I'm 23 and I recently came out of the closet earlier this year (only to one friend, but still). Tried my hand on online dating, been seeing this guy for 5 months now. Everything's going well and we enjoy each other's company (we do video calls every night while studying-- we're both postgraduate students).

One thing I've noticed is how badly my anxiety is robbing me of the usual feeling of happiness and infatuation.

This is my first time in the dating scene, and everything I'm doing here, I'm doing in the dark. I'm 23 and I haven't had any similar past experiences. This means that all that high-school-hormones shit you're supposed to feel with your first love--butterflies, obsession, being clingy, etc.--is yet to outgrow me. On the other hand, he's had his share of past experiences, so dating for him feels casual.

Now the trouble is mixing all these feelings with anxiety. Some days I keep on overthinking every possible bad scenarios, some days I read too much between his words and assume the worst, some days I "fall out of love", some days I think I could do better than him, some days I think he's growing tired of me, some days I feel people will judge us (we live in a conservative country that only tolerates gay people), some days I don't feel butterflies anymore--I feel fear. And then those days subside, then I feel happy again.

My anxiety attacks get so bad sometimes that I skip class altogether for days on end. I spend nights plagued by these thoughts and sometimes I cry myself to sleep. All of these prompted me to start getting help-- I've been reading self-help books on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, and I have a psychiatrist appointment next month. He doesn't know about all this yet. I plan on telling him once we meet personally.

Has anyone else experienced anything similar? Any tips on how to overcome this? Perhaps a mantra or a thought process to get me through while I'm waiting for things to get better? I like him too much for all of this to go to waste just because of a stupid brain thing.

Thanks and cheers!