Thank you very much, Innerzone! I’ve nearly always been anxious in relationships, most of them were long or semi long distance and this one was very much in person, so it was much more ramped up, so to speak.
I realised most of my feelings of attraction (the initial crush) had disappeared soon after we started dating, but did feel it come back in short lived moments. I definitely felt that obligation and fear. Not of dumping him and being alone, I felt guilty about wanting to but I’m not afraid of being single. It was more, I don’t know what I’m doing, I was afraid of committing myself too but didn’t realise it then. He said I can see you for a whole week when I had annual leave once, I just recoiled inside lol.

I do relate to the conditioning, even if I don’t always “obey” if that makes sense. I know my mum was annoyed when I hinted I was going to split with him (as she had been when I decided I was done seeing another guy of the same name a few years before - never dated but he was starting to show he wasn’t a nice person either by then). It shouldn’t be up to her, but it still helped keep me with him longer than I should have. I just let her have her say when it was over but didn’t absorb it.
I’m totally free of him, yes! We spoke for a few months after but I faded out of his life as quickly as I could.
I still need to work on self esteem, but I did very quickly start doing better after I split up with him. Still lots of work to do, but I’m starting to see more clearly what I need from a therapist now.
Thanks again, glad I found this site 😊