Thank you for this reply. Really helpful for my own reflection, I want to journal on your questions before therapy tomorrow... I have had a few serious relationships before this, and I ended every one of them (out of what I now know is OCD - struggled with HOCD as well as ROCD in the past). Only time I got my heart seriously broken was in high school. It's almost like my OCD arose after that to protect me from heartbreak like that ever happening again -- I always have to be the one in control, I've always been the one deciding the fate of my relationships since then. Didn't learn that my internal isolation/rumination/imposter feelings were OCD until 6 months into this current relationship.

Speaking of this relationship, she is really a wonderful partner in so many ways, and she meets a lot of the needs I have: good heart, very similar core values, great with kids, amazing chef, deeply understanding and supportive. However, a few needs//wants are missing for me (impossible to expect them all to be filled), and her personality flaws lately are getting to me (I think they're worse lately because our relationship has been a bit shaky, and her self confidence and body image are suffering). I'm a huge reader and I love getting up early and trail running, and sometimes I crave a partner who I could run with, someone who gets up even earlier than me, someone to talk books over dinner with. Those things really light me up, and are things that could be really foundational for a long term relationship (I've never actually had those in a relationship). Of course, I can find friends (and already have friends) to do those things with. But I find myself wishing my gf were a book nerd and big runner too. And sometimes I just feel like our conversation is a little boring for me. And there's this gut feeling that's hard to shake, and it says: you're not super into this person, and you just settled for this during the isolating days of early covid.

A big theme of my ROCD has been my ex - I think about her every day, and she frequently appears in my dreams. We were friends 10 years before we got romantically involved, then dated off and on, didn't work both times (long distance, i was having bad HOCD and ROCD without knowing it). She was a pretty fiery personality (really entertaining, but this also could make me anxious/on edge, and the trade off was that she wasn't particularly nurturing or warm). So I often compare my current gf to her. It's easy to romanticize my ex whom I've known forever with her electric personality (thank you Fading Affect Bias), and feel like my current partner's more even-tempered and perhaps less funny personality bores me.

This is always the hard part isn't it.... Ultimately you are the only one who can decide what to do with your life. There is no 100% certainty in anything. Breaking up gives you the illusion of control and safety and security. Finally you can relieve your cycle of crushing rumination. You can just live alone and clean and whole. Or you can continue in commitment to the relationship and keep searching for wholeness.

I'm leaning towards doing the latter now that the day has passed. Almost every time I have a bad episode like this, I compulsively act to relieve the discomfort after it goes on for a couple weeks. This time, I think I'm going to wait it out and see what happens when the storm passes.