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Anxiety & Dating
Former Member
Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
I have been on a first date that went incredibly well with the guy wanting to see me again.
As much as I want to, I feel I need to disclose my mental health. I have mild anxiety, often triggered by stress and lack of maintaining my wellbeing. I'm working on a large project in the arts. My mother's own mental health has hit a slightly low point (I'm 23 and live at home).
What this means is me getting on the train to see him is hard for me, and though I will try and push myself to do this, in not letting the anxiety beat me here, I do want to talk to him about it first.
I feel comfortable enough to do this, though I'm concerned about what to disclose and how
As much as I want to, I feel I need to disclose my mental health. I have mild anxiety, often triggered by stress and lack of maintaining my wellbeing. I'm working on a large project in the arts. My mother's own mental health has hit a slightly low point (I'm 23 and live at home).
What this means is me getting on the train to see him is hard for me, and though I will try and push myself to do this, in not letting the anxiety beat me here, I do want to talk to him about it first.
I feel comfortable enough to do this, though I'm concerned about what to disclose and how
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Comments
Welcome to the boards. :wave:
Thanks for posting this thread. It's really positive that you're looking for some help and support with this. Sounds like a difficult situation to be in wanting to disclose your mental health to him but being concerned about what to disclose and how. You said in your message you want to talk to him and that you're not letting the anxiety beat you here. What would you like to say to him ideally? :chin:
We have an article here about Mental Health and Relationships which might be useful to read, you can see this here There's also an article about telling your partner about a mental health problem which you can find here which could also be useful to have a look at.
Firstly, welcome to the boards! It's great to see you here and asking for advice from the community, and I hope you will find it a helpful place
Secondly, I'm glad to hear your first date went well and that you both want to see each other again. That sounds lovely! It sounds like now that you've got past the inital first step, you're thinking about the next steps and it feels necessary to explain to him why getting a train to see him is difficult. If you genuinely want to talk to him about it and you're comfortable doing that, that's great!
However, you mentioned being concerned about what to disclose and how. This really depends on what you feel comfortable with and what you want to disclose; there is no right or wrong way to go about telling someone about your mental health, and it is different for everyone and every relationship. The only thing I would say is to make sure you are prepared beforehand; try and decide exactly how much you want to say, whether it's just a simple 'this is difficult for me because ____ but I'm working on it' or something more detailed, and gather any support you might need such as printing off factsheets (if you feel that would help him to understand, for example) or making yourself some notes to prompt you if necessary. As for how to tell him... what form of communication feels most comfortable for you? You might want to drop it into a casual conversation (for example, if you are talking about when to meet up again), or if you are more comfortable with writing things down, you could write him a little letter which you could either send him or read out. You also might want to read this article which gives more details about telling a significant other about a mental health issue.
Another option is to practice what you're going to say beforehand by talking with a friend, a family member or by ringing SANE to practice having that conversation.
Ultimately, remember that it's your relationship, and what matters is that you feel comfortable with sharing this part of yourself. Good luck, and feel free to keep posting with how things go! *hug*
How exciting starting out in a new relationship! It really is something fun, but you do need to feel comfortable in doing so.
Tanking about mental health and anxiety isn't the easiest at the best of times, let alone when you don't know how the other person will react. It's important that you only talk about what you are comfortable with and when you are comfortable in doing so.
From my personal experience it's been better to do it face to face, because typing your inner most feelings to someone, only for them to take a long time to reply is torturous! Bit it will be whatever feels right to you!
Good luck and let us know how it goes :yippe:
If you had something horrific, like borderline personality disorder, it would be a different matter.
Hi, I just wanted to challenge you on your comments here as I don't think either of them are particularly fair or helpful, and I wouldn't want other people reading this to get the wrong idea.
Firstly, a date going 'incredibly well' doesn't have to have anything to do with sex. If the OP did have sex with their date on their first date, that's absolutely fine, but having really good sex on the first date is not the only reason that a guy would want a second date. It's quite dangerous to give the impression that the only reason a guy would want a second date is because of good sex, and even more dangerous to give the impression that good sex can balance out other relationship aspects that potentially might be more challenging.
Secondly, it's incredibly discriminatory to label something like borderline personality disorder as "horrific". That comment is incredibly nasty towards anyone suffering with BPD, but also belittles the struggles people have with anxiety - which can be just as difficult a beast.
I didn't belittle anyone, nor was I nasty to anyone. The OP said mild anxiety, which is commonplace and not devastating like BPD is. For you to claim that mild anxiety and BPD are on a level with each other is ludicrous. BPD is a long-term, very complex condition which destroys lives. BPD multiplies the chances of suicide and imprisonment. Most borderlines self-harm. The vast majority of borderlines simultaneously suffer from other mental disorders. BPD accelerates aging and greatly reduces life expectancy. More people are hospitalised for BPD than for all other personality disorders combined. Treatment for BPD is difficult and takes a long time. I used to know a borderline; she was, by far, the most dysfunctional person I've ever met. It's an extremely severe condition which is on a completely different level to mild anxiety. I'm aware that severe cases of anxiety disorders are a huge problem to their sufferers, but that's not what the OP's talking about.
If I were in the OP's position, I would not mention the anxiety disorder (which sounds like quite a mild case of social anxiety disorder) - unless he raises the topic or it becomes essential to mention it.
It's good to hear both points of view. Understand where you're coming from here Steve but it's important to remember of course that success in the context of dating is different from person to person.
Could be an interesting discussion to have in a new thread :chin:
Completely agree that BPD can have a massive effect on someone's life. But of course everything is relative and everyone can experience things differently. It's not always helpful to compare conditions, let's try to just focus on M_mic as this is their thread.:thumb:
Does anyone have any ideas for how M_mic could approach the subject of disclosing a mental health problem to someone you're dating?
For you, that's a condition of a good date, but it isn't for every body. Sex isn't the be all and end all of relationships with other human beings - connection, compassion, friendship, companionship are all equally important and the idea that "good date = good sex" is outdated. Having good sex is not a rule for having a good date - try not to make blanket rules like that.
I said that the comment was nasty, not that you were nasty. You have laid out a good rationale there for why BPD is a difficult disorder, but it's also very individual to a person and categorising a person's reactions to these challenges as better or worse than the other is not helpful. "Horrific" is quite a judgemental term, and there is enough negative judgement on mental health as it is.
With my current boyfriend, I came into the relationship having just got out of an abusive relationship, which left me quite low and with some PTSD. My current boyfriend and I have always found talking and communicating really easy, and on our second date (the day after I met him, as well!) I just ended up blurting out the full story of what had happened to me in my previous relationship. We were together, in person, and we'd had some really easy and deep conversations already. It just felt comfortable. We're both quite empathic and emotionally mature and so I think we were both able to recognise that.
He also suffers from anxiety, and I'm trying really hard to remember how I came to know about that. Quite possibly it came up in the conversation after I blurted out my recent past, but I'm not entirely sure.
M_mic, how was conversation with this guy? Did you get a feel for how he handled deeper conversations?
Roo, you're lucky that there were no major negative consequences for you when you talked about your PTSD so early on in your current relationship. That's probably partly because you both suffer from anxiety disorders, so you understand them and empathise with each other. Many people would be scared off by someone going into detail about a mental disorder at such an early stage - that's why I don't recommend doing so. There are millions of people who don't know much about mental disorders and associate them with people like Anders Behring Breivik and Ali David Sonboly.