Does "in love" last for ever?

[longhaircats]

Hi, I'm quite new here and this is my first post. My bf of 2.5 years broke up with me (because I hurt him), telling me that he is not in love with me anymore, although he still loves me and is still very attracted to me. I'm very confused. If someone love you and still attracted to you, do you leave the person because you are not "in love" ? May be I am not understanding the definition of "in love" because I am Japanese, and to me "in love" only happens at the beginning of relationship and then it grows to love. Am I wrong?

 

We tried to be friends for 4 months after our breakup, because we used to be best friends, and not talking or seeing each other was hard for both end. But it did not work out, because we had a lot of chemistry and could not help being intimate. It just got harder for me as he was very convinced that he does not want a relationship right now. He even encouraged me to date others if good ones come along

 

Do people decide to leave their partner because they feel they are "out of love"? Can we go back "in love" stage after breaking up and not seeing each other anymore? I'm trying to move on, but I cannot help wonder if he ever gonna change his mind.

[melrich]

I wouldn't worry too much about the semantics of "in love". People have been trying to define love since the year dot and no one has come up with a definition everyone agrees with.

 

I think you have to accept that you ex is telling you that his feelings for you are not what they shouldbe for there to be a relationship at the moment.

 

Yes people can find each other again after breaking up, fall in love again, it happens. But it is not something you should wait around for. You need to get on with your life, get happy. That is what will make you attractive again.

[Yvette84]

Hi,

Well I understand what he means. It's confusing though. I once was in love with this guy for 3 years! we were gonna get married and everything. But then I just fell out of love with him. I was (and still am) attratced to him and I love him as a person, But I'm not IN love with him anymore. He never understood why and neither did I. he always hoped I'd fall in love with him again, but it never happened, so don't wait for it.

But if you hurt your boyfriend, sometimes pain can cause you to fall out of love but usually it causes hate or resentment. So it's confusing because it sounds like he loves you but not in that way. Also sometimes we can get hurt badly and not fall out of love! I have been hurt badly but I still loved the guy! Like I said it's confusing. Love SHOULD be where it's permanent and grows more and more. But it's not like that in ever case, I understand what your boyfriend means because I've been there before. But then again....maybe he wasn't in love ever and just thought he was. That is also a possibility. Lots of times we think were in love but it's just strong feelings and emotions or infatuation.

[heyduh]

i think people who use "not in love with you anymore" are really saying "you are fck-able, but i can do better than you" ... ok i'm exaggerating ...

 

c'mon people. we ALL are reasonably intelligent. we ALL know that the intense attraction/lusty poetic, romantic "in love" feeling lasts at the most 6months till 2 years. this is a scientific fact .. there was an interesting article in NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC of all place (as opposed to Cosmo or National Enquirer.. lol) .. that proved how young couples (young meaning, relationship years not age of the people involved) ... have different chemical/physiological reactions in their body when interacting with lovers ... it is more passion, romance and sex oriented. when new lovers have sex or think romantically about their lover, it is a cocaine sorta high .. addictive

 

after about 2+ years, a couple who survives the relationship, their physiology (i know i am spelling that wrong) .. changes drastically .. the chemical reactions they have when interacting with their lovers is more along the lines of emotional bonding, attachment (ie. less passion, romance and sex) ... when people have sex in this stage of a relationship, it arouses feelings (ie. we still find the person physically desireable) ... but not the crack cocaine sorta high that we felt early in the relationship ...

 

try googling chemicals like oxytocin, seratonin and dopamine (i think i spelt them all wrong ...lol) and you'll know what i'm talking about ... try to look up national geographic articles on love (dunno if it is publicly available)

 

the fact is, when people say that are not "in love with you anymore" ... they are just saying, I don't feel those lusty chemical reactions in my body anymore .. I need to find someone who can give me that cocaine fix i felt in the beginning of the relationship ...

 

i have a feeling that the folks who complain about "not being in love anymore" ... will in fact find themselves in a situation like that over and over again ...

 

my ex, she seems to be like that .. before me she had a bf for several years. intense and passionate beginning (just like our relationship when it started) and after a couple of years that relationship started dying .. and she told me she fell out of love with him. ok, great. only problem, the same pattern repeats 5 years later in her next LTR - and this time, i'm at the receiving end.

 

LOL

[heyduh]

and to follow up on my post ....

 

ever wonder how (and why??) there are so many self-help books on how to rekindle the romance or keep the flame burning in long term relationships????

 

its coz we all long for that cocaine addiction even though many of us are very pleased and content to settle into a loving (not "in love") deep and meaningful relationship

 

often times extra marital affairs actually bring the spark back into a dying marriage ... !

 

i truly believe that we must take full 100% responsibility for the relationship so the key to success is keep injecting doses of the cocaine addiction type of chemical reaction in our long term relationships ... how do we do that? by regularly doing things that make them fall in love with us again ...

 

how?? read those books!!! seriously .... just look around your own lives, friends families at the REALLY successful long term relationships ... they may seem boring for the most part, but every now and then they do something EXCITING .. to give each other that cocaine addiction again

 

so, the really happy folks get the best of all chemicals (seratonin, oxytocin, dopamime) ... and also get the best of all emotions ... passion, lusty sex, romance AND emotional bonding, attachment etc

 

i feel like going back to grad school just to study and research love-biochemistry ... too bad i have a freakin mortgage to pay off !

[heyduh]

i'm on a roll tonight .. hehehe

 

following up on my last two posts ....

 

the key to successfully maintaining a long term loving, romantic, lusty sexy, passionate AND emotionally bonded, and attachment sorta relationship is manipulating a persons physiology (i looked it up this time, spelling is correct)

 

how do we do that if we are not chemists or pharmacists or .. uhm .. doctors or otherwise chemically intelligent people

 

i think the answer is to keep on attracting, and reattracting our lover again and again and again ... our biggest fault is that once we get into a LTR, we think, oh great, now we will be in love forever and make babies and buy a house ... blah blah blah

 

that's just a recipie for disaster ... the fact is that our love life should be a never ending cycle of attraction and reattraction ... things to crank the engine once again, or rekindle the spark ... every now and then do something to ignite the passion ...

 

the only problem is that now that we have really started to know each other, things can become ... well, predictable .. not new and exciting ... so it takes MUCH more effort to do then whatever we did to attract them in the first place ...

 

and more complications... in 2 or more years time, people change. their wants and needs change and things that may have attracted them 2 years ago, will not be too apealing today

 

whaddya do??

 

see why relationships are HARD WORK

 

 

[rightfromthestart]

Heyduh - have u ever seen the movie 'blow', 'scarface', 'traffic', 'wired'? have you ever heard stories about heavy cocaine users like stevie nicks

 

link removed

 

the point being, never associate those wonderful first feelings with something as evil as cocaine – read stevie nicks's story. ihere is nothing glamorous about cocaine. it is evil.

 

So heyduh – maybe you should think about using another way to describe that feeling you are talking about ok?

 

 

 

"they may seem boring for the most part, but every now and then they do something EXCITING .. to give each other that cocaine addiction again"

 

"after about 2+ years, a couple who survives the relationship, their physiology (i know i am spelling that wrong) .. changes drastically .. the chemical reactions they have when interacting with their lovers is more along the lines of emotional bonding, attachment (ie. less passion, romance and sex) ... when people have sex in this stage of a relationship, it arouses feelings (ie. we still find the person physically desireable) ... but not the crack cocaine sorta high that we felt early in the relationship ..."

 

 

 

Feelings at the End of a Relationship

 

 

 

The following are common, normal feelings often experienced when a relationship ends. There is no right or wrong feeling to have - we each react to the end of a relationship in our own unique way.

• Denial. We can't believe that this is happening to us. We can't believe that the relationship is over.

• Anger. We are angry and often enraged at our partner or lover for shaking our world to its core.

• Fear. We are frightened by the intensity of our feelings. We are frightened that we may never love or be loved again. We are frightened that we may never survive our loss. But we will.

• Self-blame. We blame ourselves for what went wrong and replay our relationship over and over, saying to ourselves, "If only I had done this. If only I had done that".

• Sadness. We cry, sometimes for what seems an eternity, for we have suffered a great loss.

• Guilt. We feel guilty particularly if we choose to end a relationship. We don't want to hurt our partner. Yet we don't want to stay in a lifeless relationship.

• Disorientation and confusion. We don't know who or where we are anymore. Our familiar world has been shattered. We've lost our bearings.

• Hope. Initially we may fantasize that there will be a reconciliation, that the parting is only temporary, that our partner will come back to us. As we heal and accept the reality of the ending, we may dare to hope for a newer and better world for ourselves.

• Bargaining. We plead with our partner to give us a chance. "Don't go", we say. "I'll change this and I'll change that if only you'll stay".

• Relief. We can be relieved that there is an ending to the pain, the fighting, the torment, the lifelessness of the relationship.

[heyduh]

So heyduh – maybe you should think about using another way to describe that feeling you are talking about ok?

 

hi .. i was speaking METAPHORICALLY and btw, i ain't the first person in the world that described the feeling of new "in love" in terms of a drug addiction

 

in fact, from what i recall, that's what the premise of the national geographic article was ...!

[laboheme]

There's an article that I read a while ago...maybe that's the one heyduh was talking about?

 

link removed

 

And I definitely think that the idea of introducing chemical replacements to recreate the passion can be problematic...

[heyduh]

There's an article that I read a while ago...maybe that's the one heyduh was talking about?

 

link removed

 

And I definitely think that the idea of introducing chemical replacements to recreate the passion can be problematic...

 

nope .. that is not the same article ...

 

but try this link removed

 

"And then there are drugs. Despite Dr Fisher's reservations, might they also help people to fall in love, or perhaps fix broken relationships? Probably not. Dr Pfaus says that drugs may enhance portions of the “love experience” but fall short of doing the whole job because of their specificity. And if a couple fall out of love, drugs are unlikely to help either. Dr Fisher does not believe that the brain could overlook distaste for someone — even if a couple in trouble could inject themselves with huge amounts of dopamine. "

 

LOL

 

really, the only way is do-it-yourself .. ie. keep doing ALL the things (emotional, physical, spiritual, intellectual, etc etc etc) that naturally cause release of these chemicals by being a good partner/lover ..

[drum4god]

I had a happily married couple that gave this wise advice. Make sure you find a person you are "in love with", a person you like, and a person you love. When the "in love" feeling fades, its the friendship and the love that will rekindle the "in love" feelings.

 

When you are in love, you are just concerned how that person makes you feel. In a way its sort of selfish.

When you like a person, you just like hanging out, talking, being a friend etc.

When you love a person, you put everything aside to make that person happy.

 

Some people are just in love, but don't have a friendship to fall back on. So when times come around when the "in love feelings" fade, they can't just hang out like friends.

 

Or some people are just so selfish they don't want to love when they don't feel it. That is why it annoys me to no end when someone says I fell out of love. Unless there was abuse, or the person changed and treated you badly, falling out of love is very selfish. In my experiences people I know who fell out of love due to boredom either continued the pattern, or had the same thing happen to them.

 

Read Corinthinans 13 in the bible about love. No where does it mention "being in love" Love is a choice you make. Of course we all long for the feelings, and believe me, if you choose to love when the feelings aren't there (again this is provided there is no abuse, or bad treatment) then more times than not the feelings will come.

 

Do you know how many people regret leaving there partners for greener pastures. I can tell you tons of stories, and in fact it happened with me. A women took me for granted, and then left. She realized she made a mistake. Begged me back, wrote letters, but it was too late. I found someone else. All because she claimed she fell out of love. I found it interesting she fell back in love when I was gone. That is why I feel being in love is somewhat selfish.

 

People say relationships are work, but its not work when you feel like your in love. When you are in love, you would travel 100 miles just to see that person for 10 mins. Its not work, because you are coasting on the feeling. The work begins when the feelings fade. That is why people check out. They have the instant gratification mentality, and if there is any work invovle they go somewhere else.

 

With that said, I believe you do need to have strong feelings for the person. You can't discount the feeling of being in love, but don't think it will last forever. I do think you can have it come back in waves, if you work. I have seen it happen. So when the feelings start to fade, don't give up. Just work a little and you will see the spark reappear.

 

Just my 2 cents.

 

Keep the change.

[heyduh]

amazing post. now where can i find a cute young unmarried girl that thinks like you do

[Lady Bugg]

wOW..Drum nailed it RIGHT on the head there!!

That was such a mature AND realistic view of what love is.

 

I agree that people have an "instant gratification" mindset with relationships.

It's sad really. I mean it's SO easy to stick around when it's all sticky sweet..and wonderful. What about when you're sick, and feeling ugly?

 

I agree with Drum that being in love should NOT be so much work. I personally also believe that feeling of being "in love" DOES have a lot to do with chemistry.

 

These might be bad examples....but look at Bobbi Brown

and Whitney Houston (who are getting dvorced now lol) but they had a

marriage that was FAR from "fairy tale". I truly believe that even though

their marriage was volatile....and probably unhealthy, they must have had

that "chemistry" in order to stick together for 14 years. I also believe

they probably DID love each other...but sometimes that is simply not

enough.

 

Love is a strange thing...you can't predict who OR why you might love one person, and not another. Then again I think that's what makes it so amazing when it happens.

[Dako]

Love is something you give.

[longhaircats]

Thank you hyduh and drum4god for your insights. I was also thinking that in love stage can comes in waves, because there was a time that I was not sure about my feelings for my ex. I could say my "in love feeling" was faded when my ex wasn't happy with his current job and lack of his education, yet he didn't seem like trying to change the situation. Only thing he was doing was complaining about others and self-pitying himself. He never treated me bad, but it was depressing to be with him when he was in the "darkness." Our relationship went bad after he moved in my apartment. I made a mistake by picking fights and kicked him out from the apartment during fights (that's why he's hurt), but I couldn't breakup with him because I loved him as a person and friend and I really cared about him. He was so worried about the possibility of me leaving him and he built a wall in his heart so that he won't get hurt, he explained to me later on.

 

So I understand that feelings change and people may fall out of love, but I feel sad that my ex stopped loving me when I didn't love him back the way he wanted.

[brando]

Love is something you give.

 

 

 

......to yourself first.

[WorkNProgress]

That couple gave a great piece of advice to you. My mom and my friends mom told me that same thing. That when the tough times come you lean on each other as friends and then like you said it rekindles that loving feelings again.

 

This is something everyone should take heed to when considering marriage. Perhaps our divorce rates wouldn't be as high as they are in the US.

[longhaircats]

My mom(Japanese) said the same thing too! So I guess it wasn't a cuiltural thing. I don't think my parerents are in love, but I know they love each other and they respect each other. My ex's mom left him when he was 4 years old, so may be he is not aware what makes two people stay together for a long time. I want to tell these things to him someday if he ever contacts me again...

[Griever]

How would that work out If youre both each others first true lovers

(they always say the first one is special and you house special feelings for them not matter what )

 

Treathed her good with repect and love,But after a while was a to nice guy instead of the BF?

And made her lose her spark for her BF?

 

How would those ppl house their feelings ?

And maybe even come back together ?