- You may fall in love easily if you’re addicted to love: when we fall in love, we experience a rush of feel-good chemicals to the brain that can create a temporary high.
- Falling in love can also be a pleasant escape from reality. If you're dealing with stress in everyday life, you may be prone to emophilia as a distraction.
- Low self-esteem or an insecure attachment style may also make you prone to emophilia: if you fear abandonment or believe you’re unworthy of love, you may crave it often.
Possible Reasons You Fall in Love So Easily
The chemical release just feels good. Scientifically speaking, when we fall in love, we experience a rush of dopamine and other feel-good neurotransmitters to the brain. This chemical reaction can give us a high and even decrease physical pain. Because it feels so good, it’s actually possible to be addicted to love.
You have a fear of intimacy. When we talk about “falling in love,” we’re usually talking about the honeymoon stage of a relationship, but it’s after the honeymoon phase that couples really get to know each other and develop greater intimacy. If you fall in love quickly and easily with lots of people, but struggle to stay in love beyond the honeymoon stage, it could mean you’re afraid to experience deeper love and be truly known.
You struggle with low self-esteem. If you don’t like who you are, you may seek out people who make you feel good—at least for a little while. New partners may distract you from yourself and may make you feel better about yourself. Once the relationship progresses into more intimate territory, you may push your partner away and seek out a new romance, because you fear being rejected once your partner gets to know you better.
You don't want to be alone. Our culture emphasizes dating and marriage above singledom, so if you haven't found "the one," you might wonder if there's something wrong with you (there's not!) or if it means you'll be alone forever. The fear of being single may make you more susceptible to emophilia. Keep in mind that if you're lonely while you're single, a relationship won't necessarily fix that: loneliness is not the result of being alone, but of feeling isolated, whether or not you're with other people.
It’s an escape from reality. If you’re dealing with stress in other areas of your life—school, work, family, health, or what have you—a new romance can be a great distraction. Because the chemical reaction that occurs when we fall in love can make us feel so good, some people may seek out romantic attachments in times of stress.
You’ve got an insecure attachment style. Your attachment style refers to the way you connect with people in close relationships. Attachment styles are formed in infancy and early childhood based on how your needs were met—or not met—by your primary caregiver. If you fall in love easily, you might have an insecure attachment style. There are 3 types of insecure styles: Anxious: You tend to be clingy in relationships and fear abandonment. You may feel a constant need for love and reassurance and do almost anything to get it. You may be more likely to have an anxious attachment style if your parental figures weren’t consistent with their caregiving: some days they may have offered care and support, and other days they didn’t. Avoidant: You reject others’ attempts to connect on a deeper level because you fear being vulnerable, but you still crave love. Because of this, you may seek out surface-level relationships that never move past the honeymoon stage. Avoidant styles often stem from a lack of attention from a parental figure. If you grew up believing you couldn’t rely on your caregivers for attention, you may struggle to rely on romantic partners as an adult. Disorganized: You possess traits of anxious and avoidant attachers: you bounce back and forth between a fear of abandonment and a fear of intimacy. You might even worry deep down that you don’t deserve love. People with a disorganized style often experienced extreme neglect, trauma, or abuse during childhood.
You aren’t setting healthy boundaries. You may be more prone to falling in love quickly if you struggle to assert proper boundaries with other people. You might be more tolerant of mistreatment from romantic partners because you crave love. If you have an insecure attachment style, you may actually be more likely to intentionally (subconsciously) seek out unhealthy relationships that reflect the relationship you had with your caregivers as a child.
Symptoms of Emophilia
You tend to enter relationships quickly. Emophilia may cause you to attach way too quickly to people you don’t even really know. In many ways, emophilia is less about the person you’re in love with and more about the feeling of being in love itself. Falling too easily may also keep you from communicating expectations upfront with new partners: you may be more prone to quickly attaching to partners who view your relationship as casual.
You spend every minute with your partner. When you’re dating someone, it’s all about them. You may have a tendency to abandon your friendships and other relationships and responsibilities in favor of spending as much time as possible with your partner. Licensed Clinical Psychologist Dr. Liana Georgoulis, PsyD, cautions, “Be careful not to engage in fantasizing and obsessive thoughts about that person. Don’t engage in a narrative that this is the person for you.”
Your relationships are short-term and intense. Because most of the symptoms of “being in love” occur within the first few months of dating someone, you may have a habit of breaking things off when the relationship starts to deepen and lose some of its initial spark.
You have on-and-off-again romances. Are you always getting back together with exes and then breaking things off when things get serious again? A need for constant love coupled with a need for excitement in relationships may create an unhealthy push-pull dynamic with ex-partners.
You may be prone to risky sexual behavior. The thrill of being in love may influence you to seek out sexually adventurous experiences. This might include not practicing safe sex, sleeping with partners before you really feel ready to, or cheating on current partners. Because emophilia may cause some people to equate sex and love, they may be quick to sleep with a new partner and view the encounter as meaningful, while the partner only sees it as casual.
You may frequently enter unhealthy relationships. Loving the feeling of being in love more than the person you’re in love with may make it easier to enter unhealthy relationships. Emophilia might cause you to idealize your partner or to attach to them before you realize they’re not a good partner for you. An unhealthy match might involve a partner who’s simply incompatible or who is abusive.
How to Stop Falling in Love So Easily
Prioritize your other relationships. Emophilia can make it easy to forget the other important relationships in your life. Carve out intentional time to spend with family or friends this week. Dr. Liana Georgoulis advises, “Set limits with yourself on how often you see and spend time with that person. Don’t begin to rely on them heavily for emotional support.” To avoid committing to one person too early, she suggests “dating other people until you know someone well and they show you they are consistent and trustworthy.” Even if you feel like you’d rather be with your new partner, your crush, or someone you met on an app, spending time with other people who care for you will help you rely less on romance and feel more well-rounded.
Pause to assess red flags. Even when you feel a strong attachment to someone, practice pausing and looking for signs you should slow down. Dr. Georgoulis points out that it’s only after the “falling in love” stage that we really learn who someone is: “Don’t make any major...commitments to that person for several months…. Usually around 12-18 months the feel good love chemicals in our brain start to taper off and we have a clearer picture about who the person is.” Potential red flags might include: Suspicion: Listen to your gut: do you feel any inkling, deep down, that things aren’t right with this person? If so, they may not be! Controlling tendencies: Do they exhibit any controlling or manipulative behavior? Aggressive behavior: Do they yell or get unreasonably mad about things? Even if they’re not aggressive towards you at first—say, they snap at service workers—it doesn’t bode well. Moving too quickly: If your new partner talks way too soon about marriage, having kids, or moving in, or says “I love you” within a few dates, it’s a sign to slow down. Poor communication: Does this person communicate openly and honestly with you? Do you never know where you stand with them or what to expect?
Fall in love with yourself. Dating yourself can be a healthy way to prevent falling too soon for others and create a secure attachment style. Whether you’re single or dating, take time to be alone and enjoy your hobbies and passions. Learning to enjoy your alone time can help you take more pride in who you are, which can make it easier not to fall in love with other people so quickly. Practice good self-care: get plenty of exercise, eat well, and do things that make you feel good—without needing to rely on a romantic connection. If you’re struggling with obsessive thinking about your partner or potential partners, Dr. Georgoulis advises practicing mindfulness meditation for 15-20 minutes a day: “Recognize when the obsessive thinking is happening and redirect your focus instead on the activity you are engaging in in the present moment.”
Consider seeking therapy. You may benefit from individual counseling from a licensed therapist. They can help you better understand why you fall so quickly and so easily, as well as what steps to take to cultivate healthier habits. You can find a therapist in your area by searching Psychology Today’s therapist locator, or ask trusted friends who have experience with counseling for their recommendations.
Comments
0 comment