“I come at this from the opposite end. I am, and have always been, naturally highly self-aware and self-analytical – starting from a young age. My psche never lets me get away with anything (darn it!), every thought, emotion and attempt at rationalisation is noted, challenged I had a very overworked conscience.”

@Allie 1.

Good for you, Allie, having always been self-aware. I probably could have used a little more self-awareness when I was young. I think I was coming from the narcissistic assumption that “I am perfect and I just can’t understand why no one else can see it!” 😆

Apparently, my personality type is naturally inclined to envy, which is a form of desire. Also, I am shocked to learn how much I desire in general. I mean, “desire” has never been part of my self-concept. I don’t see myself as a “desirous person”. Where does all this desire come from? And then there’s the … wanting to be desired, which is even more potent than being the one doing the desiring. 😉

“The light bulb moment came when I realised I was just fine EXACTLY as I was. Very much imperfect for sure, but with a compassionate heart, good intentions and the strong desire to enrich life. A life changing moment. I now understand that almost everyone is like this deep down (i.e. good & compassionate), regardless of what we see on the surface.”

I agree self-acceptance is a really important lesson for limerents to learn. However, self-acceptance doesn’t necessarily take away the physiological arousal triggered by limerence. That’s what I always wanted to go away – the seemingly never-ending physiological arousal. Perpetual puberty, I call it. The physiological arousal part of limerence was just too embarrassing. Especially since males can’t really camouflage this arousal as successfully as females can! 😉

Furthermore, I have this huge ego thing about “wanting to be respected”, similar to most men I suppose. And I was/am convinced that nobody’s ever going to respect me as long as I remain in the altered state of limerence, because at times it’s an almost infantile state of wanting, wanting, wanting. How can one be respected (or respectable even) if one’s still a needy infant emotionally? 🤔

“I must say though that I do very much envy people that do not suffer this painful version of self-awareness. They may not be as deep or grow as much but those I know like this find it so much easier to be consistently happy in life – and their happiness can be quite infectious when you hang around with them a little, and their lack of awareness can feel like a balm to my excess of it.”

I too envy people who sail through life quite happily without engaging into too much introspection. I have had at least one past lover who was exactly like that, and the fact that nothing could spoil his good moods drove me up the wall!! 😁

On the other hand, I do feel that limerence, for some people, can be like an invitation to explore the depths of one’s own subconscious mind. And who am I to say no to such an invitation? I’ve spent the last seventeen years exploring the “dark continent” of my own soul. And, as much as I enjoy poking fun at “feelers” for their, um, stupendous powers of feeling, I seem to be a creature bedevilled with pesky and inconvenient emotions…

For example, my own personal limerence narrative is littered with enough lust, jealousy, betrayal, revenge, and forgiveness to rival the Bible (both Old and New Testaments). I don’t know who I’m trying to forgive half the time – myself or LO.

“Then, last summer, overnight, I became limerent . I had not had these strong intense feelings since adolescence, and it completely derailed me. When I was around LO, I felt terribly insecure and very shy! I did not recognize myself. I acted like a teenage girl, emotionally that is, but I am a middle aged professional. I was utterly confused, all I could do is try to figure out, what deep subconscious part of my ego LO touched and brought out.”

@Rachel.

What’s great about your experience is that you’re aware of limerence and you’re aware of the fact you’re feeling terribly insecure and very shy around LO.

E.g. I imagine a lot of teenaged girls/boy experience limerence for classmates, and yet they don’t have the life experience or the self-awareness yet to grasp how deeply they’ve fallen into infatuation. 😉

Penny

“If you never come back
If you never call
I’ll say I understand
When I don’t at all”

That is the last hurtle of my limerence. The uncertainty of why she left and why she remains silent. I overthink and ruminate about that still after a year. As the song goes …

“How can you leave without regret
Am I that easy to forget?”

Am I That Easy To Forget — Engelbert Humperdink
https://youtu.be/oNjzEceCoDc

I finally scheduled therapy, only to be terrified at the insane amount of self-reflection I need to do to make if effective at all.

That said, Adam, I thought of a song that seems to be pertinent to you and your story: “The Trouble with Wanting” by Joy Williams.

So incredibly helpful of you, MJ

Thank you.

You didn’t ask me to Frederico, but I just went and replied over there too. Just trying to help with my 2 cents.

Well, Adam, I reckon that’s an achievement, if you ask me.

I’ve read your comment several times but I can’t really seem to think of anything very helpful to say. I do envy you your relationship and your children. Alcohol can be destructive – I know that.

There are so many extraordinary comments posted these days that I think many contributions become lost rather quickly.

If you get a chance to look, I’d be happy if you looked at my post on “Help! Someone is limerent for me” on July 1st. It was just a slightly desperate and embarrassing rehash of things I have said before but I am stuck in a horrible limbo…..

Anyway, I’ll press “post comment” and see how long it takes for my name to go from 1 to 12 on the list.

Take care.

I didn’t want to face what I was doing with LO even though there was a tiny voice of reason telling me “you gonna be living alone if you take this too far”. And then to stay relevant inside my head my limerence (just like my alcoholism) tells me that it’s all I have. You’re not strong enough to stop drinking and face the world sober. Limerence; “LO is an innocent distraction. You’re just trying to be a friend to her when she has no one else.”

What is the escape from? My marriage? My doubts in life? Was I married too soon? Do I still appeal to women in my old age? Wtf was I running from to run to her? Will it happen again?

Now the self analysis isn’t so easy to do. Because that requires action and decisiveness when it comes to your distractions. Get out of your comfort zone and get help for your drinking. Distance yourself from LO. Pull your head out of your a$$ before she leaves you. LO is all in your head. She is just a co-worker like anyone else.

But who would want to do that? Sober the rest of my life? That sounds awful. Don’t keep courting the line you know not to cross and not get those wonderful highs that LO gives you? Ugh, why would I do that?

Well lucky for me, my marriage, my wife and our boys LO made that choice for me a year ago whether she consciously knew it or not. But why her? Why have I made it 23 years only to let this happen? That’s the self analysis I have to do. I don’t want another L.E. or LO. Plus I don’t think my wife will be around for another one. It’s enough she puts up with my drinking, only wanting me to get help but also realizing I have to want to get sober.

My self awareness is coming here to try my best to help anyone I can. As others have helped me. I am self aware enough that I can talk about LO here. And I have been able to do so without intrusive thoughts resurfacing. Because unlike mutual limerents without complications, most limerents’ LE’s aren’t pleasant. At least inevitably. Learn from my pain. Because a LO with complications is just as much of a victim of limerence as the limerent. If not more so.

In my case, nostalgia and projection seem to be a key. I have never seen any of my three LOs as they really were—only as I imagined them to be.

My last LO was sixty at the time…the height of when this all happened 10 years ago. His iron-grey hair was of a length that cried out for the severe attention of scissors. Complete with a battered trilby hat and an equally battered guitar, he was still flying the hippy freak flag and wrote poetry. I knew he was an alcoholic—albeit a functioning alcoholic—but his malignant narcissism only emerged much later

In the early 1970s, I had been madly in lust with a Scottish hippy. If he had survived those drug-hazed days, he would have been around the same age as the LO. I wondered what had become of him, wondered if he still wore his hair long, wondered if he too still wrote poetry and played the guitar. Too much wondering…

I find the leaning in to other relationships, starting with SO, but also with friends, has been a boost for me. Including people here at LwL. There are a lot of positive emotions to be gained by investing in other people who also reciprocate investment in myself.

Also, engaging in activity, whether it be physical, intellectual, or spiritual is a boost as well. Throughout this LE I have tried to keep myself active and interested in various things from exercise and weight lifting, cooking, hobbies such as music, and outings with SO.

All three together, self awareness, other relationships, and activity make a powerful truss to guard against LE lament and dysfunction. You might call it “purposeful”.