DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’m writing because I feel a little lost on how to support the man I love. My partner grew up in poverty, and I’ve always admired his drive, resilience, and the way he’s faced life head-on. He’s beautiful inside and out, and honestly, he’s the best man I’ve ever met.

Right now, he’s working on his own business, and I can see how much it matters to him. But lately, I’ve noticed his frustration. He doesn’t really talk about it with me — he’s not someone who asks for help — but I can see it in his face and it hurts to see him struggling.

One of the things I admire most about him is how he never lets anything keep him down. When he was skinny, he trained until he wasn’t anymore. When he couldn’t get a job because he didn’t have a degree, he went out, got one, and then landed an even better job. He’s incredible, and I respect him deeply for that.

At the same time, I’m scared sometimes that I won’t be enough for him — that I won’t live up to the amazing person that he is. But I love him completely, with all my heart, and I know he loves me too. He shows it in so many ways: he’s generous, always giving, always cooking for us, always thinking of others.

My question is: how can I really support him through this? He’s not someone who asks for anything, but I want to be there for him in the way he needs. I don’t want to just stand by while he carries everything on his own.

How do I help this incredible man that I love so much?

Sincerely,

Support Class

DEAR SUPPORT CLASS: Before I get to the meat of your question, SC, I want to highlight something important that you said: “I’m scared sometimes that I won’t be enough for him — that I won’t live up to the amazing person that he is.” This is looking at things the wrong way. Your partner isn’t looking for you to live up to who he is; he’s looking for you to live up to who you are. He sounds like an amazing guy, and that’s awesome, but you don’t need to be like him. He’s not in a relationship with himself, he’s in a relationship with you. He doesn’t want a clone or someone who’s exactly like him – at least I would hope not, and it doesn’t sound like it from what you say – he wants you. If his awesomeness inspires you to try to be more awesome yourself, that’s great… but the way that you are awesome isn’t the way that he is awesome and that’s fine! The best version of you isn’t going to look like the best version of him and that’s fine because – as I said – he wants to see you, not a mirror.

Now as for how you can support him… I have no idea. I’m not being dismissive here; I’m telling you the literal truth. I don’t know what he’s struggling with, where he could use support or what he might be able to accept.

You know who does? Your partner. Yeah, he may be someone who doesn’t ask for help very often, but that doesn’t mean that you have to wait until he asks. There’s nothing stopping you from going up to him and saying “I see that you’re having a hard time here; what can I do to help?”

Now, it’s entirely possible that he won’t have an answer for you. It may be that he doesn’t know what you might be able to do to help him with this particular struggle. Or it could well be that there isn’t anything that you can do. You may not have the training, the access, the inside information. It could well be that the things that he’s struggling with are things that other people can’t do for him or that they can’t share the load. So, there may be nothing you can do about the issues he’s struggling with.

But that doesn’t mean that you can’t help and support him. Even if you can’t help him with his specific struggle, you can still help him. Are there things that you could take off his plate that would then free up time and bandwidth for him? Does he have responsibilities or tasks outside of his career struggles that you have the time and capacity to take up and make things a little easier, without overloading yourself in the process? If you’re not sure, this is something you can – and should ask him: “hey, is there something I could do that would make things a little easier for you?”

You can also find look for things that you could do that are less directly helpful but rather help motivate him or keep his spirits up. The morale officer is as important member of the team as everyone else; they’re the person who helps ensure that everyone else has the ability to keep going. So maybe there are things you can do that would be special and make him feel as loved and appreciated as you feel from your end. It could be as small as bringing him a cup of coffee when he’s working, or arranging for something fun to do on a break.

Keep in mind that a lot of folks, especially people who are particularly driven or focused can have a hard time giving up control or delegating tasks; they feel like they “should” be able to do All The Things or have a hard time letting others take on some of the responsibilities they see as theirs. Sometimes it’s a fear that nobody else could do it “right”, and sometimes it’s a feeling that doing so would be a step towards admitting that they’re not “good enough”. So, part of supporting him could well be framing this as “letting me help you makes it possible for you to do X or achieve Y more effectively”.

And don’t forget: there’ll be times when you’re struggling too. Hopefully he’ll return the favor and take things off your plate when you need it too.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’ve been struggling with a concern that I can’t seem to shake off, and I hope you might be able to help me see things from a different perspective.

For a big part of my life, I felt like I was always trying to catch up. I once got myself into heavy debt after a bad investment decision. It took years, but I worked hard and managed to pay it off. During that time, I was also taking care of my sick mother. It wasn’t easy — financially, emotionally, or mentally — but I did it because she needed me. When she eventually passed away, I went through a period of deep depression, but I pulled myself out of it. I found a better job, I got my life on steadier ground, and today I can say I’m debt-free and living better than I ever have before.

And yet, even with all of this progress, I still feel… average. I’m not muscular, I don’t have flashy looks, and I don’t live a luxurious lifestyle. I’m just a regular guy. I don’t think I’m unattractive, but I also know I’m not the type to turn heads at first glance.

I love life. I always want to improve myself, to keep moving forward, to find joy in living. But what I can’t help but notice is that, at least in the early stages of dating, women don’t seem to care about things like resilience, responsibility, or perseverance. They care about appearance, presence, that initial spark — and those are exactly the areas where I feel I come up short.

So my worry is this: if my story — working hard, overcoming struggles, supporting family, building myself back up — doesn’t make me attractive at the start, then what chance do I really have? Is being “average” in looks and lifestyle always going to overshadow the things I’ve worked so hard to achieve?

Sincerely,

A Worried but Hopeful Guy

DEAR A WORRIED BUT HOPEFUL GUY: This, WHG, is another classic case of the problem you have is not the problem you think you have. And, like most of these cases, it’s coming down to two fundamental misunderstandings: what it takes to be attractive and what’s actually bothering you. And – again, like in so many of these cases – these two issues are tangled up like a ball of horny snakes to the point that trying to figure out where one starts and one ends is almost impossible.

But let’s start with what makes someone attractive and why worrying about your story is missing the point. Let’s start with something that should be obvious: your backstory isn’t the issue here. In fact, your story isn’t going to come up at all, certainly in the stages that you’re worrying about. This is very much a case of something that looms large in your mind, but is utterly invisible to anyone else.

Here’s the thing: you keep talking about what women care about in the early stages of dating and then list qualities that women don’t seem to care about – qualities that are highlighted by what you’ve gone through. What you don’t mention though is how you think women are supposed to know about these things or this aspect of your life?

This isn’t World of Warcraft, WHG; women aren’t going to be able to right-click on you and get your lore. They’re not going to be looking you up on the wiki to get your backstory. So how precisely, are you supposed to demonstrate resilience, your supporting your family or the dogmatic determination to dig yourself out of a financial hole on a date? It’s not as though accomplishing these things gives you badges that float over your head next to your name and faction alliance. And “hey, can you give me the info-dump on your last ten years?” isn’t exactly the sort of conversation that comes up when you’re meeting someone for the first time or even on the first date.

Theoretically you could write about it on a dating profile but… again, the reaction you’re most likely to get is “cool story bro”, not “take me in a manly fashion, you stallion!”. And that’s assuming you got one at all.

This is the thing that folks often misunderstand about attraction. It’s akin to the way guys will complain about how “women say they want a nice guy, but then they pass over me, a nice guy!”. The issue at hand is that “want a nice guy” is about the quality of the person who they are interested in dating; “niceness” isn’t what’s sparking the initial interest in getting to know someone and possibly date them. “Niceness”, like “good listener”, “ambitious” and the like are all internal qualities. They’re not something that can be easily seen at a glance; nice guys don’t radiate a particular glow and ambitious guys don’t smell like baking zucchini bread. Similarly, telling someone that you’re nice or resilient or whatnot is about as effective as telling someone you’re a world Nintendo champion; it may be true, but saying it doesn’t really mean anything. Anyone can say s--t. Niceness is observed and experienced. The way you took care of your family – which is admirable, don’t get me wrong – is the sort of thing that can solidify or validate a connection once it exists, but it’s not something that’s going to draw someone in who doesn’t already know you.

The early stages of attraction are about piquing interest and generating the desire to get to know you and know more about you. Attraction isn’t a passive state, it’s a verb. It’s something you do. Even if we posit that it’s all about someone’s physical looks (it’s not), those are part of an active process. Looking good isn’t about musculature and facial symmetry, it’s about your presentation. It’s your hygiene, your style, your grooming, the way you carry yourself and so on. The hottest people you know don’t look the way you picture when they roll out of bed, eyes puffy, hair a mess, pillow-creases in their faces and reeking of morning breath. They’ve put effort into their grooming and their clothes and overall look. Tabloids have devoted gallons of ink and gigawatts of electricity to photos of celebrities without makeup or with bad hair and ratty sweats making a Starbucks run or picking up basics at the grocery store; they look night-and-day different from when they’re going out on the town and looking to impress. They were active in shaping their appearance.

But as I said, it’s not just about looks, it’s in how you make people feel. That initial attraction is about what you do – the way you talk to someone, the way you spark particular feelings or emotions, the way you show them qualities about who you are that make them want to spend more time with you. And I do mean show; nobody is going to be so moved by your mere presence that they’re going to invest time and energy trying to excavate your lore without prompting from you. If you want to someone to want to know more about you so that there’s the opportunity to learn about your backstory, then you have to give them a reason to do so. You have to make them want to know more, which means giving them reason to want to spend more time with you.

This is why I talk so much about the Reward Theory of Attraction – the more someone enjoys themselves in our presence, the more time they want to spend with us and the more they prioritize their relationship with us. So rather than worrying about whether your lore is attractive, you want to focus on building connections with people and making them enjoy being with you.

And that’s hardly an insurmountable challenge. I’ve said before that love isn’t just an emotion, it’s also chemistry – the mix of oxytocin and dopamine in the brain. You can help trigger dopamine and oxytocin production in someone in a number of ways, including physical touch, laughter and conversation, good food or even things like winning games. If it produces an enjoyable or pleasing outcome, it’s going to increase those chemicals.

This is why worrying about whether your backstory is attractive or not is missing the point. It’s not a trigger or a cause, it’s flavor. It enhances; it doesn’t generate. So right off the bat, you’re focusing on the wrong things; paying more attention to your social skills and connecting with people will help you in the ways you want.

But that brings us to the other issue: the actual source of your anxiety. Your issue isn’t that you’re average, because being “average” isn’t bad. Most people are average – that’s what “average” means. If you had to be “above average” in order to date or find a partner, the human race would die out, because only a slim number of people would ever manage to date and mate. Everyone can’t be exceptional by definition; they’re the exception. It’s quite literally embedded in the word.

This isn’t about your being average or not, WBH or whether people are attracted to average people. This is entirely about how you feel about yourself. I mean, I can’t help but notice that – again, like so many other men – you’re seeing this as how men need to be above-average. This need to be exceptional or to stand out never seems to apply to women. This is hardly a surprise – this is about you, after all, and you’re a man. You feel like you’re unworthy or uninteresting, while being very interested in the women you’re attracted to. This fear you’re wrestling with has nothing to do with what women want and everything to do with the fact that you feel like you’re not “worthy” of women’s interest. The fear that “average” isn’t “good enough” isn’t about average being bad, it’s about you feeling like you need some exceptional quality to be worthy of attention and interest – something that goes beyond just you being you.

And to be frank, a lot of this comes up because guys make all sorts of unwarranted assumptions about the inner lives of women. They buy into the idea that every woman – or, more accurately, the ones they’re attracted to – are so flooded with attention for existing that they couldn’t possibly stand out. Other men – men who they feel are “better” than they are – exist, so why would that woman choose the “lesser” choice? But this ignores not just women’s lived experiences (most women aren’t flooded with male attention, nor is that attention all welcome or even good) but the fact that women are people too. Women don’t date people based on a spreadsheet of points and choose the person with the highest total, any more than men do; they date people they like and are attracted to. The idea that someone else – someone who’s richer or has a higher status job or is more conventionally attractive – wins “automatically” ignores that women date people. Someone who likes you, likes you because you’re you and wants to be with you, specifically. Another person who has other qualities may be interesting, even attractive, but they’re not you.

(And because I know folks will zero in on this: being in a relationship with someone, even being wildly in love with them, doesn’t mean that they no longer find other people attractive. Attraction isn’t a command that must be acted upon. If you can find movie stars attractive without wanting to divorce your wife over it, you understand how this works.)

While you should worry less about your backstory and put more effort into developing your presentation and social skills… the bigger thing you should be doing is focusing on your sense of self-worth. And you’ve got a lot to work with here; what you’ve done is really admirable! Pulling yourself out of a financial hole is impressive! Taking such care of your mother in the last days of her life says a lot about who you are as a person! These are all things you should be proud of. But that pride should be about how you feel about yourself, not about how this does or doesn’t inspire women to hurl themselves at you. The internal qualities you describe should affect how you feel about your own worth and the belief that this is why people should get to know you.

If you’re an awesome person with lots of qualities that people would appreciate when they get to know you, then you should let motivate you to find people worth getting to know. Stop seeing it as “I hope someone likes me” and see it as “I’m a catch for anyone who is a good match for me.”

Do that, and you’ll be far less worried about being “average”. You don’t need to be an exception, WBH. You need to be you, and the best version of you that you can be. If you can start letting yourself feel that, the rest comes much more easily.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I have been experiencing frequent anxiety attacks triggered by my obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). These compulsions often create irrational beliefs that feel real, such as the thought that if I fail to perform a certain action, something bad, like death, will occur. Although I am aware that these thoughts are not grounded in reality, my mind convinces me otherwise, making it difficult to resist them.

Recently, my anxiety and OCD symptoms have intensified. They often manifest together, leaving me overwhelmed, emotional, and increasingly isolated. My relationship with C, whom I deeply love, has also become a trigger. Despite her constant reassurance that I am enough for her and that she loves only me, my intrusive thoughts create scenarios — such as her being unfaithful — that feel vivid and convincing, even though I know they are not true.

C’s participation as a muse in upcoming events has heightened my insecurity. While I understand that I cannot and should not control her choices, my thoughts still make me anxious, particularly when imagining other people, especially boys, approaching her. Although I trust that she will not entertain them, the mere idea distresses me.

The Over-Thinker

DEAR THE OVER-THINKER: I wish you explained what you mean by “participating as a muse in upcoming events”, because I am honestly scratching my head as to what that would entail.

But frankly, that’s more about my curiosity than anything else. Even if I could say “well, by participating in this, she’s doing X and Y which precludes Z, so that’s something you don’t need to worry about”, that wouldn’t actually help. This isn’t about rational thinking or trusting your partner, this is about unwanted and intrusive thoughts – ones that you know are irrational and unrealistic but that still bother you anyway.

This is where I have to reiterate that this is a job for a mental health professional, not me. Dr. NerdLove, after all, is not a real doctor, and even if I were, this is an area where you’re almost certainly going to want the assistance of a therapist and likely a psychiatrist or medical professional who could prescribe medication to help with the anxiety.

What I can do, though, is tell you that I’ve had my own struggles with those sorts of unrealistic-but-still-troubling thoughts and feelings. My ADHD combo plate came with a side of Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria, which had the “lovely” effect of leaving me in a near-constant state of being convinced that not only were people mad at me but that every relationship I had was a mouse’s whisker away from crumbling all around me. And even when there was no rational evidence for this, my cursed-ass brain would invent it, turning even the most anodyne and banal interactions into something fraught with layers of meaning.

So, y’know, I get it.

Now, again, I’m going to emphasize that anything I recommend is based purely on what I did to get through the worst of it; it took getting diagnosed and medicated to really turn down the volume on my RSD. So, I can’t stress enough that this is a discussion to have with your therapist.

The first thing I would suggest is to mentally remind yourself that what you’re imagining isn’t real. You know yourself enough to know that you have these intrusive thoughts and that they’re not based on logic, evidence or even reality. It’s just brainworms, gnawing at your insecurities and dripping poison all over your imagination. Reminding yourself that these are irrational anxieties, not truth, can help give yourself a little breathing room. That, in turn, gives you an opportunity to say “but if I look at this like I was giving advice to my best friend who was dealing with this situation, I would point out that C is doing X and regularly does D, E and F, which someone who didn’t care about me wouldn’t do.”

That doesn’t make the thoughts go away, but the push-back bolstered by actual behavior does help make them less intense, less immediate and easier to name them and to turn your attention away. Naming those thoughts has the benefit of separating them – they’re not things that are happening, nor are they things that define you, they’re just thoughts you are having at that moment. That level of separation helps cut the intensity and the “reality” of them. Similarly, turning your attention away is easier and more effective than trying to force them away. It’s a little like mental judo; it’s easier to redirect energy than it is to stop it. By naming the thought and redirecting your attention elsewhere, you deflate the thoughts’ power over you and cut off bandwidth to them. No feeling, no matter how intense, can last very long without being actively fed; by reducing the bandwidth you give them, you reduce the amount of time they linger and the impact they have on your immediate feelings.

The next thing is to remember that part of what makes these thoughts so stressful and hurtful is that our brains treat what we imagine as being real. An argument we imagine with our partner hurts just as much as one we have in real life, in no small part because it feels real to our brain. We are, for all intents and purposes, hurting our own feelings.

However, the fact that it’s happening in our imagination and that our brains treat it as real also gives us the ability to change them. So, you want to stop being a passive observer of these imaginary scenarios. Instead, you should take control of them and defang them by taking away the things that make them so intense or painful. When you realize you’re having these thoughts, remember that you’re the one who’s generating them and take control… and then make them ridiculous. Fighting a fear tends to reinforce that fear, but laughing at it makes it impotent.

Let’s say that you have a moment where you imagine someone hitting on C at an event and you’re having a hard time turning your attention away. Rather than trying to push past the thought or forcing it away, change it. As the scenario plays out, imagine that the guy’s voice keeps getting higher and higher like he just sucked down a balloon full of helium. Or maybe change his face so that he looks like Garfield. Imagine it playing out the same way except now it’s in black and white and upside down and everyone’s talking in Mid-Atlantic accents like it’s a film from the 1940s. Picture the dude dressed like a clown hobo or wearing the silver-tinfoil suits of an old Flash Gordon serial. Imagine a sitcom laugh track that plays every time he finishes a sentence.

The more you inject unreality and unserious things into the image, the less “real” and less intense it becomes. This lessens its ability to affect you, simply because the absurdity undercuts the emotion behind it; your brain can’t take it seriously as a threat when there’s a live studio audience hooting and jeering at the dude after all or when he looks like an outtake from Robot Monster. 

I would also suggest looking into some self-directed cognitive behavioral therapy exercises; CBT is famously very effective at dealing with OCD issues and intrusive thoughts. Having some techniques in your back pocket to deal with these moments can be very helpful.

As I said though: these are stopgaps, things that I used to hang on until the moment had passed. This is very much a matter to bring to a therapist, not a loudmouth with an advice column. Hie thyself to a shrink who deals with OCD and intrusive thoughts, TOT. The sooner you do, the sooner you’ll start getting these moments under control.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com