My boyfriend and I have been together a little over 3 years. He has always been an awkward boyfriend, during the lovey dovey dating days, also the more serious renting-together days, and now, the joint-mortgage days.
The biggest problem in our rocky relationship is that he has been diagnosed with SAD, and has tremendous trouble communicating with me. It is virtually impossible for us to talk things out. If we are just talking about a car repair or a new kitchen sink faucet, he tends to mumble but we communicate fine. But as soon as the discussion gets even remotely emotionally charged, he clams up and shuts down.
I would ask him "are you going to tell me how you are feeling about things in the last few days? and 120 minutes or so would elapse with him uttering zero word, and i would have to re-initiate the conversation. Even then he is very much choked and I end up doing 99.9% of the talking, which I HATE. I have tried giving him more space, more time, pushing him a little bit, but nothing has worked.
He has been seeing a psychologist for CBT but he wouldn't go more than twice a month or so, and every time I try to get across to him that his disorder is disintegrating our relationship, he seems unable to comprehend any point.
I love him and I am willing to stand alongside him while he works through his problems, but we also have family/in-law issues. I am not fond of his family as they are self righteous and they tend to impose their values upon other people. They may say rude things to me, or to my boyfriend, in my absence, but he is literally incapable of being the 'stand-up guy' for me and I have to stand my ground and defend myself every time (which sucks life out of me to put it mildly).
One thing that really confuses me with his behaviour, is that, he has trouble with verbal comprehension. He is not a great speller but can read fine, and write decently with correct grammar. But when I am emotional and telling him how I feel, he doesn't seem to wrap his head around anything I'm saying.
I think in our first session with the shrink we ruled out a physical problem like aphasia, but it still makes me think that something is not quite right in his head when we have a tense (uni-directional) conversation. On the ouside, he DOES look contrite and sad that I am so upset. But then usually, we have the same argument/discussion over and over again, because he doesn't really understand what I tell him and the little he understands, he seems to forget.
He seems to be happy to pretend nothing is wrong with us and keep on living together. But I don't want to keep living my life with someone who can't talk to me.
It is equivocal that he even wants to change. He says going to a session once a week would be too tough for him, as he needs lots of time to 'prep' for the next session, and is not very pro-meds. I asked him to consider meds as he hasn't improved with CBT alone in 6 months. When I tell him if his desire to get better doesn't exist, then he will never get better and we'll have to do some serious business selling the house and all the other stuff we mutually own, so I can start my life all over again. But then again, he doesn't seem to 'get' the real seriousness of my plea, or see the imminent danger of having his second girlfriend walk out on him (the first one left him for similar reasons).
For me, a very outspoken and no-bull person, starting a discussion knowing I'll never get a closure, or asking a question and having to wait for 5 days for a simple answer, is slowly killing me. It is utterly frustrating.
Is there anybody out there who's been in a situation/relationship that resembles ours? If I really love him, should I stand by him and take this crap for more years to come? Or am I just kidding myself that in time things will improve?
Thanks all,
Sakai
My boyfriend and I have been together a little over 3 years. He has always been an awkward boyfriend, during the lovey dovey dating days, also the more serious renting-together days, and now, the joint-mortgage days.
The biggest problem in our rocky relationship is that he has been diagnosed with SAD, and has tremendous trouble communicating with me. It is virtually impossible for us to talk things out. If we are just talking about a car repair or a new kitchen sink faucet, he tends to mumble but we communicate fine. But as soon as the discussion gets even remotely emotionally charged, he clams up and shuts down.
I would ask him "are you going to tell me how you are feeling about things in the last few days? and 120 minutes or so would elapse with him uttering zero word, and i would have to re-initiate the conversation. Even then he is very much choked and I end up doing 99.9% of the talking, which I HATE. I have tried giving him more space, more time, pushing him a little bit, but nothing has worked.
He has been seeing a psychologist for CBT but he wouldn't go more than twice a month or so, and every time I try to get across to him that his disorder is disintegrating our relationship, he seems unable to comprehend any point.
I love him and I am willing to stand alongside him while he works through his problems, but we also have family/in-law issues. I am not fond of his family as they are self righteous and they tend to impose their values upon other people. They may say rude things to me, or to my boyfriend, in my absence, but he is literally incapable of being the 'stand-up guy' for me and I have to stand my ground and defend myself every time (which sucks life out of me to put it mildly).
One thing that really confuses me with his behaviour, is that, he has trouble with verbal comprehension. He is not a great speller but can read fine, and write decently with correct grammar. But when I am emotional and telling him how I feel, he doesn't seem to wrap his head around anything I'm saying.
I think in our first session with the shrink we ruled out a physical problem like aphasia, but it still makes me think that something is not quite right in his head when we have a tense (uni-directional) conversation. On the ouside, he DOES look contrite and sad that I am so upset. But then usually, we have the same argument/discussion over and over again, because he doesn't really understand what I tell him and the little he understands, he seems to forget.
He seems to be happy to pretend nothing is wrong with us and keep on living together. But I don't want to keep living my life with someone who can't talk to me.
It is equivocal that he even wants to change. He says going to a session once a week would be too tough for him, as he needs lots of time to 'prep' for the next session, and is not very pro-meds. I asked him to consider meds as he hasn't improved with CBT alone in 6 months. When I tell him if his desire to get better doesn't exist, then he will never get better and we'll have to do some serious business selling the house and all the other stuff we mutually own, so I can start my life all over again. But then again, he doesn't seem to 'get' the real seriousness of my plea, or see the imminent danger of having his second girlfriend walk out on him (the first one left him for similar reasons).
For me, a very outspoken and no-bull person, starting a discussion knowing I'll never get a closure, or asking a question and having to wait for 5 days for a simple answer, is slowly killing me. It is utterly frustrating.
Is there anybody out there who's been in a situation/relationship that resembles ours? If I really love him, should I stand by him and take this crap for more years to come? Or am I just kidding myself that in time things will improve?
Thanks all,
Sakai