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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think that love at first sight is a real thing?

233 replies

Hoovermanoevre · 22/07/2018 22:34

I totally believe in it. Not lust at first sight, but total "soul mates in a previous life" type feelings. But AIBU?
Watching a movie earlier with a friend who reckons LAFS is just a big load of bollocks. What do we think?

OP posts:
Bobbydeniro69 · 23/07/2018 11:14

I would say it' a load of rubbish, especially the soulmate thing.

I find it funny that the Guardian website calls itself ' Soulmates' when the service it is providing is basically a soul-less arrangement of people with stuff in common looking for a LTR. Spark definitely not needed, just reliability and trustworthiness.

I think I prefer being in a practical ' we are in the same place and get along really well ' relationship rather than a ' they are best friend, soulmate and entire life' one.

It might sound a bit sad, but I never liked being hopelessly in love. It just caused a lot of anxiety and feelings of vulnerability and helplessness.

pennycarbonara · 23/07/2018 11:14

It is likely to be made up of tiny non-verbal cues, body language and aspects of appearance which are similar to people you've known earlier in life (and I would argue sometimes also famous people who are familiar to you, although that for some reason doesn't make it into psychological literature, despite the amount of time people spend watching TV, film and other celebrities). I've found that the people that happened with were also the ones where it was ridiculously intense in both good and bad ways. because you set each other off in a lot of different ways - but then I didn't have the easiest of backgrounds and neither did they, and that was why things happened as they did. I wouldn't want it again because it was too draining. Whereas pairings of people who are both fairly straightforward could be more successful on this basis.

Takfujimoto · 23/07/2018 11:22

I've never had the 'thunderbolt' feeling with a lover or DH, but I have with two people that I consider friends.

One was an elderly woman who was my grandmothers neighbour and the first time we met I just knew her, some part of my brain recognised her as someone I've known before somehow.
I can't explain it and I am not a 'woo' person but I don't have another explanation, although I'm sure there is someone that has a theory.

We had a close relationship throughout the years, but in my early twenties she became very ill, she had one son that lived in a different country so my family helped take care off her.
Two days before she passed in her sleep I was moisturising her feet and as I was putting her socks back on she stopped me and said,

" Thank you my dear one, I never thought I would have you again but your eyes are the same, so beautiful."

The second was a man a few years older than myself and I met him during a recruitment selection, we were in a mixed group of 8 and were completing some team building/GTKY exercises and we both couldn't take our eyes off each other ( non sexual) after introducing ourselves the co-ordinator asked us if we knew each other, we both paused, still not looking away until he mentioned that I felt familiar for some reason and shrugged it off.
We became very lose again, shared similar aspects of our personalities and thought process, SOH etc, we seemed to know what each other was thinking and would finish each others thoughts etc, it was weird and he mentioned the strange connection before I did, he was a very practical and logical person and I think he struggled with this.
Eventually he did begin to question it, one day we were eating lunch at our desks and a song came on the radio, both of us rushed out how much we loved this artist, he laughed and then told me about a book he'd read that discussed soulmates/reincarnation and in the book it describes how people who were family/friends in past lives finding each other again and how if that was true knowing me would make him believe this theory.
We didn't love each other, no lust but again familiarity and comfort just a sense that I was in the right time and space as him again for whatever reason.

I didn't have a thunderbolt of lust when I saw DH but I did 'know' I was going to marry him, I told a friend I was with and she scoffed because we are total opposites, but less than 2 years later we were married and expecting.

BroomstickOfLove · 23/07/2018 11:22

I think that you can discover that you are highly compatible with someone in a very short space of time, and that probably makes long term love more likely.

I had that not with DP, but with one of my closest friends. We met at a party and talked all night and it was wonderful and I was all giddy with excitement at the thought of seeing her again. But what I felt wasn't love, it was the potential for love.

peachgreen · 23/07/2018 12:58

Ah yes but what if the lightning bolt is so powerful it's sufficient to make you question everything thereafter?!

I broke up with my partner of 10 years the day I met my now-DH. Long before he and I got together. I knew that even if it didn't work out, he was the one for me and so it wasn't fair to be with anyone else.

peachgreen · 23/07/2018 13:01

It might sound a bit sad, but I never liked being hopelessly in love. It just caused a lot of anxiety and feelings of vulnerability and helplessness.

That's partly how I knew DH was the one - I didn't have any of those feelings, I felt 100% secure and confident of his love. I feel buoyed up by him and always have done.

CuppaSarah · 23/07/2018 13:22

I had this with my dh when I met him ten years ago. I just knew. I genuinely put it down to smell, while I didn't go up to him give him a big sniff and decide to marry him, something about the way he smells(not that he's a sweaty smelly gross thing) just drives me mad. Makes me want to settle down Infront of a fire, cuddle up with him and have a cup of tea while talking about random crap that pops into my head.

pennycarbonara · 23/07/2018 15:17

I genuinely put it down to smell

Ah, yes, I'd forgotten about that. Smell and histocompatibility. That's actually reminded me of a third one it happened with. Thankfully I've forgotten what it was like now. It is possible for other people to smell great without being so ridiculously good it's like an addictive drug. His family also thought I looked like I was related to them.

DSHathawayGivesMeFannyGallops · 23/07/2018 15:19

@CuppaSarah - yes! The smell! One of the things about my ex lover was the smelll of him. Just so right.

BottleOfJameson · 23/07/2018 15:27

Statistically they'll be times your drawn to someone at first sight and it'll work out. There'll be far more times that it doesn't though!

Original poster
Hoovermanoevre · 23/07/2018 21:41

@peachgreen wow that was a very bold move! Really? The same day?

OP posts:
Original poster
Hoovermanoevre · 23/07/2018 21:43

@Takfujimoto what a lovely post.
As so many are. I'm enjoying this thread so much. Thanks everyone Smile

OP posts:
BitchQueen90 · 23/07/2018 21:53

I think the idea of love at first sight and soulmates is a load of rubbish. But I am a very much a head rules over heart person and I don't tend to feel emotions very strongly.

thenaughtyone · 23/07/2018 22:02

It happened to me when I least expected it. I had been with my boyfriend for 7 years. Just bought our first house together and I had just changed jobs to a job with better maternity benefits. On my first day in my new job I met my now husband. I thought he was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. I went home that day, packed my bags and left. Within the week I knew he felt the same about me and the first time he kissed me I knew I'd made the right decision. I couldn't stand the thought of never being kissed like that again. 8 years later and I still get a funny feeling in my stomach when I think about him.

Poodletip · 23/07/2018 22:15

I remember when I met my DH I told my friend that it felt more like I recognised him than like it was meeting him for the first time. Just like "Oh, there you are!" And here we are, 25 yrs later!

limon · 23/07/2018 22:17

Yabu. Science sgows that kind of "love" which isn't love at all, doesn't last.

Also the concept of "soulmates" and "the one" is BS marketed at us to keeo us dumb.

Pinook · 23/07/2018 22:19

Powerful attraction, yes, love no.

Raederle · 23/07/2018 22:22

Readaslot

I realise it’s a long time since you posted but we read that Edwin Muir poem at our wedding. It sums up how we both felt.

Mrsharrison · 23/07/2018 22:44

It's the smell. Even when my ex didn't shower, he smelt delicious to me.. he felt the same way. He claimed he could smell me whe he walked down my road and i was in my house.
And no I don't believe in LAFS.

fantasmasgoria1 · 23/07/2018 22:47

Yes I believe in it. My fiancé and I felt a very strong connection on the first date and by the end of the second date we said we loved each other. I have never before experienced any feeling like this in any other relationship. We are getting on for two years in and we love each other so very much!

Giraffesandllamas · 23/07/2018 22:48

I knew my husband was the one over thirty years ago, I wasn't wrong. I had been out with other blokes but not the same feeling.

fantasmasgoria1 · 23/07/2018 22:49

Oh I totally agree about the smell. He smells divine!

Gabilan · 23/07/2018 22:52

I had been with my boyfriend for 7 years. Just bought our first house together and I had just changed jobs to a job with better maternity benefits. On my first day in my new job I met my now husband

I've been the dumped one in a similar scenario. I mean it's lovely that someone else gets their happy ending and all that. But being the bit part in someone else's romance - it's unpleasant to say the least. And it does make you wonder why the hell they were with you in the first place.

NordicNobody · 23/07/2018 23:02

I vividly remember meeting dp on our first date and being overwhelmed by the feeling that I just wanted to give him a massive hug. The kind of hug you'd give someone you loved but hadn't seen in a really long time. It was definitely that "I've known you for a thousand years" feeling. But I don't think it was love. I felt immediately safe, comfortable, and like I could truly be myself, but actually falling in love with him was an ongoing process, not a lightnight bolt. We said we loved each other after a few months by which point we knew we shared common goals, beliefs, interests etc. But I continued to fall in love with him when he moved in and I found out he was great to live with, and when we had our first child and he was a wonderful father, and when we went through financial hardship and I realised I could rely on him 100%. And in a few months time when we have our next child I'm sure I'll love him even more. So although we had an instant connection I feel like it would be doing our relationship a disservice to call that love, because our love is built on many years of shared experiences rather than a moment of chemistry.

ConkerGame · 23/07/2018 23:40

The thing is sometimes you can have that feeling and then it doesn’t work out and so you realise that people who claim it’s happened for them are just lucky it worked out afterwards.

I had the feeling last year on a first date. Felt like I had known him for years and he said he felt the same, very strong physical attraction, everything either one of us said the other one was like “oh my god, me too!” Just felt like fate. I texted my best friend and told her I’d met my future husband!

Three dates in and the cracks started to show...we lasted five dates and I realised he was not at all like what I had imagined him to be like. We had quite clashing personalities and I ended up being completely turned off by his behaviour. So there you go...I think it is just excitement mixed with attraction mixed with good timing! (Sorry, not very romantic!)