Limerence for a former date

[GreatExpectationalized]

I met up with someone from an online dating website a few years ago, when this person appeared at the station where we had agreed to meet up, it was as though I was dumbstruck. Almost a ringing in my ears, feeling as though my limbs had become part jelly, and a wild inexplicable parade sensations coursing through my veins - a feeling of euphoria. Strangely though, coupled with tremendous self-consciousness.

I'm not normally like that on a first date, far from it. For some reason, I couldn't stop myself saying how attractive this person was (the photos had given no indication of this, they were quite “normal”. Embarrassingly, I remember saying it more than a few times. Cringe.

Despite all this, we agreed to meet up for a second date... the impact on me only worsened, except this time I had to endure those crippling sensations for several hours. I remember sitting almost hunched over, talking barely above a whisper... it was as though every once of self confidence had been sapped out of me.

Obviously, my date didn’t agree to meet me again. Several years later, this person still overwhelms me just to think about. It is as though all of your wishes and fantasies became personified in one person and you almost cannot believe it and are too dazed and over-awed and overwhelmed to function properly.

I still wonder what would have happened if this person had met the real me, if I’d been able to control my reaction better. Lots of what ifs... these memories still have a powerful impact and sadden me and have me lost in beautiful memories in turns.

How do I shake off this mad nonsensical limerence? I never even got to know this person! Has this happened to you? What causes it? How did you deal with it?

@LadyfromtheBelleEpoque

Wow *@EstuaryBird*

‘ the whole universe shook. Sat there kissing for a while and when I went to stand up my legs wouldn’t hold me.’

Wonder if he knew the effect he had?

I doubt he would have believed he could have that effect on anyone! But he did travel 20 miles on the train the next day to sit on a bench with me for a couple of hours so he must have thought it was worth it.

I had this once. Completely spellbound by him. I think the feeling was mutual for him too though.

We didn't work out for obvious reasons now, but it hurt both of us.

It was weird because we gravitated toward each other for a few years.

We haven't had contact in years now, both married to other people. Weve crossed paths a few times, and we don't speak to each other, but I always sense him before I see him.

That familiar jolt of something. Its not anxiety, more like an energy. I've felt it a few times and he's walked past me within a few minutes. He always looks a few times, I completely avoid eye contact.

It took years to get him out of my system.

Knowing what I know of him now, he isn't who I'd choose, however if I saw him and spoke to him, all rhyme and reason would go out of the window.

@GreatExpectationalized, unfortunately we were both married so it could never go further. 😭
I have never been so tempted but couldn't do it, even though the opportunity was there.

Luckily I was moving jobs, so wasn't confronted by him every day. I still have such regret we met at the wrong time though. 😟

Never experienced anything like that before or since, I'm still incredulous at the impact he had on me.

@Inpersuitofhappiness this is so similar to my situation. My person works at the same place as me (very big workplace though) and we can go years without our paths crossing but when they do it’s just as you describe. It’s an energy. Both amazing and uncomfortable all at once. It goes beyond attraction - I’ve been attracted to several men before, this is much more than that.

Strangely with mine, I didn’t feel it instantly when I first met him, in fact I didn’t think much about him at all. We ended up kissing on a drunken work night out and it was at that moment the crazy feelings came. And never left. The strongest I’ve ever felt about anyone (and I’m married now, I sometimes feel guilt about knowing I could have stronger feelings than I do for my dh but the relationship is completely different, not crazy and intense but calm and stable and supportive)

Oh guys there is a pattern!!!

1/ we are not that interested at first
2/ don’t know the guy well or at all
3/ feelings are overwhelming/never experienced before/hit us sideways
4/ the guy is never quite right
5/never seen through to the end/around him long enough to see he is real
6/ accompanied by such strong feelings of anxiety that we have to walk away

Something is going on that we can’t see and it is not understanding it that fuels it/drives us crazy if we let it.

We haven’t missed anything great - just swerved a bullet, I reckon🤪

Some of these guys could be love bombing/on drugs/emotionally out of control/fuelled by lust

@LadyfromtheBelleEpoque you’re right! I definitely think mine love bombed me, then took it away, then love bombed me, then took it away.... it was like the high of it when it was good was the best I’ve ever felt. Then the low when he took it away.... awful. I got stuck in a cycle of trying to get the good bit back again. Eventually I walked away, but it still effects me over 10 years later and like I said if I see him (rare) then the energy is still totally intoxicating. I’m not an idiot, I like to think I’m a perfectly sensible grown up most of the time but this is just like my nemesis in life! I’ve even discussed it with a counsellor. I understand on a rational level that it’s ridiculous but I just wish I could switch off my feelings towards him.

🤣🤣🤣

You know what? I have chocolate on the mind so here is my chocolate analogy...

I made a cake for a event once and in trying to get it right I bought very rich chocolate and made some extra chocolate pieces to adorn the cake base with. I didn’t add anything (milk/vanilla essence/egg) just used the expensive full chocolate that I had. When people ate it, they were shocked at how rich it tasted but if you are more than one or two it was sucky.
There wasn’t enough base ingredients to tone down the richness of the chocolate and although I am quite happily decadent even I recognise you need a balance - of flavours/tones/ etc - they complement one another as create that full, rich experience (of the senses). I think people focus on one thing, turn up the volume and blast in our face so we feel like we are getting the full multi dimensional, sensory experience that satisfies us but it’s not- and our senses tell us this.

In my simple word, that’s how I see it anyway. Apologies for all the confusing metaphors but now I’ve started thinking of chocolate I can no longer concentrate.🤪

And the typos😖😖😖 sorry no sleep last night 🤪

@NC866

You can switch off those feeling - they exist in your body, he’s no longer around, right?

You don’t want to. There’s a painful pleasure in them, I think. Like you are able to tap into the memory of something so intense without the real consequences that go with it.

I’m the same 🥺

I think that sounds like a lucky escape, tbh.

First time it happened to me was awful. He was my best friends boyfriend. It seemed obvious he felt the same and anytime we spent in each others company was horrific. Luckily I didn't act on it.
Turns out years later when I talked to my friend she had, had the exact same instant reaction to him as had his girlfriend before. What was weird was he wasn't interesting, or particularly good looking. He was a massive cokehead though and we guessed some sort of pyschopath or narcissist. When he was done with them he just disappeared and went off with someone else.

Second time it happened was a guy who turned out to be a massive covert narcissist. Proper full on fucked up lunatic. So I think if you're the sort of person that picks up on things, I've come to the conclusion that it could actually be danger you're sensing but it gets misinterpreted as love.
I've had sexual chemistry as well but it was nowhere near as intense.

Yes - or it’s their confused, out of control emotional realm we’ve stepped close to. The warm love might be present in them but for them self, not you; the ecstasy could be (mdma!) their feelings for what they are getting from you not what you are creating together. It is when it oasis accompanied by that overwhelming anxiety that I get suspicious - on some level you are sensing something amiss.

[quote LadyfromtheBelleEpoque]@NC866

You can switch off those feeling - they exist in your body, he’s no longer around, right?

You don’t want to. There’s a painful pleasure in them, I think. Like you are able to tap into the memory of something so intense without the real consequences that go with it.

I’m the same 🥺[/quote]
This is absolutely spot on.
Quite frustrating.
I’m able to make it go dormant for long periods, especially if I’m busy, then up it pops again.

I just want to be fully able to untangle the psychology behind it, and perhaps understanding will bring relief.

I’ve experienced this three times. Completely floored by these people, like I’d been hit in the stomach with a sledgehammer. Unable to speak or function. Jelly legs. Couldn’t think about anything else. All three happened in my teens, which I think is significant.

Number one has always remained a stranger although he has reappeared in my sphere a number of times throughout my life, and each time I see him the effect on me is exactly the same - it goes right to my core.

Number 2 was a friend of a friend; another unrequited affair. Until, that is, I bumped into him at a wedding a decade later. He didn’t have quite the same effect on me this time, but I had more confidence then and thought what the hell, and dated him for a couple of years anyway, I think for the romance of it or something. Eventually I woke up and wondered what the hell I was doing with someone who was in fact very mediocre and a bit of a cocklodger, so ended it.

Number 3 broke my heart.

I married someone who does not have the sledgehammer effect on me, thankfully, because it is very discombobulating. I fancy him in the normal way, and we are equals. There is no imbalance of power in any way.

It’s nice to look back on those experiences and remember that amazing feeling, but I wouldn’t want it in my life now. Too exhausting.

It is way too exhausting!!!! And too intense!!!!! When would you get your washing done? Sort out your life admin and all the 101 boring but stabilising things we need to do just to stay afloat!

You know what else it does? It makes real life seem inadequate, unsatisfying and depressing and if you spend too long on that sphere you lose your relationship to the things in life that make it worth living. Ground yourself in reality and start seeing the beauty in the everyday.

I think there is a school of thought that says when we idolise or put on a pedestal another person or thing it is because we have become disconnected at the roots to the basics. It is how bad religions succeed (by narrowing your focus on to one person) instead of good spiritual practice that says look at the world and all the beauty in it.
I do understand the feelings though. We are only human and we are allowed to have an emotional world and be flawed.

Btw, just in case I sound as though I know what I’m talking about - I’m perceptually single, an emotional and physical mess and not really terribly experienced in these areas so please feel free to disregard what I say!😅😅😅😅

Perceptually? Perpetually!!!!!

@ roundturnandtwohalfhitches, wow! To think that might have been a misidentified fear reaction, that’s just blown my mind.

So if you have prepared yourself to go out on a date, and you discover your date is far more attractive than you’d initially thought, your guard is going to be down isn’t it, especially if you are meeting in a very public busy place. So a violent reaction inside yourself is then naturally assumed to be a strange some of very uncomfortable attraction, which is interlaced with euphoria. Although the euphoria began to build as I headed home after the date...

As an extreme example, so you are saying this might be akin to the feeling you might have if you had parachuted out of an airplane - terror, followed by shock and euphoria.
And to be honest I really was almost shaking on that journey home (both times), but I did not feel myself to be consciously frightened.

‘ the whole universe shook. Sat there kissing for a while and when I went to stand up my legs wouldn’t hold me.’

Wonder if he knew the effect he had?

I think I have been the object of this.

Out with my friends, a man asked for my number, and if we could go out to dinner, seemed genuinely shy, but nice, so we went out a few times. I was reasonably sweet looking, and had a vitality that young women have, I suppose, but I'm not at all pretty, or even approaching good looking.
The first time we kissed, he gripped the wall and said he couldn't stand, that his legs wouldn't support him. It happened the next time too.

He was nice, but I didn't feel an enormous connection, and I met my long term partner right around that time, so we didn't keep in touch.

It was nearly 30 years ago, and he's probably married to a MNer now

I have had this

Felt lightening had struck- it was the most all consuming, body melting, brain destroying passion, almost a sickness, as though I been drugged - it lasted for the torturous 6 months we had a relationship and about 8 years afterwards.

Approximately 20 years after I first met him I feel nothing but astonishment at how powerful my one sided feelings were. I wish I hadn't felt that way at all as it didn't do anything positive for me whatsoever

Well apart from the mind blowing sex I guess, looking back!

That sounds like sustained torture, you poor thing.
Do you feel it was love or some kind of adrenaline response?

Adrenaline.

Definitely.

Related to an unconscious sense of danger?

Sorry, was out and lost connection.

Yes, absolutely. So, in my case, this guy had made a couple of comments that we would now call 'negging'. I'd heard them, registered them but still spent time with him ( we were a group of new graduates hanging out).

He had never travelled, was very insecure around certain people and not from London (from a Northern city). I am from London, had travelled quite widely during university years and was back in my hometown after being away for a postgrad. It is obvious that I am more comfortable in London where I grew up, no? Yet he kept making these little digs about things that were clearly a reflection of his insecurities. I was shocked, actually. I think he was out of his depth in London and not someone who was used to do things on his own. very w/c background (supposedly) and had skived his way through things not really building any resilience or stamina. I had worked really hard at university, had p/t jobs to give me the structure and money I needed, had kept focused. One thing he offered to do for me was very telling - I remember thinking 'how come he doesn't realise I can do that for myself?' he is making it seem as though I need him to do it.

He married a woman who was very different to me in many ways.We are both from the same religious, traditional background but she was from a different country, alone here, not working and has given him the family life I think he needed. I am family orientated, too, but at that time (mid 20s) was just starting my career and wanted to enjoy earning money, independence, etc. I had a feeling he would be very controlling over things and I can't help but feel he married someone he could dominate/ be in charge of ? whereas I had a big, supportive family around me, friends, connections, etc.

There are more specific things I could say that illustrate my point better but I don't want to say them here as they are too revealing but he contacted me a couple of times via social media and didn't mention his pregnant partner. I just had an overwhelming sense of relief that I had dodged this bullet and looking back I can see that he was a fraud. The world changed very quickly from mid 90s onwards and none of us really knew how what was going on - in retrospect as much as I questioned somethings, I also knew that I was right about other things and if I didn't listen to that part of me I would have drowned. And he did not have the sustenance or skills to help me out So, I ran.

This is from the Marilyn Manson thread

id recommend reading a book called Gift Of Fear. It's quite frightening how an abuser will select and lovebomb his target before starting on a methodical cycle of abuse. Every single stage of it is done deliberately to create dependance

I am not saying that the feelings you experienced were from this place - they sound positive! Just that when they are that intense I am sceptical. On examining my own situation, I could see certain things clearly.