Relationship anxiety out of control

Hey, I have found this forum while trying to research ways to help myself with some phobias I have. I would very much appreciate feedback on this, even though it will be rather lengthy. My phobia is to commit myself to a girl and I very much would like to but my anxiety goes absolutely berserk and destroys any self-confidence I have.

My first actual romanctic relationship was when I was a senior in high school, growing up I only fantasized about dating girls and never had the guts to try to go for them. Before my first girlfriend, I had two romantic interests but I was way too anxious on what to do to move forward that I just did nothing and they left. My whole relationship was just an anxious nightmare, I was boyfriend number 7 and she was my first girlfriend so I was psyched out constantly on if she was going to leave me for someone better, like she has in the past. Sex was scary for me because I was afraid I was going to do terrible and she would leave me for someone better because I had no experience. As it may be predicted, my insecurities and anxieties led to the end of our relationship after 8 months. Realizing my mistakes and that I caused it, instead of biting the bullet and dealing with the emotions and fixing my anxiety, I let it pull me into the depths. I had no self-confidence and drowned in the ocean of my own self pity and the fact that I wasn’t good enough. I never wanted to date again and I fell very hard into self-gratification.

As the years went on, I have had numerous occasions where I hooked up with girls and each was tainted by my old thinking, that I wasn’t going to please them properly and that I wasn’t going to do a good enough job with them, which I later realized was that I have some intense performance anxiety. My libido was very low because I was too worked up about not being able to perform. Throughout all of these, I was fine with being with them for only one night and didn’t want to see them after, for fear of them or me attaching emotions.

The initial breakup was over three years ago and nowadays I have very beautiful women come to me with interest to date, and I am terrified. I can’t help but think that they will leave me after I get emotionally invested or that they will lose interest after I show that I have no sexual prowess. I want to have a girlfriend for a long time but every time I’m in a setting where I’m by a girl with romantic interests, I completely panic and make myself look ridiculous. I am currently in a reboot to bring my libido back to normal and eating well and excerising.

I guess I spilled my guts like this in a Hail Mary attempt to gain a bit more knowledge on coping and beating this type of intimacy anxiety. Anyone who has had similar experiences of no self-confidence in relationships, I would be honored and grateful to receive any bits of advice or tips to help me work through this.

Hello guy: I see this is your first post here on PC. So... welcome to PsychCentral! I hope you find PC to be of benefit.

I'm sorry I can't really comment with regard to your concerns. Here are links to 2 articles, from PsychCentral's archives, on the subject of relationship anxiety, the first by our host Dr. John Grohol, Psy.D.:

What is Commitment Phobia & Relationship Anxiety?

How To Overcome Your Fear Of Commitment

And then here are links to 2 articles on the subject of avoidant personaliy disorder which may also be of interest:

Avoidant Personality Disorder

Avoidant Personality Disorder Treatment

You may also be interested in taking some of the quizzes & tests which are available here on PC:

Psychological Quizzes and Tests