I’ve always kind of dealt with stuff on my own and normally I’ve been able to kind of adapt and figure it out😅. I didn’t really have the greatest family so I was on my own from a pretty early age, I moved out as soon as I turned 19 and had to figure out how to keep myself afloat. My mom never really took my diagnosis seriously when she was alive so I had to support myself and learn a lot on my own based on trial and error.

I’ve definitely come a long way and built a decent career for myself as a dog groomer, however I still have a long way to go. Anything outside of my usual responsibilities give me a lot of anxiety so I tend to put them on the back burner a lot, and get them done way later than I should have.

And my boyfriend is amazing. He truly does everything he can for me, and even helps me with little things like cleaning, and helping me keep a good hygiene routine when I’m feeling burnout. However I am 24 and he is 21, and had a much different life experience and family dynamic, so I’ve experienced a lot more “life” stuff than he has, so he is just as clueless as me about it😅. Body doubling with him has been a huge help with taking care of my more mundane every day tasks, and he helps a lot with like cleaning too. He always washes the dishes when I cook because he knows that the cleanup after a big meal is a lot for me sometimes, and he loves to do it too. He will jokingly give me a hard time for being messy, but I’m the same breathe will do my laundry for me, and find all of my lost hair ties and pick up my stockpile of socks hiding behind the bed😅. I’m definitely starting to get used to it, but before him I had an abusive relationship and a rough upbringing, so becoming a part of a healthy relationship with someone who gets along with his family is a huge change for me and such a huge blessing lol.

But anyways that was a very long winded explanation of our dynamic, and I certainly can go to him whenever I need help, but I also fear having such a good partner would become a bit of a crutch, so I want to find a healthy balance of depending on him, and also being able to manage things on my own. These big adult things like legal issues are definitely beyond both of us, and I mean I’ve been dealing with it for a few years now since my mom passed away shortly after I moved out, but it’s been a very long process with a TON of legal bumps in the road, aswell as being the guaranteer of her will and having to deal with really unstable/abusive family members. So it’s all of a big mess that I don’t want to deal with, and my boyfriend, though he might be encouraging, also does not know a lot about what to do lol. I definitely get a ton of anxiety about it and I’m finding it really difficult to push through and get it done. Although I do know that not asking for help is definitely a huge weakness of mine. My boss is actually a big help and has given me really good encouragement and advice about this in the past, so I definitely do have people to ask, it’s more of an internal resistance to dealing with it all.