"Aren't I enough?"

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Has anyone else experienced this while discussing things totally unrelated to a relationship or sexual desires? Nothing to do with wanting to date other people or needing more excitement.

I had a discussion about not fitting in and why it's had me down lately with my boyfriend (NT) tonight, and that's how it ended. With me walling off because my relationship to him was repeatedly brought up, and I just began to feel guilty for being upset with life in the first place when I have someone waiting for me in the evenings.

He says he brought up how we belong together to show support, but I don't see how my relationship to one individual is supposed to make me feel good enough to not want to discuss my worries about my relationship to the rest of the world. I may even need a therapist specializing in gender and sexuality if such a thing exists around here for my specific problem.

Yes, the relationship is a small sanctuary, and here is still the problem that's on my mind - is there any way to say that without sounding like a total as*hole? Is there something else behind the words when people say these things that I don't understand?

Sometimes I wonder if I'm cut out for relationships, after all. I'm glad to be sleeping alone tonight.

Make an analogy that he' just ONE PILLAR supporting the structure that is you, and to be properly supported you need additional pillars (friends, families, etc), so just because you have one, doesn't mean that the others should be disregarded or that they have less value, being human means engaging other people and not just one.

If this guy has problems with you wanting a social life OUTSIDE the relationship, he is probably crazy and your relationship is extremely unhealthy and you need to get out of it. This is how emotionally (and sometimes physically) abusive relationships start. Ascertain that he's not got ANY problem whatsoever with not being good enough (because HE IS NOT good enough to substitute for an entire real social life), and don't worry about hurting his feelings or seeming overly aggressive about this because it is very important and if he has issues with it HE shouldn't be dating.

He is not a pillar. Friends, family, etc. are pillars but HE is just a little unnecessary add-on. Relationships are NOT necessary or required...they're great to have and can be very fulfilling, but they're not a NEED and if that relationship is your only form of social life and he's trying to keep it that way he's TRAPPING you so that you'll need him. It may not seem very bad at first, but that's how manipulative people do...they sneak things in there so that the crazy doesn't SEEM crazy.

I don't mean to freak you out or overreact, but the last person I dated started out like this, with us sharing EVERYTHING and the relationship becoming my only form of social life, and he ended up doing a lot of messed up stuff to me, including trying to kill me. I may be biased against dating in general, but other relationships like this have also gone terribly wrong and not all dating HAS to be unhealthy like this.

No, and I can tell when a relationship is like that. I hesitate to ask for input on Internet forums because the smallest thing in a heated one-sided account becomes oh dear god abuse run before you die. Like anyone here has never said or done something that could be blown wildly out of context if strangers heard it from an angry significant other. I haven't said that I'm not to have outside support or contact, just that I don't fit in and he keeps bringing up that I fit in with him while I'm trying to talk.

He says he understands that, unlike him, I do need an actual sense of belonging instead of books and machines despite not being a traditionally social person, but inevitably conversations about belonging turn to our relationship. Maybe it's because he doesn't really desire close friendships and was doing fine without a relationship.

Could you be more specific? I'm having a hard time understanding exactly what you mean, and I want to help. To me, it sounded like this:

Him-You always have me (trying to comfort you)
You-I know I have you, but being in this relationship isn't enough for me to feel like I belong. I need more social contact than just with you.

Pretty much, with multiple attempts on his end to use that as a comfort. I know it's well-intended, but hearing it again and again just makes it hard to focus on what I'm struggling with instead of what's already right.

I do have social contact, but I don't want a lot of close relationships. It's easy for me to become overexposed to the emotions and demands of others, especially in close, two-way relationships. I become sick if there are many people reaching out to me emotionally and requiring specific behaviors from me outside of work or educational contexts.

What I miss is a sense of belonging and places I'm happy to invest in, which is separate from social contact in itself.

Last edited by ReverieMe on 06 May 2014, 2:34 am, edited 1 time in total.

I would say this:

"I know your intentions are to be helpful, but it's not helping my problem directly. Perhaps I just wanted someone to listen and validate my complaints as real, not to be told that it's OK because we are in a relationship. I'm grateful for you trying to help, but you saying 'insert what you view as not helpful' is actually making me feel worse because it's as if I'm supposed to forget about my problem because we are together. My mind isn't working like that."

From there, I would tell him how he CAN help. Or, tell him a list of things that he is saying that is upsetting you. Pretty much if you need a hug, if you need to be validated, if you need him to help you find a place that you feel like you belong, you should tell him this.

Did you have previous places that you felt you belonged to? What happened to those places?

OH! You mean he will ask "aren't I enough"?

Well, now I made sense of this. He wants to fulfill all of your needs, but he cannot. Humans sometimes need more than just one person. You need a place of belonging outside of the relationship. You appreciate him, but it's not enough, because he can't possibly be expected to fulfill all of your needs. This is not the way humans work. This has nothing to do with him or if he is not trying, no.


I would add "You are enough when we are speaking about you being my boyfriend. I'm speaking of things like a sense of belonging with friends. You can be my everything romantically, but humans have other needs besides romance. So yes, you are enough when we are speaking about you being my boyfriend, but you are not enough to fulfill all of my social needs, just the same as many other people feel about others. Humans need a lot of support, and you are not burdened with being all of it."

He probably feels like the reason you feel a lack of belonging is because he is not providing it for you. Heh. I did this to my husband (expected him to be everything) but he couldn't take it and told me I need other supports. It seems like your boyfriend thought how I did.

I do think something like that would help, and it's hard to think in the moment. He's not much better at telling when someone needs a hug and when someone needs to talk than I am, though. Whether our mutual separation from the norm is an overall strength or weakness for us, I can't say.



Just time. I'm no longer employed in that position or I lost interest in the hobby, and when I came back it was a crowd of new faces with a new way of doing things. People moved away to warmer states and started new lives. There were a few forums which simply disappeared altogether with time.

I've found several potential replacements now that it's gotten bad, but it takes a very long time for me to integrate into someplace new (if I stay). Whether it's because a place is so busy or because I don't tend have the same style of socializing that others do. Being unusual in general doesn't help when it comes to not feeling like an outsider.

I think bleh12345 has some good advice.

I would ask him what he thinks will happen if he's not 'enough'. I would presume it's something that worries him (something like losing you), and if he actually thinks about it and you can both understand it better it may reassure him. Because no-one is 'enough' for anyone, not in the sense here.