Women and Anxiety: Do Your Anxious Feelings Interfere with Your Romantic Relationship?

Anxiety can make it difficult to form close relationships. Especially romantic ones.

All across the nation, women and anxiety fight daily battles with one other. Unsurprisingly, trying to conquer an unseen force like anxiety can be very tricky.

At times, too tricky.

Anxiety can eat away at a relationship. Often crushing the trust and connection between two people, anxiety undoubtedly interferes with romance.

To untangle the matter of women and anxiety, let’s dive into how exactly anxiety impacts romance.

It Fabricates Worst-Case Scenarios

Have you ever been in a situation where your partner canceled a dinner plan? Or, what about when you didn’t get a response via call or text as quickly as you’d expected?

Did you ever experience a shock wave throughout your body when your partner “liked” someone else’s social media post?

In these situations, epic warfare between women and anxiety typically ensues. Anxiety will try to convince you of various worst-case scenarios—like your partner doesn’t care, you’re unimportant, they want to break up, they’re cheating, etc.

To help deal with your anxiety, practice calming techniques like deep breathing. Get off of social media for a few hours or days, and carve out some time to talk with your partner about what you’re dealing with. Usually, you’ll find that anxiety made the situation much worse than it really was.

Although it may feel uncomfortable to just “sit and wait” until you get an answer, practice being temporarily uncomfortable.

It Sidetracks Your Attention

A big part in establishing a healthy relationship is being committed to vulnerability.

As you may have guessed, anxiety often inhibits your ability to be vulnerable to your partner. You may feel less aware of both your own needs and your partner’s needs because you worry about the what-ifs. So you close up, in a way.

Feeling overwhelmed with what could happen causes pressure to build within your relationship. You may have difficulty soaking up the moment and enjoying being with your partner.

It’s not uncommon for resentment to build up from both sides. Your partner may not understand why you can’t live in the here and now, whereas you may feel like your partner doesn’t understand you. To avoid this anxiety trap, practice living in the moment.

While it is possible for women and anxiety to “get along,” it takes practice.

For instance, when you feel upset or worried, pause before taking action. Anchor yourself back into the present by reaching out for your partner, verbally or physically. This simply action builds trust and invites you both to be more vulnerable.

It Skyrockets Self-Doubt

Anxiety can have a debilitating way of making you believe you’re not worth being in a healthy relationship. It may make you doubt why anyone would actually want to be with you. A defeated feeling, it often accompanies a conflict in a relationship.

Rather than rebounding from a conflict or disagreement and moving on in a healthy way, anxiety can quickly suck you down into a self-loathing headspace. You could even feel like you have to protect yourself in your own relationship because of how badly you feel.

When you feel this dark cloud of anxiety descend, talk to your partner about it. Be open and honest with them, asking for acceptance and support when you need it.

Remember that your partner doesn’t have to be your sole support system in facing anxiety. Recruit a strong circle of family or friends to be your cheerleaders and sounding boards.

Also, adopt a positive mantra and put it on repeat in your mind. Be compassionate with yourself by amping up how you take care of your physical and emotional needs.

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Simply dealing with anxiety doesn’t doom your romantic relationship. But it can complicate it. Therapy can help you navigate these complications and safeguard your relationship from the negative impact of anxiety.

 

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