4 stages of limerence

you’ve got a goal at the end of this – emotional freedom – and that is what you are pursuing with focus. you are taking control of the situation and starting to feel some clarity returning to your thoughts. you’re feeling ok now, and so maybe it’s safe to dip a toe back in the water and see if you can cope? now, in my case, we were both unavailable, and i was the one who was dying. i think nc is too hard so i just stop trying and succumb to thoughts of stopping, coupled with occasional glances at lo, but still feel like i’m nc. i understand that in the world of adult responsibility things don’t always work that way. i can only say that if i were to do something about it, it would be at the end of year 11, if i still felt this way, and i would tell a friend. failing that, i figured that i would at least be able to blurt it out on the last day ever of school. kids tend to forget after a while, and all these people are going to be irrelevant in two years anyway. and i came to the conclusion that it wouldn’t be very long-lived and there would be a break-up which i couldn’t cope with. she goes over to her friends and tells them what happened and i get teased about the rumour that it secretly true. i’ve had one failed relationship, lo #2. that’s because i invested in her, asked her to marry me and she declined. she left for the dance and as i was leaving, another girl said, “she really doesn’t like you, you know.” it hit me hard. there was a girl who liked me my junior year but i was so insecure that i drove her away. short of blurting it out she’s not going to know that you like her if you just go up and talk to her. i can’t help wondering if this le is my subconscious trying to make up for the missed experiences?! all my experiences have led me to the person i am now. i told him if he wants me to get over him, i need him to be ok in the presence of my so as if he truly is a friend of mine, i do not want to hide him from my so. the reason i want to go nc is that it still hurts a bit that lo moved on with his lo (yes, i am not fully over lo) but i feel all the facts are aligned for me to accept getting over lo and that it should be possible to do so. it does sound as though you are trying to manoeuvre lo and so into somehow presenting themselves to you in a way that will make it easier for you to make the right choices. i feel like i am a very weak person, unable to decide what’s best for me and my so. i have told lo (texted) that i want nc and that i wish him all the best. for a month maybe it felt good, the fog started to clear and i was in control and taking my life back. i am finally implementing that – to a degree. it was nonsense of course and when i did contact her she shoved it in my face! not much risk of inappropriate behavior (i hope), because now i know too much and know all the pitfalls (thanks to dr. l). fortunately her own situation is so weird that what at first was a curse (while in the throes of limerence) is now a blessing (as i struggle to extract myself). when lo #4 was in her stonewalling phase, i found myself apologizing a lot to see if i could get out of the doghouse. in reply he said ‘funny, i also caved yesterday and sent you a postcard’. so i have dropped all personal questions to my lo, and i keep to just the professional subject matter in our interactions. i cut it out of the newspaper and framed it. things are getting rapidly better for me but yesterday was another one of the incidents i have to just grin and bear. i took the blonde hair and tucked is so it was hanging out of my collar. and to all the other commenters who showed me that i wasn’t alone in this insanity. i craved his attention and friendship to an embarrassing degree, but even when i saw that his attention was lacking in substance and hollow, i still craved it for quite a while after. the realm of fantasy showed me that inside i was aching for connection, emotional intimacy and for freedom to express my true-self. for me le was one hell of a lesson to finally find the self-acceptance and inner-strength i’d been lacking all my life! freedom is a prize that can be won… i am so glad you have moved through the worst of it and have learned more about what makes you ‘tick’. i want to crawl into a hole and be left alone… thanks again dear grief, i really feel for you, hang on in there, it does get better. i want to crawl into a hole and be left alone…” have you consulted a physician? i am so happy for you, and also grateful to this site. i got to this point through a lot of questioning of the validity of the stories i was simply accepting as solid truths. sorry i don’t know how to be brief in these replies and sorry if it all sounds a bit airy fairy, there’s always so much comes forth when i think about this experience! it kind of zapped the reality out of it when i started doing the inner work and realised it had nothing to do with him, that the stories the mind created around it are not to be trusted! i can see it’s just the mind caught in a loop and it fades much faster. however, the only reason this happened was because as soon as i got back to school, and thoughts of being around her had begun to make me nervous, i was put next to her in science. when i was in the depths of my le he was also too young to really understand anything. it took until i had my first child in 1996 to not have that memory be the first thing i thought of when i woke up on xmas morning. as soon as i let go of needing to find the meaning in our ‘thing’ and what it meant about his feelings for me and what that meant about me etc, etc, that’s when it started freeing up more space. thanks for all your insightful comments vincent and for being a good example of where i’d like to be in the coming months. i planned to take it before she finally left but the end was very messy and acrimonious. to make matters worse she wants to stay “bffs in the office” but as my therapist says, she is heroin to me and you can’t have a friendly lunch with heroin. that would help someone in your position… she wants to stay “bffs in the office” but as my therapist says, she is heroin to me and you can’t have a friendly lunch with heroin. i would have to listen because “that’s what friends do.” when i found someone and spent my time with that woman, i’d be accused of lying to her because i said it wouldn’t affect the friendship.




oh and thank you for the resources dr l. i have found that 10 step pdf and found it useful. i forgot to mention that “susan”, the so of “michelles” new interest, has ceased communication with myself and my so. i think it will be hard for me to strike the right balance with lo. we had lots of fun and i did what i could to help make this a great event. i didn’t understand a lot of the things he said before, and it all makes sense now. all the time and mental energy i’ve put into me and i bet he’s barely given me a second thought at home… it’s embarrassing for myself. you are right, we have to put us before lo and i keep on telling myself that it would never work out and that i do not want to be in a relationship with a person like this. dirty lens: do not ever blame your so for your decision to commit adultery and the actions you took to make it happen. to add to this, sometimes i kind of need to give myself a mental slap and have a really firm word with myself about how lo is not all that i think he is. it takes time and i’m not there yet but it is getting better and i don’t have the benefit of being able to go nc. i think the latter is correct. this no contact article has come at the most crucial time for me, that i have to imply nc in order to save my marriage and get rid off the feelings for a lo. i am an addict and i have to get clean ! it’s not cool in my mind and i wouldn’t want to be ghosted. i am in phase 4, but have yet to face lo in a social situation. she commented how she replied to a recent topic, and i simply said yes you did reply to that and i left it at that. i felt terribly guilty during the height of my le when i tried to distance myself, and then in early nc. i know that he thinks we’re getting back to “normal” but i really don’t want to talk to him every day and he doesn’t need to know what i am doing every second of the day. roughly two weeks of nc then attempts at lc once she was back in the office with her catching on to what i was doing and try to lure me back in, telling me she misses our conversations and that she can only be herself when she’s with me. but we also had to take a test online today and a lot of the questions reminded me of my le and how i’m thinking of it and trying to deal with it, so i was slightly annoyed by the end. then, when i was just about to get up, i suddenly became aware of a very recognisable presence coming towards me. when she talked about me at the end of physics) but, after i feel a very big urge to pinch and smash something, it normally degrades into extreme depression when it’s not satisfied. you are fixating on the negative, and using it to feed your low self-image. “no matter what happens, i am just going to go back to school in a week and go through the same torture and torment and depression and anger and infatuation for someone who doesn’t like me all over again, and nothing i can do now will change that.” well with that mindset of course you are!! but it is meant kindly – i really want things to improve for you! you have been such an inspiration to me and one of the reasons why i have come as far as i have. i have to say, nc has been the best thing, hands down, so limiting contact and pushing him out of your life as far as you can is the best you can do. hopefully in the next couple of months i will be able to go complete nc and i can’t wait for this day but until then avoiding is key. the best i can do is to neutralize my emotions. neutral is the new happy for sure, and i’m hopeful that i can get there too. and i need to remember the “danger to my wellbeing” when i’m tempted to indulge my mind. i haven’t seen him since the 29th of february, but i still think about him a lot. i love my wife, but not at all like this, and i never did, so it is hard to get the strength from that, though i do try to be closer to her these days. for me it borders to love addiction, i was limerent for my ex husband also, maskimng the fact that we did not match. if you don’t reply to their message, i wouldn’t count it as part of your nc clock as it was your lo who reached out to you and not the other way around. actually it was him who sent me a link to something he thought i might like. i hope maybe you can relate to some of the videos and take out what suits you. for me i think my limerence / person addiction is a result of abandonment fear that is an result or source of low self esteem. hi mia and everyone….yes, i agree completely that for me at least, the timing must have been right, and i wasn’t even aware that i was unhappy with my lot in life. it’s hard to believe that one day you will be over this lo but it will take some work and pain. i hope that some day i also will get to the point of being helpful to other members, and will be able to give back…….meantime, i’ll saunter on over to social media, just in case he’s posted something…anything….oh boy…..if it wasn’t so excruciating, it would be funny…… i’m not positive i’m a limerant but i was a love addict for a long time. buoyed by the early success, you start to feel more emotionally and psychologically robust.” oh i wish this had worked like this for me. i walked down the aisle with a clear heart and a clear head. i know i will never forget lo#2, but i do not want the memories of him to sting or have any romantic feelings tied to them. it sounds like you feel a bit insecure in your worth as a person, and you feel you need this figure to “shore you up”. i’m generally pretty confident and happy with myself—it’s just when i come to a hiccup—you know, “being human” … that the problem comes in. and it seems to be the start of addressing my needs. i was actually able to express to lo#2 when the pressure was too much, and actually have the idea that the pressure was too much for me… be validated. and i think all the emotion or dopamine or whatever kicks in at some point and we forget that it’s only a story and we’re probably being a little too careless with the facts. i hugged the present, still-unopened, to my warm little chest and floated down the elevator on cloud nine. i don’t even think i have a fantasy image of him, but i liked the little i knew and want to know more! i remember talking to my therapist about my lo, saying something about how i thought i was in love with him, and she asked, “but where is the love?” the question hit me like a ton of bricks. what keeps me going is the fact that i haven’t announced the nc to him but just stopped “showing up” and he hasn’t tried to get in touch. but if i don’t think i’d be over him to the extent that i am if there was even a slim chance i’d run into him. many thanks to the artists who offer their work for free with a cc licence.

but it’s important to recognize the distinction between seeing a person clearly so you can develop a relationship with them or if you’re unintentionally reducing their complex personhood down to a manic pixie concept, shaped primarily by your hopes and dreams and what they can offer you. “many people don’t really recognize the existence of limerence and simply consider someone experiencing it to be a ‘hopeless romantic’ or ‘passionately in love.’ it can be hard to suss out the signs of limerence since the very concept itself is usually seen as a fairy tale and therefore positive in contemporary culture. limerence doesn’t have the same depth, and if you’re in it, it can feel more like a one-note romantic comedy.

it may be useful for you to understand that even if you’ve never felt this way about a person before, that doesn’t mean the person is uniquely special. according to gottman, the third stage of a healthy relationship is building commitment and loyalty. this is the phase of love that feels most steady and predictable—the opposite of the limerence phase.” what matters is if you’re able to tolerate the discomfort of loving a person, not the fantasy, and if you can still show up for them as the relationship burns from passionate love to compassionate love. the idea of limerence is beautiful, but it can veer into a shallow and emotionally immature version of love instead of the real thing.

le = limerent experience/episode (a period in which a limerent is beset by limerence). lo = limerent object (the person that limerence is focussed on). 1) the impetus. the reason we do limerence is because in the early stages it feels great. 2) implementation. phase two is where you get serious different stages of limerence: stage 1: infatuation stage 2: crystallization stage 3: deterioration., signs limerence is ending, signs limerence is ending, limerence while married, how to snap someone out of limerence, limerence and midlife crisis.

1. obsession 2. emotional highs and lows 3. viewing the person as ideal 4. feeling exhilarated 5. losing focus. what attachment style are you?⭐take the quiz: http what are the stages of limerence? infatuation crystallisation deterioration., limerence in a relationship, how to beat limerence, what triggers limerence, limerence destroy marriage, limerence symptoms, signs of mutual limerence, limerence and regret, limerence test, i am a limerent object, limerence vs love.

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