Love Addiction
While pop songs and ballads may croon the beauty of being addicted to love, the reality of love addiction is anything but. Some may scoff at the notion that a person could experience something as negative as addiction to something as positive as love. Yet, as incongruent as the idea may sound, love addiction is a reality for some people and when it forms it can ravage a person’s life as surely as do other emotional and behavioral addictions.
Most people enjoy the initial stages of romantic love. Hearts flutter, pulses race, and moments together are deeply gratifying. At the outset of a new romantic relationship we may spend all day imaging what it will be like to be with the other person. Just thinking of them can make our hearts tighten. We plan all sorts of ways to please the other person and go out of our way to look and be our best when we are with them.
The initial thrill of attraction, however, is not the stuff of long-term relationships. Eventually the fantasy of being with the other person must give way to the reality of two humans learning to get along. Doing well together even when we don’t look and act our best, even when our pulse doesn’t skyrocket just because the phone rings and when the ordinariness of life squeezes out the heart-throbs is what is required to make romance mature into long-term love.
The person addicted to love can’t seem to make that transition. He/she revels in the romance and fantasy of love but is ill-equipped to accept the maturing of love. The person addicted to love is on the hunt for the thrill and will pursue another someone, even if they are completely unsuited to one another, just to keep that thrill alive. The love addict spends all his/her time thinking about being in love much in the same way a drug addict becomes preoccupied with a substance.
In the same way, a love addict will neglect family, friends and responsibilities in pursuit of love. This heedless preoccupation with another can lead the love addict to stay in relationships that are not only unhealthy, but downright dangerous. The addict cannot face life without another and so may choose to endure physical or emotional abuse if it means keeping the relationship intact.
Some people who struggle with love addiction are so caught up in their craving for love and romance that they relentlessly pursue another, even when that person may already be in another relationship. Love addicts may stalk the object of their fantasies. Once in a relationship, this person may be so possessive that any contact their partner has with another is cause for jealous outbursts. Of course, when the relationship combusts, as it almost surely must, the love addict collapses into a heap of fear and despondency so intense that suicide may be considered.
Love addiction is real. However, like other addictions it is treatable. If you find that you cannot think of yourself alone, cannot handle relationships after the emotional highs of romance or stay in relationships you know are damaging just because you feel the need to be connected to someone else, please talk with a counselor. Don’t ignore the concerns expressed by your family and friends and don’t excuse your own behavior. Love addiction can be overcome and healthy love is even better.