Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

How many times have you been in love?

44 replies

Bardie · 30/08/2024 23:38

Just curious. I’m 50 and have been in love three times. First love as a teenager- a lovely guy but after a few years we broke up. Then in my twenties the man I married and had children with, then divorced. Then the man I met post -divorce who left me after 6 years. Hoping there’s another one still to come…

OP posts:
researchers3 · 30/08/2024 23:41

6! 3 more significantly and seriously than the other 3.

I'm hopeful for at least one more!

TuesdayWhistler · 30/08/2024 23:45

I don't think I've ever been in 'Love' really.

I've had 3 long term relationships, but each was just kind of fallen into, one started with a drunken fumble, and in each we just started hanging out and we just carried on hanging out..

I can't sit here at 45 years old and tell you what love feels like.

Arlanymor · 30/08/2024 23:48

I’m 45 and three times. Proposed to three times, married once and that was to my second love. My third love is the one who I genuinely thought I could love forever but it wasn’t to be.

GreenGrass28 · 30/08/2024 23:49

Twice. My first serious boyfriend (16-21 years old) and my dh (who I met about 10 months after breaking up with my first boyfriend). I had a few flings in the time In between but nowhere near love level.

Crushed23 · 30/08/2024 23:50

Zero, I think.

I was utterly, utterly infatuated with the boyfriend I had aged 26-28 which I mistook for love, but looking back I don’t think it was the real deal.

Other serious relationships I have loved the guy in question and been very happy, but I don’t think I’ve ever had the proper falling in love experience where it’s genuine and not just an infatuation (as above).

I’m mid-30s.

Arlanymor · 30/08/2024 23:51

PS. @Bardie Don’t give up, I haven’t! Just a few more frogs to snog I tell myself…!

StJulian2023 · 30/08/2024 23:51

Another 45 year old here. Once. He died when we were 37. Think I’m done with love now. Apart from for our kids.

Drttc · 30/08/2024 23:51

One time. I thought I loved my first serious boyfriend, but once I met my DH I could see what I feel for DH is much more deep and stable and beautiful - unlike the ‘first love’ experience (which was more a flirtatious friendship).

Teanbiscuits33 · 30/08/2024 23:54

Twice. I’m 33. The way the dating scene is now, I honestly don’t think I will ever be again! I definitely cant imagine it anyway because I honestly can’t be arsed to get to know someone long enough to fall in love 🤣

Bardie · 30/08/2024 23:54

Arlanymor · 30/08/2024 23:48

I’m 45 and three times. Proposed to three times, married once and that was to my second love. My third love is the one who I genuinely thought I could love forever but it wasn’t to be.

i felt the same about my third too. He really broke my heart.

OP posts:
Bardie · 30/08/2024 23:54

StJulian2023 · 30/08/2024 23:51

Another 45 year old here. Once. He died when we were 37. Think I’m done with love now. Apart from for our kids.

I’m sorry, that’s very sad.

OP posts:
Crushed23 · 30/08/2024 23:55

Teanbiscuits33 · 30/08/2024 23:54

Twice. I’m 33. The way the dating scene is now, I honestly don’t think I will ever be again! I definitely cant imagine it anyway because I honestly can’t be arsed to get to know someone long enough to fall in love 🤣

I’m the same.

I just can’t be arsed to go through the rigmarole of getting to deeply know someone on the off chance it turns to love.

Arlanymor · 30/08/2024 23:57

Bardie · 30/08/2024 23:54

i felt the same about my third too. He really broke my heart.

Mine too, it was honestly the most difficult thing I have ever gone through, I didn’t know how all encompassing pain could be before him, it was awful, but he wasn’t, the situation was. It ended five years tomorrow (his birthday!) and I’ve told myself that after tomorrow I need to put all thoughts of him away in some kind of mental Tupperware box in my brain and get on with the rest of my life.

So bring on the frogs…

Arlanymor · 30/08/2024 23:58

StJulian2023 · 30/08/2024 23:51

Another 45 year old here. Once. He died when we were 37. Think I’m done with love now. Apart from for our kids.

I’m so sorry. ♥️

Teanbiscuits33 · 31/08/2024 00:00

Crushed23 · 30/08/2024 23:55

I’m the same.

I just can’t be arsed to go through the rigmarole of getting to deeply know someone on the off chance it turns to love.

Yeah exactly! And It feels like too much of a risk nowadays. What if you fall in love and they do a disappearing act 🤣 all too common now. Easier not to bother. Luckily that hasn’t happened to me but I’ve heard plenty of anecdotes! Really deep connections seldom materialise now anyway.

KendraTheVampyrSlayer · 31/08/2024 00:01

Once, with DH. We met as teens, I'm 46.

Frith2013 · 31/08/2024 00:20

Twice.

No one has ever loved me, apart from my children.

DramaAlpaca · 31/08/2024 00:26

Three times. I'm 60.

WordOfTheDay · 31/08/2024 00:31

Never.

Femme2804 · 31/08/2024 00:31

Once. That burning passion deeply in love with my ex before DH. Been 10 years and i cant still forget him. But unfortunately he is a nightmare, cheater, lazy and uneducated. He is not a goodman and i cant see future with him. Then i met DH. He is the opposite of my ex, i love DH, certainly got attraction, but never really in the burning passion fall in love like with my ex. Still miss my ex sometimes and wondering how he is now even though never meet him in 10 years. But i still have happy marriage with DH until now.

Lieutenantdan79 · 31/08/2024 00:52

I am also 45 by bizarre coincidence. I thought I loved my first love, the father of my three children. I now know it was lust and infatuation co -dependent and overall pretty terrible for both of us.

I had a brief relationship after was sure it was love it maybe was... he died. Was not mine to love, he had another family I didn't know, found out after so hey ho I chalked that down to experience and desperation on my part.

My third love lasted six years and he broke my heart and me his I think. I was beyond devestated and five years on not sure I ever recovered, he still crosses my mind every day, which I used to hate but now just accept.

I am now in another relationship have been for 4 years. He's different to my usual type, he's steady though and I know I can count on him and he is a good man, I like pretty much 99 percent of who he is and what he brings to my life, we are the best of friends. Do I love him? Yes but not the same as I loved before. I think the last time broke me so bad I swore never again. That being said I'm very happy with him and wouldn't trade him for all the tea in china.

TonyeKnausgaard · 31/08/2024 00:57

I had a big love in my teens, one in my twenties, and again in my thirties.

I've had absolutely heaps of boyfriends though. I've lost count at this point. I loved most of them but it wasn't like the people I lost my head over.

The one in my twenties, I fell in love with him the first time I saw him. I didn't sleep or eat for three days afterwards, I was that far gone. I still have a lot of love for him now, although we're not together.

Maybe I'll have one in my forties but I don't know if I have it in me anymore.

Tarkan · 31/08/2024 01:03

I fall for people quickly, even when it isn't reciprocated so if you'd asked me a decade or two ago I would have said too many times to count.

Now I know it's just once. What I have with DH is honestly nothing like anything I've ever felt before. I thought I was in love with my kids' dad but he treated me horribly and I only saw it once I was free. DH makes me feel safe, secure and unbelievably loved. It's actually 11 years today since we got together and they've been the most amazing 11 years ever, we've had hard times but we've got through them all together.

Bbq1 · 31/08/2024 01:04

Once. My husband. I knew he was The One almost straight away and he felt the same. We were engaged after 6 months and now have been married 25 years.

CharSiu · 31/08/2024 01:07

Twice, the first didn’t truly love me but the second fortunately really does.
I need to add really with the first I was young and infatuated so I thought it was love and it was of a sort but not the real deal.

Swipe left for the next trending thread