Hi,

First of all I got to tell you that English is my second language but I'll try my best.

I am 26, doing my master's degree and love my field (Theatre) so everything seems fine about intellectual skills.
However, when it comes to social situations I feel like I've got an inner impulse to fail. I've got a couple of friends who know me well and I feel understood while interacting with them. But when it comes to my professional life and relationship with my boyfriend, I act so weird. I don't know what happened to me but I'm too timid when I talk to my professors who are really friendly to us, and all the other students feel free. I wasn't like that before. Beside that I totally become a different person when I'm with my boyfriend. I respect him too much and he's been criticizing me a lot so this may be a reason. Even though I know what to say, I just can't. And worse than that, I choose the exact words to make him think I'm as silly as he thinks. This is driving me mad.

I really know what to say or do, but when I'm with him I just can't. I may be loving this inside and this seems like a disorder. Something, maybe my subconscious forces me to look like the fool he thinks I am. I give him the opportunity to accuse and. I regret what I say right after leaving the room. I make my mind about something and say the exact opposite when he calls me. Even my speaking voice changes and I'm aware of this. This very situation might be related to my attitudes in academy too because he's also a student there and everyone respects him a lot. He's a writer and even professors admire him and they're friends with him. I'm too oppressed. I wouldn't be this annoyed if I really were what I look like. But I'm aware of everything and it's killing me.

I tried to disguise as someone else and wrote my boyfriend on Facebook. I told him I'm an academician from abroad and we wrote each other in another language and guess what, he became very impressed. He found me so intellectual, so smart, and he was so respectful. Even I felt more like myself behind that persona.

I don't know what to do, please help me.

To begin with, your English is very, very good. Here in the U.S. there are people born and raised here that aren't as good at English as you are.

I'm just guessing here, but it sounds like you're intimidated by him. You may be unaware of this, but it's as if you feel like he is your intellectual superior and that makes you nervous. When you try to be his equal you stumble on yourself. In other words, you are trying too hard. You stated that he is well "respected". That's great, but aren't you respected too? I imagine you are. You are well-read, intelligent, concerned about your own well-being as well as the well-being of others.

You need to get comfortable being yourself in any given situation. Otherwise you're insincere (a fake). You're better than that. You have something inside of you that no one else has. It might be a talent, a loving heart, humility, charity, a beauty inside that you haven't shown him yet, anything. If you're not a comic, then stop trying to be. If you're not well versed in a subject, don't act like you are. Don't try to be something you aren't. Let him be him. But you need to be you, and do it better than anyone else. You are warm, and kind, and respectable, and beautiful. You and I have never met, but I see every one of those qualities living inside of you. Let those qualities out. That is what people want to see.

You just need to believe in yourself. If you managed to impress him while hiding behind a fake identity, as awesomagic pointed out, it might just be that you are intimidated by him. You have what it takes, give yourself some credit.