When anxiety starts to strain your relationship

Can anxiety damage a relationship?

It can put real strain on one, mostly through the patterns it creates rather than through anything either person intends. The National Institute of Mental Health notes that anxiety symptoms can interfere with daily life and routine activities, including relationships. When one person is anxious much of the time, both people end up living with it.

That strain is not a verdict on the relationship. Many couples find that once anxiety is named and understood, it becomes something they face together instead of something that keeps coming between them. Getting help is often the turning point, whether that help is for one person or for both.

How anxiety tends to show up between partners

Every couple is different, but these patterns come up again and again when anxiety is part of a relationship:

• Reassurance-seeking: asking the same questions many times, such as are you angry with me, are we all right, did you lock the door. Each answer helps for a moment, then the question returns.
• Irritability and a short fuse, because a mind on high alert has less patience for small frustrations.
• Avoidance: canceling dinners, skipping church or family events, or not wanting a partner to travel, which can leave the other person feeling hemmed in.
• Accommodation: the calmer partner quietly takes over driving, phone calls, money or social plans to keep the peace. It feels kind, and it can also let the anxiety grow.
• Distance: the anxious partner withdraws to cope, and the other reads it as rejection.
• Sleep and intimacy suffer, because anxiety rarely leaves room for rest or closeness.

Flooding and shutting down in arguments

The Gottman Institute, founded by relationship researchers John and Julie Gottman, describes a pattern it calls stonewalling, in which one partner withdraws from a conflict, shuts down and stops responding. In the Gottman account, stonewalling is often the result of feeling physiologically flooded: the heart is racing and the body is so stirred up that a calm discussion is not possible in that moment.

For someone who already lives with anxiety, that flooded state can arrive quickly. It helps both partners to recognize it for what it is, take a real break, and come back to the conversation once the body has settled. Couples counseling often works on exactly this. The couples counseling in Tryon and Polk County page describes that work in more detail.

Small-town pressures on a couple

In Tryon, Columbus, Saluda or Landrum, a couple's friends are often the same friends, the same church and the same neighbors. That can make it hard for either person to talk to anyone about what is happening at home, so the strain stays bottled up. It can also make the anxious partner more worried about appearances, which adds a layer of pressure to every social event.

A counselor is one of the few people you can talk to who is not part of that shared circle. The pillar page on anxiety and privacy in a small town covers how confidentiality works, including what happens if you see your counselor around town.

Individual or couples counseling?

There is no single right answer. A few rough guides:

• If the anxiety came first and spills into the relationship, individual counseling for the anxious partner is often a good starting point.
• If the anxiety and the relationship problems feed each other, couples counseling can address the patterns between you.
• If only one of you is ready, start there. The other partner can join later if you both agree.
• If the anxiety is about the relationship itself, for example after an affair, see infidelity recovery for foothills couples.

How Laura can help

Laura Bass is a psychotherapist who works with adults in individual counseling, couples counseling and infidelity counseling, and anxiety is among the concerns she lists. That combination means the anxiety and the relationship can both be on the table, in whatever setting suits you. Her main practice is in Charlotte, and she has a part-time office at The Healing Cottage in Columbus.

She works with the whole person, mind, body and spirit, and clients choose what to include. She does not promise particular results, and no honest counselor will. If you are unsure whether to come alone or together, say so when you get in touch and talk it through.

Call 704-706-3264 or use the contact page, and ask which days she is in Columbus. Your first anxiety counseling session explains what the first appointment covers, and reaching out discreetly helps if you would rather not tell your partner yet.

If anxiety or conflict at home turns into a crisis, call or text 988 at any hour, or call Vaya Health's crisis line for Polk County at 1-800-849-6127. If anyone is in immediate danger, call 911.

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