Anxiety : Hi. I've been suffering from... - Anxiety Support

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Anxiety

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Hi. I've been suffering from anxiety quite badly since around January 2017. I didn't really know what it was till a few months ago as I thought of myself as reasonably confident. I think it has been affecting me previous to that...I got clean off heroin, crack & alcohol 3 years ago. Anyway my life seemed to be going great. I have my daughter bk in my life, I run a flat and a car, I work as a drug/alcohol worker and I have a girlfriend who I really love. We got together at Christmas. It's my first proper clean/sober relationship and I'm 42. She has a condition called vasculitis. It is a horrible condition and I'm constantly in awe of how well she handles it. But since we've been together I've been plagued with feelings of not being good enough, funny enough, interesting enough. Thoughts that tell me that I'm messing up the relationship spin round my head an awful lot of the time. Compliments just bounce off me. It's as if I'm wearing armour. I think I've worked out that i don't love or approve of myself very much, maybe wreckage from all the daft, selfish and dishonest things I did in addiction. I find myself doing praiseworthy things but when I get praise or am told that others are proud of me, the compliment just makes me feel hollow... like its coming from the wrong place and im trying to substitute self approval with praise and approval from others. I'm trying to access some CBT and have started counselling through work. But I feel pretty hopeless. I also feel I'm gonna lose the best woman I've ever met if I can't sort this out. Sort of like a self fulfilling prophecy cos the anxiety I feel makes me unable to be totally myself around her and my friends recently.

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