4 Crucial Things To Remember If You Love An Overthinker

Here are four crucial things to remember if you love an overthinker.

1. No, we can’t “just forget about it.”

Now, this isn’t to say we aren’t going to work on our anxiety, we will and we are! But simply dismissing what we’re worried about and instructing us to “just forget about it” isn’t going to make the fears go away either. It will just make us feel worse and even more misunderstood than we already do.

While you don’t have to validate the fears themselves, you can validate the experience. For example, saying something like, “I know this is hard to navigate, but I am here for you,” will bring us more comfort than you’ll ever understand.

2. We overthink because we care so much.

Because we don’t want to lose you. We often overthink how something we said or did could have come across, and how it could push you away and make you leave us. We overthink to try and figure out how we can make it up to you and make you stay.

3. We overthink as a means of self-protection.

Sometimes when we overthink, it may be about something you said or did. For example, if your energy was different one day or if you were short via text another.

We read too much into every single interaction as a means of self-protection because of the bad relationships we have had in the past. We operate on the assumption that we can handle the worst case scenario better if we plan accordingly. Of course, this doesn’t really work, but we can’t help but try to fix before it all goes wrong anyway.

4. We know it can be frustrating, and we’re sorry.

We know the worrying and constant need for reassurance can be tiring. It annoys us so we can’t even begin to imagine how it feels being on the outside looking in. Please know that we are working hard to manage our overthinking and we appreciate your support.

Thank you for being patient and sticking around.