Caring for friendships and relationships can be a difficult task in college, even with no other external factors added into the mix. However, having a friend or partner who deals with anxiety can make maintaining that friendship even harder. People who deal with anxiety often have to work twice as hard to maintain a friendship or relationship because anxiety causes you to worry and stress about things that most people don't stress about. Anxiety can causes you to stress about the state of your friendship or relationship even when there is no conflict going on in the relationship. Anxiety can be so consuming that it can ruin relationships, especially if the person dealing with anxiety doesn't feel loved or supported. Anxiety can also cause a person a build of stress and worry that it becomes very hard for a person to carry out simple tasks, such as studying for a test coming up, hanging out with friends, or even getting out of bed in the morning.
For myself, I have dealt with anxiety most of my life and it has been very challenging explaining to people who do not deal with anxiety why it is so tough to get myself out of bed in the morning when I'm feeling anxious. Anxiety is often the reason why I have sleepless nights; I'll be up over-thinking specific comments made towards me and allowing the negative ones to consume me. Anxiety is the voice in the back of my head telling me that everyone hates me and that I shouldn't bother talking to my friends because they dislike me. Anxiety has caused me to cancel plans last minute because I'm so exhausted by my anxiety and I'm labeled as "flaky", which makes me stress even more. Talking to friends who have dealt with anxiety, they have had similar experiences as me when it comes to friendships and relationships. To be frank, sometimes the person dealing with anxiety may have no idea why they are anxious; sometimes anxiety does not have target, it simply wants you to feel stressed and worried about the future in general. Anxiety can get so overwhelming that it can cause the person dealing with anxiety to destroy friendships and relationships, often because they are so worried about the friendship falling apart that they make it hard to let their guard down and let go of the idea of control.
Knowing how consuming anxiety can be to a person is important, but it is also important to know that it can be overcome. When loving someone with anxiety, it is important to make that person feel supported and push them to be the best version of themselves as they can, but not to the point where you are pushing them to the point where they feel uncomfortable. For myself, anxiety often makes me feel like a burden and I'm often too embarrassed to ask for help and support from my loved ones. Loving someone with anxiety can be difficult because the thoughts in their head can absorb so much of their energy that they cannot put energy into anything else. This is where you need to be a patient. The person dealing with anxiety isn't maliciously trying to shut you out, it just often seems like a way to guard themselves from getting hurt again.
Sometimes in moments of frustration, one can say something that they often don't mean. However, when loving someone with anxiety, be mindful that if you say something hurtful, the person dealing with anxiety with not only remember it, but will overanalyze it to the point where they create a sea of hurt. I have had friends who have told me to stop acting like a victim and get over my anxiety; comments like this have been engrained in my mind for years. I would argue that language is very important when loving someone with anxiety because words in general hurt, but words for someone with anxiety can keep them up at night with a worrisome mind.
The most important thing to remember when loving someone with anxiety is that a person may have anxiety, but anxiety does not have them. They may have anxiety, but they are able to overcome anxiety with the proper love and support.
