Read my (29F) boyfriend’s (32M) anxious thoughts and now I’m doubting everything.
My boyfriend (31M) and I (29F) have been together for 9 months and living together for 3. Overall, our relationship feels genuinely great. We have fun together, feel very comfortable around each other, and consistently show love through actions and care. I can honestly say I’ve never felt this loved in a relationship before.
That said, my last boyfriend blindsided me with a breakup completely out of nowhere, so even when things are good, I carry a lot of anxiety about it happening again.
Today, I was taking out the recycling and noticed some handwritten pages torn out of a notebook. I was nosey and read them, realizing they were journal pages my boyfriend had thrown away (not sure if he was trying to get rid of them so I wouldn’t see or if they didn’t feel relevant any more). I know I probably shouldn’t have read them, and now I’m conflicted because I found something very personal.
The entry was dated before he asked me to move in with him (which happened around 6 months into dating — fast for both of us). It looked like an anxious brain dump. He wrote about how amazing I am, how much I add to his life, and how he had no actual reason to doubt me. But he also said despite that, he had this “unknown feeling” inside him that made him question the relationship and if he should take this step.
He wrote that part of him wondered if he should break up with me before we moved in “to avoid the hurt of a terrible breakup down the line” and had thought about this earlier in our relationship too. He said he was scared of eventually going through something that would feel like a divorce and wondered if ending things earlier would hurt less than being devastated later. He also mentioned that moving in felt very permanent to him, almost marriage-level serious.
At the same time, he repeatedly said he loved me and believed these fears were coming from his own issues and “looking for something that isn’t there,” not from me. He also referenced a very painful past breakup and fear of repeating old patterns. Another thing that stood out was him saying I’m different from the type of women he usually dated (I’m more feminine/girly and he’s very sporty and used to dating more low-maintenance/no-makeup types), and that the unfamiliarity scared him. He said he worried our views on this could cause fights and was also worried my adhd could cause me to be a messy partner( he also noted this was not something he had seen, just feared).
What’s confusing me is that despite all these fears, he was still the one who asked me to move in. Since then, our relationship has honestly felt stable, loving, and close.
Now I’m spiraling a bit wondering:
Are doubts/fears before a major relationship milestone like moving in normal? It hurt to have him question our compatibility and I’m worried he just moved in so he wouldn’t hurt me.
Does this sound more like commitment anxiety from someone who’s been hurt before, or genuine doubts about the relationship?
And do I bring this up, knowing I found it by reading something out of the trash?
I know journal entries are often just raw thoughts and fears, not final conclusions. But because of my past experience with being blindsided, this really shook me.