Caroline* came to see me with one of the more common problems that plague people in our modern era – difficulties with romance and dating. She was a young woman in her early 30s who said she had always found it difficult to find a man she felt connected to. She’d had one long-term relationship in her early 20s but had otherwise been single despite trying online dating and many dating events. Many of her friends were partnered up, and her best friend had just become engaged, resulting in a cascade of anxiety for Caroline, a fear that she was defective in some way and would miss out on milestones in life.

“I can’t stop thinking about the things that might be wrong with me. I’m even thinking of taking Ozempic and getting a boob job,” she said, anxiously prodding at a stomach that appeared to be a perfectly normal size to me.

She felt so overwhelmed by her lack of success in dating that she was slowly withdrawing from the activities that usually brought her joy, in favour of spending most of her time swiping on dating apps. However, she said that in the past this usually alternated with periods of intense apathy about dating because of the poor behaviour she had encountered, and difficulties........

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