Limerence: Addicted To Love?

Call it a crush, call it new relationship energy, call it infatuation. But if it becomes an addiction, then you can easily become your own drug dealer by retreating into fantasy.
That's when it starts to become a very serious problem.

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Limerence 0:02

And hello to you and welcome to the Richard Nicholls podcast, the personal development podcast series that's here to help inspire, educate, and motivate you to be the best you can be. I am psychotherapist Richard Nicholls, and today you'll learn a little bit about Limerence, and if you're ready, we'll start the show. It's February, and you know what that means? Pancake day. Yay. And I think National Chip Week as well. All the things we love. But we've also got Valentine's Day too, haven't we? Because we don't just love chips and pancakes. We also love each other and in lots of different ways. I'll be making an episode on Patreon next Monday, is that the ninth? About love. 'Cause the psychology of it is quite interesting, so do look out for that one. But today I want to talk about how It can go wrong in our brain. Because it really can. Do you see the very beginnings of a romantic relationship feels stronger than at any other time. That's no secret. As relationships grow, they can become better, if you wanna think of it that way, they can become deeper, more meaningful, more important, but quite often, that very first stage when you can't think about anything else other than your infatuation. It lights up every happy button in the brain. It feels amazing to think about them, let alone meet up with them. And this period of time is sometimes called the limerent stage. Limerence is a term that came about in the 1970s from a psychologist called Dorothy Tennov. She was trying to find a word for that obsessive early stage crush sort of thing. It's the stuff of all the romantic comedies when you're daydreaming about somebody all the time, when you analyse every single message they send as if you're decoding some sort of ancient prophecy. It's exciting, it's intoxicating, it's romanticised like mad in books and films, but, and it's a big but. Limerence becomes a problem when it doesn't go away. When it sticks around long after the spark should have fizzled out. Long after it's become clear that this isn't mutual, or maybe it was a bit, but now it isn't, and yet you're still hooked. When it's pathological limerence, it becomes addictive, genuinely, as in your brain, treats it like a drug. And I get it. It feels like love. It really does, but it's not, it's a loop, a compulsion, a habit, a craving. You see with Limerence, you get a hit of dopamine just from the thought of them, from seeing their name pop up on your phone from a like on Instagram, even if they were probably just mindlessly scrolling, it feels like something. It feels like connection, but it's not the sort of connection that nourishes you. It's the sort that drains you. Because it's fragile, it's conditional. Based entirely on what they do or don't do. And when they go quiet or pull away, which in a lot of cases they inevitably do, your brain goes into panic mode, the obsession gets worse then. You start checking their online status. Rereading conversations, fantasising about bumping into them, replaying things that you'd said, things you wish you'd said, things you'd do differently if you could just go back. And it becomes exhausting. The relationship isn't real and you're not deluded. You know, it's just a fantasy, but stopping it feels impossible. That's Limerence. Now, if you've ever found yourself in that sort of situation, whether it's been for weeks, months, or even years of being fixated on someone, please know this isn't about any weakness. You're not pathetic, you're not broken. Your brain has just latched onto something that feels familiar, comforting, even if it's actually hurting you. 'cause we don't get addicted to things that feel bad all the time. We get addicted to things that feel good sometimes, and that's what keeps us going back for more. The hope, the memory of that one time they looked at you a certain way. The belief that if you just say the right thing or become the right version of yourself, they'll finally feel the same. But that's not love. That's longing and longing's not sustainable. So what causes it? Well, there's quite a few things that can set the stage for pathological limerence. It's not just one event, one wound. It's more like a perfect storm. So let's start with low self-esteem. When you don't feel good enough. When there's a part of you that's convinced that you're unlovable, you end up looking for someone else to prove otherwise. If they want me, you think, then I must be worthy. It's like putting your self-worth into somebody else's pocket and then wondering why you feel so unstable when they walk away. And then there's attachment styles. You've probably heard me talk about attachment styles before. If you grew up with unpredictable caregivers. You might develop what we call an anxious attachment style, and that means that you crave closeness, but that you also fear rejection. You can end up hyper fixating on signs that someone might be pulling away, and then you cling tighter, you obsess and it feels like love. Because it mirrors how love felt when you were little, when you might have felt that things were uncertain, conditional, dependent on staying useful or quiet or impressive. Trauma can play a part as well. Maybe emotional neglect, maybe abandonment. Maybe just never feeling truly seen. If that was your normal growing up, your nervous system is gonna be wired to chase intensity, to feel drawn to people who trigger those same feelings. 'cause we are weird like that, aren't we humans? The brain doesn't necessarily want what's good for us. It wants what's familiar. And sometimes we mistake anxiety for chemistry. We mistake being triggered for being in love. And it's only afterwards when things fall apart that we realise our body was screaming danger and we thought it was butterflies. Also, some brains are just more prone to addiction, even if childhood was great and self-esteem is fairly good, we can still get addicted to things, especially if you've got a family history of addiction, whether it's to substances, gambling, food, whatever. Your brain might be wired in a way that makes it easier to get hooked on a feeling or a person or a fantasy. And once your brain learns that thinking about somebody is gonna give you that dopamine boost, it'll want to keep doing it even if you know better, even if you've blocked them on everything and you've deleted their number. You can still think about them because the reward system in your brain doesn't shut off that easily. That's why addiction exists. That's why we can get stuck. Why we keep going back to something, even when we know deep down that it's hurting us. 'cause addiction isn't really about the thing itself, not fully. Whether that's alcohol, gambling a person or just a particular feeling. Addiction isn't about pleasure. Not really. It's about relief. It's about regulation and once that reward system in the brain gets involved, it doesn't matter how smart you are, how much you know better. The brain doesn't respond to knowing. It responds to cues, to patterns, to chemistry. In neuroscience, they talk about this difference between liking and wanting two separate systems in the brain. Liking is about enjoyment. It's the pleasure itself. You eat a bit of chocolate. It's nice, it's satisfying. That's liking. But wanting, that's something else. Wanting is the drive, the craving, the impulse to go and get it. Now, in an ideal world, those two would stay connected. You'd only want the things that you actually enjoy. But the more that we repeat a behaviour, especially if it provides some temporary relief, the more the wanting system takes over. And eventually we still want it, but we don't really like it anymore. We've become desensitised to it. So to like it again, we need to intensify it. Now with drugs, that would mean needing to take more as you get more addicted. I think we all know that that's what drugs do. That's no secret. And it's because the brain gets overwhelmed with all the liking, and is dysregulated. So it turns the liking down next time. But not the wanting. Does that make sense? I hope that I'm explaining that properly, that when you have something you like, it feels good, but it's kind of like it's too good and the brain can't handle it, so it turns it down so it's not as good next time. That's the heart of addiction. And wanting something that you don't have is painful. That's why people say addiction isn't chasing pleasure. It's chasing relief from discomfort, a hit of dopamine to distract from pain or boredom or loneliness. And sometimes that hit comes from a drink. Sometimes it comes from endlessly scrolling social media and sometimes, heartbreakingly often, it comes from chasing someone who doesn't love us back. When people get stuck in limerence or relationship addiction, they're not addicted to the person. They're addicted to the cycle, the anticipation, the reward, and then the crash. They become addicted to the loop and the loop gets harder to break the longer it goes on, because the brain loves routine. Especially routines that provide even temporary relief. So you end up checking your phone hundreds of times a day just to see if they've posted anything. Not because it brings any joy, but because it brings a moment, just a moment where the anxiety drops, where you might feel better. I think that's probably why there have been more reports of Limerence in the last 10 years than we've ever seen, because the way we connect to each other has changed. More people use social media than ever, and so it's way easier to get a connection to the Limerent object than it used to be. You just open up an app on your phone and there they are. Even if all they've done is just shared something of someone else's. There's their name, there's their profile pic. And your brain goes, ah, that worked. Do it again. Even if you hate yourself afterwards for it, that's not a lack of willpower doing that. That's not being weak, that's addiction. It's just what the brain does. That's the kicker. Addiction works through repetition. It rewires the brain through use. So the more that you do the thing, the more that you chase the person in this case, or the drink or the feeling, whatever it is, the stronger the neural connection gets. The analogy I've always used is that it's like walking through a field. The first time you take a certain route, it's slow. You're pushing through grass, but the 50th time, it's become a pathway. Clear, automatic. That's how addiction paths form in the brain. And it's also why recovery isn't just about stopping the behaviour. We also need to create new paths in the brain, new ways of feeling okay, new sources of reward that don't destroy you. And that's slow work, but it is possible. Now, I wanna say something here about shame because it shows up a lot in addiction. The thing about addiction is it often becomes a source of shame because of how visible the behaviour becomes. You're hiding things. You're lying to yourself. You're ignoring your values. You start saying, why can't I just stop? And then when you can't, you feel broken. But the truth is, addiction thrives in shame. It feeds on it because shame hurts. It isolates us. Shame makes us feel unworthy. And what do humans do when they feel pain? They look for relief. And so the cycle continues. One of the most powerful things we can do in recovery from any addiction, is not to try and beat ourselves into change, but to bring in compassion, to meet the behaviour with curiosity. Why do I keep going back to this? What's it giving me? What's the need underneath this craving? And when we understand that, when we realise it's not about being messed up or weak, we can actually begin to heal, not just quit the thing, heal. Another thing worth saying is about the withdrawal phase. 'cause that's real. Whether that's physical or emotional, when you stop feeding an addiction, your brain and body don't just go, oh, alright then, and then move on. There's a gap, there's a void, and it hurts. That is normal. That is part of it, and it's why people relapse because the craving says, but this will make it better. Yeah, and for a second it might, but what comes next? More shame, more pain, more needing relief. So we need to plan for that. We need to actually make space for the discomfort. We have to build scaffolding around that void so we don't fall in. Friends, therapy, routines, exercise, creativity, anything that gives your nervous system a new language, because that's what recovery is. It's not just behaviour change, it's brain change. So this is hard. I'm not gonna pretend it isn't, especially when the addiction is to a person. Because we don't get to just throw out all of our memories. We carry them, we dream about them. We can bump into them in the town. We can see somebody who looks a little bit like them and it floods the system. But even then, even when it feels impossible, you are still allowed to choose differently. You are still capable of change, and you are still worthy of the kind of life that doesn't revolve around chasing something that's hurting you. So next time you feel that craving, whether it's for a drink, for a message, or a fantasy, take a moment. Breathe. Ask yourself gently, what am I really needing right now? Is it connection? Is it safety? Is it proof that you matter? 'cause those things don't live in the bottle or the phone or the arms of somebody who only wants you when it's convenient, they live in you. And you can learn, slowly, kindly to access them without the thing you've always used to cope. That's not a fantasy, that's not a motivational poster. That's neuroscience. That's healing, that's hope. So what do we do when we're addicted to Limerence? Well, we treat it like we would any other addiction, and that means not relying on willpower alone. 'cause willpower is great for picking salad over chips, but it's no match for neurological obsession. You need structure, you need boundaries. You need support and you probably need some discomfort. 'cause like I say, the withdrawal is gonna hurt. It really does. We can't get away from that, especially when it's from a person or from the fantasy of what they represented. So the first step to recovery is to cut the supply, and that might mean no contact. I know that's harsh. Sounds a bit extreme, but if this is someone that you're limerent about, chances are you're not ever gonna be just friends. Even a casual alright, how are you? That could set you back months. One text is all it takes for your brain to go, oh, we're back in. So be kind to your future self. Go cold Turkey. You're probably gonna have to block their number or their social media pages, at least for now. And then replace the behaviour. You've got all this mental energy going into one person, it needs to go somewhere. It is gotta go. It's gotta, you've gotta find somewhere else for it to go. Whether that's in creativity, movement, talking to real people in real time. Anything that grounds you in your own body and your own life. 'cause Limerence pulls you out of your life. It makes everything about them. Recovery pulls you back in. Into the moment, into you and maybe when you're ready into therapy. 'cause if the obsession is rooted in attachment wounds, or childhood trauma, you'll probably need more than journaling and podcasts. As lovely as podcasts are, obviously you might need extra help in understanding where this began and why your brain thinks that this one person is the answer to everything. Because spoiler, they're not. They're not. You are. You're the answer. Always have been. So if you're struggling with this, if you're stuck in that painful cycle of hope and despair of highs and crashes, please know. You're not alone. I asked on social media last month for people's stories and oh my God, the stories I got that helped me to understand this a bit better. Limerence is painful and more common than you think. It's certainly one in five people minimum. That experience this addictive cycle of limerence. And it could be more, 'cause It can sometimes get misdiagnosed. Sometimes people think that it's OCD by mistake. So it's quite common. Do you know five people? Yeah. Well chances are one of them has been addicted to somebody. And if, well, if you've chosen to listen to a podcast episode about it and you've never heard me before, then well, it might just be you. And that doesn't mean that you're weak. It doesn't mean you're broken. It means your brain learned to find safety in longing, and now you get to teach it something new. That you don't need to be chosen to be worthy, that you don't need to be needed to be enough. That love, real love doesn't feel like addiction. It feels like peace. So if this resonated, do share it with someone else who might need to hear it or sit with it for a bit. Maybe journal, maybe cry, maybe do both at the same time. I dunno. That's how a lot of people's weekends look and it does them good. And as always, remember. Healing doesn't happen in one big moment. It happens in the small ones. Like this one. So time for me to go until next time. I'll be back on Friday, obviously, like I always am with a five minute bonus episode about something or other, I dunno. But I'm on Patreon with a full episode and some hypnotherapy tracks every single Monday, as I'm sure you're aware. Come join me on there if you like. Closer to Valentine's Day, probably Monday the ninth, like I say, I'll make an episode about some of the concepts that psychologists refer to when thinking about romantic love 'cause it's quite interesting. I hope you'll join me on there. So have a super week, either way. Take care of yourself, folks. Speak to you soon. Bye for now.