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Original poster

Have you ever suffered from limerence?

268 replies

Mummysgogetter · 26/10/2023 20:12

Hey everyone,
there’s this buzzword that I keep seeing everywhere at the minute “limerence”. I found out about it when my best friend mentioned she thought she was suffering from it for her married piano teacher. I have looked it up and to me it sounds like a crush really.

I have had crushes on people that don’t go anywhere and get disappointed, then move on. My friend thinks what she has is more than a crush because she can’t move on because seeing him gives her a glimmer of hope (he low key flirts). So it got me thinking, how common is this limerence thing?? Have you ever suffered or is it just “experts” pathologising an intense crush?

OP posts:
funbags3 · 26/10/2023 20:21

I've only ever seen it mentioned on here. I thought it was more of an obsession.

Aldicrispsareshit · 26/10/2023 20:29

No but the people I've noticed who have experienced it have generally got something about them that needs working through with a therapist. Be it trauma, low self esteem, depression etc

Whiskerson · 26/10/2023 20:35

People on MN do seem to use it to describe what I would call a crush. Your friend sounds like she has a crush. Of course it's hard to move on from a crush when you see the person all the time - I'm amazed she's gone this far in her life without experiencing that!

I think it's good to keep one's head screwed on and keep things in perspective, but I also feel that we live in a zeitgeist that pathologises the beautiful human experience of attraction and even falling in love. (Now I have said "love", a lot of posters will be after me saying it's not love till they have nursed you through illness and taken the bins out every week etc, but I'm talking about falling in love with someone, which is messy and risky and magical and part of life, and I'd rather say I'd fallen in love than dismiss the whole thing as a psychological problem).

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about these subjects:

Dating General relationships
Hibye23289 · 26/10/2023 20:37

I had it after my marriage split and it did my head in the obsessive overthinking and thoughts about the person when you really don't want to! It's like a form of anxiety I would say, thankfully I am over it once he shown his true colours

stopmefeelingsick · 26/10/2023 20:49

Yep, saw it mentioned on here for the first time and it was such a lightbulb moment. I sometimes get completely obsessed by people. It's so much more than a crush. Thoughts of them seem to fill my every waking moment. I might be in the middle of something really fun or really important but I just can't stop my mind wandering to them and linking everything I do to them. It's like being under a spell.

Sometimes they fade gradually but I remember once one I'd suffered for years went away in a flash. It was like waking up from a dream and I was walking on air all day. I felt I was free for the first time in three years.

I'm in between them at the moment which is quite liberating. I know another will come along eventually though.

If it makes a difference I do have ASD and I know autistic people are more prone to obsessions.

notprincehamlet · 26/10/2023 20:56

I think Petrarch beat Mumsnet to the concept if not the buzzword

HeadAgainstWall0923 · 26/10/2023 20:58

I’ve suffered from it and it’s in a different league to just having a crush. It’s totally consuming and yes, lots of obsessive thoughts.

RedRobyn2021 · 26/10/2023 21:01

Sounds like me with my last boyfriend before I met DP.

Obsessed is another word to describe it.

Goodgriefisitginfizzoclock · 26/10/2023 21:01

There is a very informative podcast by ‘lalalaletmeexplain’ about limerance, I’ve found her podcasts interesting and have encouraged daughters 20/25 to listen wide ranging topics informative, brutal and funny in equal measure.

dessertorchide · 26/10/2023 21:10

Yeah I have had three or four spells. I posted on MN about one because it was really becoming an obsession and I was in danger of doing something marriage ending like telling DH I’d fallen in love with someone else.

I had really bad perinatal OCD which presented as intrusive thoughts and needing to tap surfaces a certain number of times so I wonder if it’s a predisposition to that sort of behaviour.

RedRobyn2021 · 26/10/2023 21:15

Goodgriefisitginfizzoclock · 26/10/2023 21:01

There is a very informative podcast by ‘lalalaletmeexplain’ about limerance, I’ve found her podcasts interesting and have encouraged daughters 20/25 to listen wide ranging topics informative, brutal and funny in equal measure.

She's brilliant, I recommend her podcasts too

Original poster
Mummysgogetter · 26/10/2023 21:55

Hey thanks for all the interesting replies. What’s the best way for a person with this affliction to make it go away or at least reduce its intensity? She has to see him cause he’s her piano tutor.

OP posts:
Original poster
Mummysgogetter · 26/10/2023 21:56

dessertorchide · 26/10/2023 21:10

Yeah I have had three or four spells. I posted on MN about one because it was really becoming an obsession and I was in danger of doing something marriage ending like telling DH I’d fallen in love with someone else.

I had really bad perinatal OCD which presented as intrusive thoughts and needing to tap surfaces a certain number of times so I wonder if it’s a predisposition to that sort of behaviour.

He did you get over them dessertorchide? Did you feel it was reciprocated?

OP posts:
Whiskerson · 26/10/2023 22:00

Mummysgogetter · 26/10/2023 21:55

Hey thanks for all the interesting replies. What’s the best way for a person with this affliction to make it go away or at least reduce its intensity? She has to see him cause he’s her piano tutor.

To not see them. Get a new piano teacher. It will hurt like hell for a while, then it will get better. The only hope of a cure is to stop feeding it.

Scorpioseasonorsummat · 26/10/2023 22:05

Following

dessertorchide · 26/10/2023 22:19

No absolutely not reciprocated in any way at any time which was why it was so bizarre that I was so into them and how I know it wasn’t just a crush. Circumstances changed for each occasion after a while so we were no longer in close contact. The one I was the worst with I had to initiate a separation (sounds dramatic but I don’t want to explain but in your example would for eg find new piano teacher).

Aldicrispsareshit · 26/10/2023 22:20

Mummysgogetter · 26/10/2023 21:55

Hey thanks for all the interesting replies. What’s the best way for a person with this affliction to make it go away or at least reduce its intensity? She has to see him cause he’s her piano tutor.

Therapy and no contact.

Goodornot · 26/10/2023 22:20

Oh yes. A couple of times. It's very unpleasant. That way madness lies. Glad I'm over it now and have a real boyfriend.

Edit...mine was reciprocated. Both strung me along knowing they didn't want me. It was kind of obvious whilst in the thick of it that they weren't interested.

What ended it for me was both of them moving on with someone they did want and letting me know I was just good for now.

But they occupied my every thought at the time.

Milarky · 26/10/2023 22:23

Yes I've had it. It's awful. Like a drug. Awful much more than a crush. Takes over your life!

Only one way for your friend and it's to get a new tutor. Only way!

Cold turkey all the way.

MorrisZapp · 26/10/2023 22:30

Yip, but I wouldn't use that word. I had a weird year long obsessive crush on a very inappropriate colleague. I lost weight, changed my hair, started wearing different clothes etc. Every midlife crisis cliche you can imagine.

I had wildly inappropriate sexual reveries and basically spent the year in a trance. DP didn't notice, natch 😂

Then it blew over and I felt inwardly embarrassed about it all but in a funny way I miss that insane, high feeling. Back to middle aged comfort I go, and very nice it is too.

ABeautifulThing · 26/10/2023 22:30

If she needs advice on how to manage this she should go to excellent website www.livingwithlimerance.com
Tells you everything you need to know about what's at the root of this experience (which has such a powerful grip, it's more than a crush) and how you can try to free yourself.

HeadAgainstWall0923 · 26/10/2023 22:35

Mummysgogetter · 26/10/2023 21:55

Hey thanks for all the interesting replies. What’s the best way for a person with this affliction to make it go away or at least reduce its intensity? She has to see him cause he’s her piano tutor.

She gets a new piano teacher.

I told the person I was crushing on that I couldn’t see them anymore and then I stayed away from them for a good 3 months, absolute no contact.

We are now back in each others life because we have to be but I am completely in control of my feelings now. I know how to keep a check of myself and although our lives have been intertwined again for the last 3 months or so I don’t have any inappropriate feelings towards them anymore and I know where my boundaries lie. I have never let our friendship return to how it used to be (during the Limerence phase) and never will I again. I understand that although we are back in each others lives I make sure I keep a very safe emotional distance from them.

At its height though, it was just insane.

Hibye23289 · 26/10/2023 22:45

Yes to no contact but does she have anxiety or ocd in other parts of her life because I'm not saying anti d's for limerance but it just loops in your head and I feel like tablets can get to the root of it

Marygoesround · 26/10/2023 22:48

Can/ do men experience limerence in the same way? It seems like a passive/ introvert sort of thing. Are even introverted men more forward with their attraction, risking rejection but avoiding the curse of limerence - or do they suffer in the same way?

ABeautifulThing · 26/10/2023 23:36

Men are just as likely to experience this.