This disorder could very well ruin your relationship

Are you that jealous partner, but don’t really want to be? Do you constantly live in fear when your lover is out, afraid that he/she will cheat, even though you know it’s irrational and that you ruin your own evening like this? In short: do you have unpleasant thoughts about your relationship that you are not happy with, but can’t seem to get out of your head? Your surroundings probably also say that you shouldn’t make a fuss and that you’re worrying about nothing, but it still lingers in the back of your mind.

Don’t worry, you’re not crazy. Sometimes there’s really nothing to be done about these kinds of thoughts and you shouldn’t see them as irrationalities, but for what they are: obsessive thoughts. They can be part of an Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and as someone who has dealt with it my whole life, I can tell you: it’s quite exhausting.

Therapists have now found a sort of offshoot when it comes to this disorder, namely Relational Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, which specifically deals with these kinds of obsessive thoughts about your relationship.

According to psychologist Susan Albers, it may be that you seek and/or ask for extreme amounts of reassurance, while it’s never good enough for you. Additionally, you tend to get stuck in your own thoughts and there’s a good chance it will get worse.

‘ROCS can be very toxic and harmful to relationships, especially when you are with someone you genuinely care about. It really affects how someone functions from day to day. They can become somewhat paralyzed by these obsessive thoughts, which can be very overwhelming and stressful.’

Important to know: there is no official diagnosis for ROCS, but there is for OCD. And psychologists can absolutely help you with that. So if this sounds a bit too familiar to you, know that there is really nothing wrong with you and that you can definitely do something about it.

Image: Netflix