How to help my boyfriend deal with anxiety
Hello!
My name is Lucía. I am writing because I am concerned about my boyfriend. He is a very anxious person to the point where it will sometimes deprive him of sleep or make him feel really sad. Needless to say I do not want this for him. I recommended he seek professional help, as I have in the past (though my anxiety issues were nothing too bad) but he said he has not had satisfactory experiences with them in the past, and doesn't have the time or the money to go to one now.
I am writing because aside from other things, our relationship is a constant source of worry for him. He says he feels inadequate, like he can't provide for me or make me happy or keep me entertained. Needless to say, none of these things are true. I love him and aside from wishing to help him with already existing worries I would not wish to add myself to them. I am by no means a professional but I have dealt with other sort of problems before, with friends and family members of mine. And though I can't really be a therapist for him I figured there is some way in which I can help to ease his worries. At the very least, I am a good listener and I care for him. I feel this should suffice. Also, I know from him that discussing his feelings is not something he usually does, so just getting him to talk about them should help. He is very lonely most of the time, but now he has me to help.
More to the point, my exact questions are the following: What, if anything, can I do to help? How can I get him to demistify his fears? How can I make him feel more comfortable with them? How can I help him to see them more objectively and put them into perspective? What can I say that will make him feel better? How does one help another person feel safe and more calm?
I know it is his responsibility to take care of himself, and I know that it is not my job to do it for him. But I also know he is afraid of being judged or getting hurt and that he trusts me. All I want is to be better equipped to make a difference to him.
Any opinions on the subject are greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Lucía.
It's great that you care so much for your boyfriend and want to help him feel better. Often just knowing someone's there for you is a tremendous help on it's own.
For starters, you could introduce him to 7Cups if he's not on here already. Lots of people are dealing with similar issues as he is and it might make him feel less alone if he realises and experiences this.
As for things to help him calm down, you could suggest doing some form of yoga or meditation together. I can imagine going to a class could provide even more anxiety for him so you could just look up some articles on how to practice yoga/meditation and do it together somewhere. The mindfulness recordings on this site are brilliant too, and you can both do them together.
Like I said, just being there for him is tremendously helpful. Ofcourse there are various activities you could try together to help him relax, such as yoga, meditation, walking, exercising etc. But at the end of the day it's not about what you do in particular, it's about the intention behind the action. Your intentions are wonderful and he will see and appreciate that.
I am new here, so I want to testing before posting something here
