What do I even need in a relationship?

Due to a given situation I´ve recently been faced with the question of `What do I even want and need in a relationship?´. Now you would think that since I have been trying dating for a while and became stable enough mentally and emotionally to also actually enter a relationship, I would know the answer(s) t this question. However, I never thought about it too deeply until now. I know I want to feel safe with a person and that I want to be accepted as myself, but I haven´t ever thought about what qualities a person must possess to give me the feeling of safety and acceptance. And what more do I need? 

I guess I´m writing this only to get myself to think a little and maybe come up with something. I feel safe with someone when I am accepted by them. Safety to me also means a certain feeling of being at ease and feeling peaceful with a person. My head hardly ever shuts up and overthinking and (over)analyzing everyone and everything is a daily thing for me I have little control over. It usually only stops once I´m doing something that catches and keeps my focus. Working is one of those things for example or binge reading a new comic I´ve found. Now the point here is that I used to tell myself my head would shut off this constant string of thoughts with some people I used to date or be with. However most of the time looking back it´s just that I was with people who kept me intrigued and entertained while doing something, but I wasn´t actually able to shut off my head and feel relaxed with them once we weren´t actively doing something. Now the last person I dated however was able to give me that exact sense of peace and comfort to make me somehow not constantly overthink and get lost in thoughts when we were just cuddling or falling asleep for example. I know that´s something I need in a relationship, just someone who is able to ease my mind just by being there. I will probably write another post about what I liked about this person specifically because I do wanna be able to pinpoint that more for myself. After all, this person is the reason I´m even sitting here trying to figure such things out in the first place. 

I also wanna be able to talk to someone I´m dating. That means 2 separate things for me personally: 1) Communication with the person and 2) sharing interests. Starting with the latter, I of course want to have some common interests with whoever I´m dating, but I also want to be able to tell them about whatever topic is on my mind at the moment. I want someone who will not turn me down uninterested when I´m telling them how I fell into a research hole and what I found. On the other hand, I also want that person to share their thoughts and daily findings with me a la Óh you read up about this really random but special type of beetle? Yes please tell me about it!´. Now just because my usual interests don´t include beetle research doesn´t mean I don´t want to know about random new things, especially if my partner likes them. Of course not all interests and such will be shared by both parties all the time, but I want someone who is eager to listen to me and my thoughts as well as generally interested in learning about new things or experiencing them. I guess that also means I´d want someone who will go out adventuring with me at least from time to time, since I do like doing that but hardly ever do so alone because I don´t have a motivation to just do such stuff by myself. Adventuring doesn´t have to mean big things either, just driving to a different place, going out to a new restaurant or even going for a walk somewhere nice new or interesting would be a nice little daily adventure. On that note I also would like to just spend a weekend in with a partner though. Not always but sometimes, especially when I spend my week running down my social battery levels. Guess that kinda brings me to the other part I mentioned, aka communication. I still have to figure out some things about myself and how I communicate but mos to all this means that I want someone who will be able to openly and honestly talk to me and vice versa. I´m afraid to mention problems I´m having when it comes to problems I have with or including the person I´m dating. Now thankfully I´m not as bad as I used to be and actually talk about such issues, but sometimes I need a little time to figure myself and my feelings out or think about how to start talking about such complicated topics. For me that means rn I´m fine with it if my partner were to take a bit of time to do that as well if they needed that, but I do want to hear about problems and if they involve me, I want to be talked to and involved in the process. I want honesty. I want a partner to be honest towards me and towards themselves, even if it´s uncomfortable or painful. I recently found out that I am able to have uncomfortable thought sessions with myself and that they´re well worth having. I guess honesty and the effort to talk to me are things I highly value. I often need to ask clarifying questions and honestly I´d do well in asking them even more often than I do, rather than just silently assuming I kinda understood what the person talking to me means. However I also know that this can be rather exhausting for the other person. Especially combined with my overthinking and overanalyzing. 

Now that makes me think I need someone who isn´t afraid of my overanalyzing and not constantly exhausted by my overthinking. I have a tendency to find people´s issues and weaknesses, quite often so because I automatically analyze people, so I tend to either scare away or offend people with that I guess. As a social worker it´s a pretty useful skill to have since it´s my job to help people deal with their shit. It´s also useful cause more often than not it helps me get a deeper understanding of a person and why they (might) do the things they do. So the analyzing does serve it´s purpose, but as I mentioned, I guess it can scare people away too. Who would like to be either seen through or have assumptions made about them and their issues? I know I learned to analyze people and read their moods as a survival mechanism, it´s just that I don´t think about that fact much and I don´t think it´s something I can really turn off. And of course none of this is helped by the fact that I get hyperfocuses on people I date and then I don´t only think about them more, but I also crave to get to know more information about them. However, while all of that must sound as if I´m some obviously obsessive person, I don´t show this stuff much unless I get anxious or am talking to the person in question trying to help them with something. Most of the time, I wish I could mention those little things I like and think about more, but I don´t do it much. Not only because it could scare a person but also because I would have to make myself vulnerable by admitting how much I think of the person. And ontop of all that, I may overanalyze and overthink, but I am also somehow bad at reading social cues or understand it when someone flirts with me or is being affectionate with me in a non-physical way and I am easily scared to ask for things like affection.

This weird ass paradox of my abilities is rather shitty sometimes, not gonna lie. It means I need someone who is willing and able to openly and very directly show me their affections. I literally need people to tell me straight forward what they mean or think sometimes. Not always but sometimes. That kinda rolls me back around to honesty but adds the point of directness. 

I also want someone who can make me laugh and who I can be silly and impulsive with. That is especially needed when I´m down or spiraling in my own thoughts again. It helps to have someone give me an impulse that pulls me out of such spiraling and maybe even make things so silly that I can´t help but laugh. 

Through all of that I also need stability though. Much as I suck at sticking to routines (unless they´re forced upon me like a job), I need them to a certain degree to function. I need someone who I know is going to be able to deal with it somehow when I get overstimulated, triggered or just sad. obviously it makes sense to  figure out how to help/ support someone in such a situation together before stuff happens or at least as a result of it afterwards. I just want to feel like I am enough and not too much. I want to be able to know that when I make plans with someone these plans are kept up. I want to be able to rely on someone. I hardly do that and it scares me to rely on people, but I need the stability and safety to know I can do that if I need to. 

I want to be able to trust someone I´m dating. I need to know that when they say one thing, they don´t mean the other and they will keep the promises they made towards me.

I want someone to openly show me their affection. I want someone who will tell me they love me when they do and when they think it. I want someone who isn´t afraid or uncomfortable to hold my hand or dance with me in public, or kiss me. I don´t need those things all the time, but I want someone who at least every now and then will openly show their affection towards me without being afraid to do so. I want those little touches in private that show me the person wants to be close to me. I want someone who will tell me when they like my outfit or my hair or whatever. I just want someone not to hide their affections but to show them and vocalize them to whatever degree they can and we both feel comfortable with. 

I want to be prioritized. Now of course that doesn´t mean I want the person all for myself all the time or that I would hold it against them if they couldn´t do that for some reason. I´m not a person to forbid someone from seeing friends, from traveling or taking the spontaneous chance to have a good time. I want my partner to have a fulfilling life, whether that´s regarding experiences or social stuff. I´d love for my partner to have a wide network of support so they don´t have to feel alone when there´s something I cannot help them with when they need the help. But beyond all of that, I still want to know that I am a person of priority for the person I am dating. 

And I want someone who will be able to make compromises for me if it´s needed. I´m more than willing to talk about most everything and figure out ways to make things work out as best as possible for all involved parties, but I also don´t want to keep taking the backseat anymore. I have such a tendency to people please that it is hard for me to even vocalize and talk about my needs in the first place, let alone ask for things. So I want to know that I can ask for things and have my feelings and needs taken into consideration instead of keeping up the habit of putting myself last. I´m working on my communication and my anxiety and I have made progress and kept it up, but I still need support in having my needs and feelings heard, validated and supported sometimes and I would like a partner who is willing and able to do that. I´m still willing to compromise as long as I am not compromising my own needs, mental or physical health. 

I´m honestly surprised I was able to write this much, especially since I started with hardly being able to think of anything specific I want or need in a long term romantic relationship. I´m sure there´s some more I haven´t thought of yet, but still. Most of all I am surprised that I was able to actually write in a demanding way. At least I feel like I must have sounded pretty demanding so far, but I feel good about that for once. As I mentioned, I am hardly someone who will to ask for things in my private life unless I feel really really comfortable with the person I´m talking to, so the fact that I was able to make demands for what I would want to have in a relationship in any type of way is new. I´m exhausted but I´m glad to have this out of my head and written down. 

I guess writing things to figure them out is helpful to me and therefore a habit I should try to upkeep. I don´t know how sure I am about my ability to actually do that, but for now it feels good to have it out, thought about and that it feels like I am heard somewhere somehow. 

Love, Rox