Hi,

I guess this post encompassesses elements of anxiety, low self esteem, jealousy, relationships and sexuality. To provide some context, I am a 23-year-old bisexual woman who is currently in a relationship with a man of the same age (we have been together for 3 months, so far). This is my 4th relationship, and the first that has been with a man. Up until this point, I indentified as a lesbian, so I am new to the heterosexual world. The guy I am with is amazing. We have known eachother since secondary school and he has always had strong feelings for me (so much so, that I am his first ever girlfriend and was his first ever sexual experience). He is an amazing partner; emotionally supportive, affectionate, loving, giving, appreciative and so forth. He really adores and admires me. However, despite all of this, I am still suffering from the above in my realtionship. I think it is wise to mention that I suffer from anxiety in general (not just in the context of relationships), and have battled with it for several years.

Now, I have noticed a pattern in my relationships. At the beginning, when the relatinship is fresh, I experience mainly 'feel good' feelings of love, connection and intimacy. Then a little while into the relationship, something happens - I get attached. With this attacment comes a fear of loss/rejection/betrayl, and it quickly becomes a breeding ground for anxiety, insecurity, jealousy and low self-esteem. I realise that I rely on this other person to provide me with a sense of worth and value. I have identified a few key features to what I experience:

Jealosuy - the inability to accept that my partner will be physically/sexually attracted to other people.

This is a fact that really bothers me. It has become a lot more prominent since being with a man, since men are a lot more visually-orientated and sexual in nature than women. I get really anxious when I know that my boyfriend will be spending time with his male friends (whom are all single), because I dread the 'male banter' that they'll be enganging in, which will inevitably bring attention to other attractive women. I've been amongst them when they've engaged in such banter, and it left me with in an inherent dislike towards his friends. It makes me wish they were more mature (they're all a few years younger than us, and thus very sexually immature), or/and in loving relationships themselves. In addition to this, I am a feminist, so I take real offense to hearing women being reduced to sexual objects for male pleasure. It makes me feel a deep disappointment towards how superficial men can be. I was also devastated to discover that my boyfriend watches/masturbates to porn (which I later found out was not unusual for men in relationships - I had no idea, as I am new to the heterosexual community). I cannot stand the idea of him been aroused by/ejaculating to another woman's body. I was disappointed to learn that he does this despire being with me - someone he waited almost 10 years for. I would have thought that his desire for/attraction to me was so strong, that no other woman so much as comes to his attention now that he finally has the opportunity to be intimate with me. Knowing that he still gets off to other woman's bodies makes me feel undesirable and sexually inadequate. This leads me to have "Did I not live up to his expectations?"-style questions circulating my mind. I am not suggesting that he is at all in the wrong - I am aware that it is MY issues that are the problem, not his behaviour. I think another issue that fuels my jealousy towards my partner being physically/sexually attracted to other people is the fact that that I am what is called 'demisexual' - someone who only really experiences physical/sexual attraction once forming an emotional bond to a person - so it's something that I don't really understand. Also, because I don't "check out" etc other people, I naturally expect the same from partners (which I understand isn't exactly fair if they're not also demisexual). 

Low self-esteem - an inablility to see what my partner sees in me, or to conceptualise what is so great or attractive about me to them.

To be honest, I'm not entirely sure it's that - I think I'm pretty darn amazing (I'm a Leo), but I often wonder if my partner recognises the things that are amazing about me. I often worry that they're overlooked, or that I'm underappreciated. So, rather than it being a case of me not feeling good enough about myself, it's more that I worry that my partner won't recognise what's good about me. For example, if I catch my boyfriend looking at an attractive woman in a shopping mall, my first thought would be somthing like "So, he's looking at this attractive woman? Why must he be so visually-orientated? That must mean he doesn't appreciate me for my creative MIND!" 

Past experiences of being lied to/cheated on - an inability to trust my partner's words/moties/intentions.

Almost all of my past relationships have resulted in being cheated on, so it's somehting I have really come to fear. As I put my self-esteem and sense of worth/value in my partner's hands, being cheated on makes me feel extremely undesirable, inadequate and all round-worthless. Because of this fear, I am often very anxious and suspicous. A simple "I'm hanging out with friends", in my mind, translates to "They're going to be talking about women again, aren't they? I bet there'll be women where they are. What if one of the women is attractive? What if her bum is bigger than mine and he gets an erection? He'll want to cheat, won't he? I bet he'll cheat!" - you get the point. In addition to this, in two of my past relationships I learned that my partner had a years-long preoccupation with another woman, resulting in a lack of trust for parners' feelings towards me, feelings of competition and feelings of inadequacy. I now almost expect that my partner is going to be attracted to someone else behind my back, or worse - cheat!

Anxiety - the expectation/anticipation that something will go wrong, and that I'd better either reduce to chances of it happenning, or prepare for it.

I've often driven partners away by invading their privacy. In the past, I've gotten into the habit of checking their messages, internet history, emails and so forth - all in the anticipation that they're up to something. Checking their things is a way of preparing for the perceived negative outcome (being in the know that it's hapenning). In addition to this, my anxiety makes me crave control - in my mind, the more I can control it, the less likely it is to happen. An example of this might be me pursuading him to spend time with me rather than his friends, or frantically trying to gain weight (I'm currently feeling very slim and unshaprely) so that my body is deirable enough for him not to check out women with bigger bums (on a few occasions, I noticed that he'd searched for 'big ass' porn, which has lead me to be to insecure about the size of my bum). 

These issues really affect my ability to enjoy my relationship, because I am forever feeling as though I'm not good enough, that no matter how great I am my partner will always notice other woman, and that my partner is probbaly getting ready to cheat.

If anybody else battles with these feelings, I would like to hear about your experiences, and how you manage them.

Thank you.