Depression

As most say they have been through a lot in their lives. Ive been through abusive relationships, being cheated on, parents separating when i was 4, had an abortion, felt isolated etc.. ive been with my partner for four nearly five years and from the start i had trust issues and massive insecurities due to my past, he was patient with me and understood but it seems as though my insecurities affect our relationship. Im not the most confident person and i tend to think what if, what if he cheats or finds someone better. Im 22 and i lack alot of growth in my life in terms of where i should be at my age (good job, qualifications, own car) my partner has all these things so it makes me feel beneath him and down although he doesnt make me feel this way its just off my own mind thinking these things. I have thought what if i am going through depression or bipolar. It has been said in a jokey kind of way before from him but what if it is true. Could i have bipolar. My mood change from 10-0 just like that. One minute im ok then i switch just like that. I cry a lot sometimes over thinking things then i snap out of it

Your past experiences taught you that getting close to people and putting your trust in them got you punished. Fast forward to today, with your partner who's nothing like those people, and- Sod that, let's switch to a far simpler analogy... You - who's eyesight was a bit blurry (human design fault) - loved bees. But some of them didn't love you back. They stung you. In a lot of cases, very badly. The result included your eyesight getting even (temporarily) blurrier. Little did you and your blurry eyesight know - the ones that stung you were actually HORNETS. Boyfriend seems to be a bee. A honey bee, no less. :-) Unfortunately, because they appear and behave so similar in so many ways, it takes TIME for the eyesight to clear enough to distinguish between hornets and bees, and thereby know which type to avoid or quickly run away from in the first place. But the more badly stung in the past, the longer this takes. You basically need to spend more time with lots of bees or one giant, special honey-bee, and experience enough opportunities to get stung yet witness yourself NOT getting stung...all the while learning far more deeply - to point of expert - all the things that show the meaningful differences between bees (good) and hornets (bad). Unfortunately, usually when you're feeling under the weather or low in whatever other ways, including UNDER-STIMULATED (lack of good job, etc.) - even the sound of buzzing can take you straight back to those horrid stinging episodes as sees you panic and constantly backing away (mentally in this case) to a safer distance. Forwards, backwards, forwards, backwards... backwards being predominant. Backing away is the last thing you should do because obviously to become an expert and grow more confidence takes very deep and thorough exposure. I don't think you're bipolar but you do sound as if - not helped by having too much time and mental room on your hands - you're suffering from negative thinking (possibly OCD Thinking) that you can't snap yourself out of very well. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy would do the trick if you want to overtake nature's usual process pace? Saying that, so would taking a leap of faith (by remembering that [1] the hornet stings *didn't nor could* actually kill you and [2] you do KNOW after 5 whole years that boyfriend isn't a hornet in the first place) and flinging yourself with total abandon into greater intimacy with him as is the very mechanism which simultaneously BUILDS STRONGER TRUST. I mean - I *say* 'can't snap yourself out of very well' but - QUESTION: tell me - does having had a cry tend to snap you back? If it does then the answer to this seeming dilemma is not only very simple but already insitu, working its magic (despite it doesn't FEEL very magical). RSvP.

Yes. I tend to over think ALOT. Sometimes for no reason or if im bored or something is too good to be true. It does still hurt when i think about my past, and those insecurities is what gets in between my partner and i as we never actually argue. We fallout following one of my episodes of being hormonal or making him feel like i don't trust him or doubting us then he'll leave i'll cry stop crying wait days missing him and its becoming a cycle now. I hate being so insecure

"or something is too good to be true" You need to change your attitude through how you're looking at everything (pessimistically, albeit understandably). This loving relationship with this obvious diamond of a geezer is NOT 'too good to be true'. The way some people in your past treated you was TOO BAD to be true. See the difference that makes all the difference? "Nice people are happy people / happy people are nice people. Nasty people are miserable people / miserable people are nasty people". It really is that simple, so feel SORRY for all those individuals or groups in your past that were so constantly bothered or angry they felt compelled to kick the cat - whichever cat was already conveniently to-hand or CAME closest without reservation or even total abandon (you). You need to stop (or already have stopped?) rushing with open arms but no thought towards anything that buzzes - as you've found to your peril. Don't get me wrong: we all have a pre-portion of trust that we readily place in other people (the world as relies on pack interactions wouldn't work otherwise), and your pre-amount is obviously greater than the norm. That's perfect if you get with a Like (be they male or female) because then it's a case of no contrast... no-one is "over-trusting" nor vulnerable to attack or getting taken advantage of. But it's a sad fact that some people are unhappy cat-kickers who mistake anyone's ready willingness to trust to a higher degree than the norm as some sign of weakness. They see it thus because, usually, the only time THEY are nice is whenever they NEED something from someone (not because they want to give), hence, to them, needful or needy equals WEAK (equals exploitable/mis-useable/abuseable). Like you've been doing with boyfriend (albeit with him you've been going that bit *too far* in holding back followed by returning to him that bit *too* closely whereat you suddenly feel so precarious you panic and back off too much again), you need to wait and watch and base your input and investment into any relationship on what the other person puts in. Tit For Tat. Think cardgame called, Snap - you place a card, they place a card, he wins that round, you win the next one, but both of you are getting joy out of it, meaning both of you ultimately are winners. You can initiate, sure, but just as you wouldn't sit there during Snap putting down card after card without letting the other take their turn - don't keep giving/expending effort where reciprocation is proving inadequate or absent. You can tell *very* early on in any type of relationship whether or not the other person is initiating/reciprocating. (Well, you certainly can if you're not so busy luxuriating in the pleasure that you forget to do your job of self-preservation.) So there's your first opportunity to spot a Red Flag and hold yourself back until it goes Green or dump the dud if it never does. I appreciate how because he's the first person to treat you well off his own bat, he feels like the only person who could or would - ever - in the WORLD. But this isn't the case. You met him because you freed yourself and departed from a PLACE - a step on a developmental progress staircase. Having psychologically recovered sufficiently from your past, you strengthened and grew enough to take a step UP. This, too, is a place - one that unhappy (thus frozen and stunted) people cannot reach. On this higher step there are MANY diamond geezers, you just haven't met any or all of them yet. So boyfriend is just the first, not the only. Once you've spent time on this higher step where one receives better treatment from better people, and had a chance to get USED to it, the contrast between this experience and that at that hands of the lower-stepped people from your past gets brought into much sharper relief than ever before. Suddenly, they didn't just do this/that, they OH MY GOD, DID THE UNTHINKABLE, HOW HEINOUS!!! This triggers grief on many levels for many various personal reasons (which crying helps discharge), e.g. feelings of having lost or wasted that whole precious era because you were too busy fending off the constant insults, frustration and latent anger because only now can you think of better ways to have dodged or dealt with it, pity for your past self, disbelief (and a loss of faith in the world) that people could be so downright mean and nasty....etc. What I'm pointing out is the irony of your better situation, in that, it's so good that as you complete each quantum of adaption, everything else before feels and looks in hindsight worse and worse and worse.... At the end of this phase comes Acceptance (and said pity for them). And then you're over it... it never feels threatening or worrying again because you realise it's a world away. YOU'RE a world away. (Making sense?) But you have to take care not to set yourself up via a negative self-fulfilling prophesy. By feeling fear about whether you'll lose this good thing or whether said good thing will suddenly turn into a monster 'like all the others' and hence holding back, you become the athlete who takes one look at the racecourse, decides he hasn't any guaranteed chance at winning, and because of this, DOESN'T put his all into the actual running. How stupid is that? How can he POSSIBLY win if he's whatsoever holding himself back? The chances of his losing are now far greater, all because of his fear in combination with his over-active imagination. FYI, top winning athletes have these same fears tapping them worryingly on the shoulder now and again, but they've been taught positive visualisation skills (go google). If this relationship doesn't last forever, you'll spend time in recovery (so as not to risk sliding back down to the prior step), then - back to normal (these days better) strength, will hook up with a new man, undoubtedly even better. There really is no Lose here, just win/win. And you're already ON that racetrack, inches from the tickertape, so what on earth nonsense are you fretting about? Right? Also, cease giving yourself a hard time about the fact that you're not as far up the personal social status path as possibly others your age. Lucky THEM that they didn't have weights around their ankles, waiting to drop or get shaken off, eh. But maybe now that your weights are finally leaving you, with your legs resultantly far stronger and faster than theirs, you'll soon be overtaking the lot of them! That's usually how it all works. Feel the fear and then IGNORE the fear and do it ANYWAY. *That* is how to guarantee you win this time rather than next. And as for you having less than your partner: maybe that's something he LIKES, as in, makes him feel that much more manly-protective over you THUS GENTLER? Again, I realise you've been taught to be wary of any position that resembles 'underdog' because of said past kickings, but, remember, this guy isn't a kicker. When he sees someone at a disadvantage or even feeling at one, he doesn't kick it, he scoops it up and takes care of it. Diamonds don't cheat, anyway. They wouldn't ever stoop so low, would find it easier to gouge out their own eyeballs. As for arguing, though: arguing is just your difficult conversation requiring negotiation that's got subjected to over-delay and thereby gets to roll around the room picking up unnecessary fluff and detritus. If you keep sharing your thoughts and feelings and enquiring after each other's contentedness levels on a regular basis, there's no need for any argument about your relationship per se, save for unexpected problems courtesy of daily life. Even then, arguments aren't bad. It's how you both get through and over them that's most people's sticking points. But then that difficulty is usually down TO said remissness of shelving and ignoring, anyway, so - think good housekeeping: regular little clean-ups and tidy-ups as you go from room to room equals no actual dedicated housework sessions. So, anyway, above all else, your mind is like a very bored thus naughty toddler running riot around your house, getting into all sorts of out-of-bounds places and likely to make a mess of or break all you hold most dear if you don't intervene. Strap it into the highchair and give it a colouring-in book and crayons, quick, for gawd's sake, before your favourite crystal vase (your relationship) gets it! Fears aren't real. They're just imaginings that either never come true or are self-embarrassingly no big deal at all if/when they do. Ignore them and they'll go away. Much like bullies, eh. ;-) Finally, I'll leave you with a magic phrase for extending and turbo-charging boyfriend's patience: "It's not YOU I don't trust (I do) - it's life. I sometimes still feel like maybe it's out to get me and might use you/our precious relationship as its tool". Hope that helped. ("Phew, doesn't she go on", LOL)