I did not initiate contact with LO because he was married, but I certainly engaged in the personal connection once he initiated contact. In the new year he upped the ante by telling me he had something he could not put into an email. He left me a long voicemail about a work matter, but asked me to call him anytime on his personal cell. I called on my personal cell, but instead of focusing on the personal, I did end up telling him something I had needed to tell him about work that was stressful – that HQ told me a colleague in his group who had been causing him some trouble did not want him seeking advice from my group because it was going to cause changes in the colleague’s work area. LO actually made some anguished sounds, and then said to me that our call had not gone the way he had thought it would go.

LO is coming to my state on a business trip and I believe LO wanted me to come see him in person. I think a PA surely would have ensued. Had he actually raised it, I would have told him that, while I had feelings for him, I was not going to engage in a PA with a married man. However, he never made a disclosure to me, as I believe he originally intended to do, simply because I said I had been carrying this difficult HQ information with me, and he needed to know to protect himself. It was as if it was too real for him, and I just didn’t become a source of good feelings and to my astonishment all the connection we had built up over the preceding months was gone.

Maybe a PA is all that LO wanted because LO stopped communicating with me in anyway after that. About a month later my group did need to contact LO about a serious work problem. I invited LO to call me to discuss prior to the presentation. He did that and we talked seriously about the issues, but then when we flipped to the personal side, he was very standoffish. He mentioned a B&B that he had mentioned in the last call, but now just said it was owned by a friend and I should check it out sometime if I was in the area. In the first call, it seemed as if he wanted me to go there with him. Now, LO ended the call by saying I’ve taken up too much of your time.

So now I find myself rejected and embarrassed that I revealed the concerns that I had about the colleague in his group. But if that was enough to end our relationship, then, as you say, he is a toxic, indecisive person who is all about himself and his own feelings, and doesn’t have anything to give me that is ultimately positive. That is very hard to accept and I do not know how long it is going to take me to work through it. Especially because I continue to have to interact with LO. I do find that regular, neutral interaction with him calms me, as opposed to these sporadic interactions, that as you point out, I was allowing him to initiate, thereby giving him all of the control over the relationship, and unintentionally, treating myself as a doormat. However, I did not initiate contact with him when I didn’t need to because I thought it would’ve come across as odd since I would’ve been doing it because I was interested in him.

However, I have realized that part of my limerence/LE is that I am rarely attracted to people. Far more often people are attracted to me, and I cannot reciprocate, even if they are devoted. I have learned not to get into relationships with them, because invariably, I will hurt them. So when I find a man I am attracted to, I become very attached. Here, having discovered a mutual attraction, it seemed incredibly wasteful not to pursue it.

Having been married, I am of the opinion that once one reaches the point that they are utterly attracted to a different person than their SO, staying in their marriage is not noble or understandable. The marriage has become transactional, and the only reason people are not ending it is because they don’t want to undertake the financial costs of divorce. Nor do they want to be critiqued by others. Children do not benefit from remaining in a household run by a dead marriage. They need to learn to be happy in married life.

This concept of expecting the SO to listen to the limerent’s recitation of their fixation on the LO is truly unhealthy for both the limerent and the SO. A healthy marriage does not emerge from this. If the marriage continues, it is because two weak people stay in a contract that a court would readily end by dividing up the assets. There is nothing noble about keeping that marriage going.

My marriage ended in part because my ex-husband took a job overseas and became involved with a person in a third country who, it would appear, had Asperger’s, and for whom my ex-husband became an LO. My ex was a narcissist, and he enjoyed the attention. It actually reached the point where he was telling me in detail how fixated on him his affair partner was. It was truly unhealthy and not something that an SO should have to listen to. The only solution to this was divorce. Do not do this to your SO or advise that it be done to an SO.

I thought I would share the perspective of someone who is autistic because it seems that limerence is quite common for us. Also have childhood trauma from abusive family which adds to my susceptibility. My (already married, plus child) LO was actually limerent for me years before I became limerent for him, according to what he has said to me. Sometimes I wonder if I was actually manipulated into limerence (my SO believes I was manipulated at least) because being neurodiverse is very lonely most of the time and I am very much susceptible to becoming very attached to people that I feel “get” me. And this LO seemed to understand me more than anyone else (but he knew I was neurodiverse… I do wonder if he was saying the right things on purpose to get me limerent for him?). The things we had in common were almost supernatural – at least that is what it felt like at the time. He told me he was neurodiverse too. I remember that he was oversharing a lot of personal things with me before I began oversharing things with him as typically I have my guard up with everyone… perhaps that is what triggered all of this.

Once I became limerent for him it was like nothing I had ever experienced before. I was thinking about him 100% of the time. It was like when I develop a special interest in a topic except it was in overdrive. I couldn’t sleep properly, I was struggling to do my work. I was still engaging in my hobbies but LO was invading my thoughts and distracting me from them too. I couldn’t enjoy my holiday because anything that seemed to take me away from him was something I wanted to avoid at all costs. My SO began to notice the change in my behaviour and suspected something was up, but I didn’t know how to explain what was going on with me as limerence was a completely new concept. I eventually learned of it through the aspergirls subreddit – a community for autistic women – when I searched around for person obsession to try and understand what was happening. Me and LO were messaging eachother constantly every day at this point and I definitely became addicted to him. I was feeling conflicted because neither of us were available but my dumb limerent brain at the time ended up overriding that.

We had mostly an EA since we couldn’t see each other often, majority of our interactions were via text. He came to see me secretly a couple of times during the LE and the beginnings of a PA had started (hugging/kissing).

It all ended up with him coming to my house with his wedding ring removed, declaring that he loves me and that he was going to leave his wife for me. What actually happened was after he got home and told his wife his interactions with me became very mixed and confusing. One minute saying we should remain close friends, the next minute writing me very intimate things and telling me that he loves me. Then telling me he can’t message me every day anymore and he changed to e-mailing me sporadically instead (of course all the while reassuring me that he loves me). This pretty much drove me insane because it was so incredibly confusing and painful.

This was what ultimately caused me to initiate no contact with him because I was no longer getting that limerent high from our interactions and the anxiety of not knowing what he actually wanted was really just too much. I think what he actually wanted was to stay with his wife but keep me in a strange limbo and continue some sort of affair… which is really not what I would want at all. I sent him one final message explaining that I was going to block him and go no contact, along with why. I’ve not heard from him since so he seems to be honouring it at least.

Since I initiated no contact I have finally been able to sleep properly (though I’m not sure how many proper sleeps I’m going to need to catch up on a few months worth of poor sleeping lol)… I am feeling better and I have a lot more mental clarity now. However I do occassionally second guess my NC decision since it is difficult for me to make friends being neurodiverse and I am enduring a period of a kind of grief of sorts. Having someone that I was talking to every day and felt like I could say anything to… to suddenly being alone every day (working from home) has been very hard. My SO has been great and understands how I ended up in this situation and helped me arrange to join a women’s autism group so I can hopefully make some like-minded friends there and feel less lonely which will help me avoid falling into this limerence trap again in future. 🙂

Please if you are in this situation go no contact. Even if you are in that euphoria stage, it really doesn’t last forever. 🙁 Especially if you are neurodiverse – you never know if your LO is actually taking advantage of you!

It’s so close! You can almost grasp it!”

The stuff of poetry. Such good writing, Dr. L! 😛

Thank you 🙂

I’m so sorry you went through this😣, that just sounds horrendous.
I wonder if narcissists experience limerence and if they do how?
I am always so focused on the needs of others- my limited understanding of narcissism is that they prioritise their own needs above all else. That seems either counter to limerence or a very dangerous combination i.e. pursue LO at expense of all others….

On the other hand, the guy I chased for a good year, The Chief, never gave me a solid answer on anything and ultimately avoided speaking to me when I finally got the courage to try. His girlfriend was around so I never quite knew what to make of that. (His girlfriend had broken up his marriage for selfish purposes so I honestly didn’t feel too bad talking to him in spite of her.) One of my friends got drunk and sent him a friend request on FB and he accepted it while driving through the town where I live. That spooked me out and has always made me wonder what really happened, but I will probably never know.

Then there was my really **EVIL** LO, my ex-boyfriend, who would claim he didn’t want anything to do with me, then show up at dinner parties when he knew I was coming, only to engage me maliciously later by sending me threatening letters. My limerence for him died really quickly after one round of that.

No, it’s not such an ego boost put that way. But it definitely made me laugh!

Exactly. I had this happen to me. I forced full no contact eventually. Result – 3 years of extreme suffering so far. I fucking want it to go away already. lol

Landmarker!

5 months later I come across this and it’s just perfect. I’m starting NC today and your comment captures just where my mind is at.

Thank you.