13 Biggest Insights When Your Partner Is In Limerence!

[@followingfenna]

For my help in your limerence: wwwfollowingfenna.com

[@jcherpes]

Oh my gosh, this video is spitting truth. It was like watching my ex-wife change into a completely different person. Encouraging the bond with our children was hard, and most of the time I tried it felt like she just wasn't all that interested, even to the point of giving me 100% custody. She told me that she never loved me really (21 years married), and that I held her back. 4 years later she is no longer with her LO but has had relapses where she reaches out to him and she spirals into a deep depression. Our oldest (18m autistic) has refused to see her for over 2 years, and I don't know if that relationship can be salvaged. I wish this channel had been around when all the stuff was going on. Awesome video, Fenna!!

[@followingfenna]

@jcherpes thank you, evey-thing you described comes with limerence and unfortunately it happens a lot that the relationship with the kids get damaged. Good luck to you 💓 ✨️

[@danaschield5090]

You are a wonderful teacher! ❤️🙏 Thank you!

[@danaschield5090]

Thank you, Fenna! ❤🙏

[@DominicOkinawa]

My mother left my dad, and left us as well. I knew she was having a limerent episode. It hurt the whole family. Of course, I am here for my own limerent episodes and both my mom and I are working on our addictions. I almost left my wife and children on one extreme limerent episode. I'm glad a change of heart happened and I'm double-glad my wife decided to forgive me and stay with me. I think many would have left me. How blessed and happy I am and should be. Thank you Fenna.

[@followingfenna]

You dodged a serious bullet indeed! 😮 I'm happy for you.

[@DominicOkinawa]

@@followingfenna Thank you Fenna

[@MoKVidel]

iam soooo grateful for your videos!

[@followingfenna]

Well thank you 😊 🙏

[@2025Retiree]

Fenna - back in the 80’s American rocker Joan Jett wrote a song called I hate myself for loving you. It’s all about limerence really. Here are lyrics Midnight, gettin' uptight, where are you? You said you'd meet me, now it's quarter to two I know I'm hangin' but I'm still wantin' you Hey Jack, it's a fact they're talkin' in town I turn my back and you're messin' around I'm not getting jealous, don't like lookin' like a clown I think of you every night and day You took my heart, and you took my pride away I hate myself for loving you Can't break free from the the things that you do I wanna walk but I run back to you That's why I hate myself for loving you Daylight, spent the night without you But I've been dreamin' 'bout the lovin' you do I'm over being angry 'bout the hell you put me through Hey man, bet you can't treat me right You just don't know what you was missin' last night I wanna see you beggin', say, "Forget it" just for spite I think of you every night and day You took my heart, and you took my pride away I hate myself for loving you Can't break free from the the things that you do I wanna walk but I run back to you That's why I hate myself for loving you

[@mariad1151]

Classic! It's an anthem for limerents! Jett is on tour in 2024 btw & looks great!

[@2025Retiree]

@@mariad1151 she is my fav! I might have limmerance for her and @fenna! 😂😂

[@mariad1151]

@@2025Retiree lol we're all addicted to Fenna

[@2025Retiree]

@@mariad1151 yes! I want to watch other videos but there is Fenna! 🥰😂😂

[@followingfenna]

I'm so honoured:)

[@ArthiGomathinayagam]

My partner left me for someone else. I came across limerence due to his sudden behaviour change during the affair. He blamed me entirely and said was never in love with me. He said the LO was his soulmate. He devalued and demeaned me so much. I read the messages between him and his LO and I couldn't even recognise the person he was there. He gave her everything I was asking from him. But she left him to go back to her partner. He came back now and is now seeing his addictive ways. But I do believe he was in love with the LO. They both were planning to get married and leave the respective partners. I am confused now as to whether I was in love even. I feel I was limerent on my partner in all this. We had this avoidant-anxious trap going on. But looking back now with respect to how he was with me and how he was with the LO, I feel he just didn't like me. Maybe he wasn't avoidant and that he just chose not to love me like he did with LO.

[@kerrymillar1267]

With the LO it was a fantasy. The LO maybe had avoidant tendencies and made him more anxious. Don’t internalise any meaning about your worth to this. Emotionally healthy people don’t do things like this. Something very similar happened to me, I’m still with him mainly because we have a child. It’s been the most painful experience of my life and I’m still struggling. Think carefully about letting him back in, put yourself first. He did.

[@ArthiGomathinayagam]

@@kerrymillar1267 Thank you for taking time to reply. I am completely detached from him and I feel I don't even know him. I am questioning what was true with regards to our relationship. I just want to heal and move on. And yes..trying my best to not internalise anything about my worth. I am sorry that you experienced something like this as well. It is hell.

[@followingfenna]

I'm so sorry this happened, seems this ticked all the limerence symptoms/ signs / cliché. Are you oké now ?

[@ArthiGomathinayagam]

@@followingfenna I am getting better. Trying to move on without making him a villain is hard. Coming to terms with his utter lack of consideration has been hard. He seemed to have breadcrumbed me. I wouldn't have realised that had I not read the messages with his LO. He was unrecognisable there. All of that is so heartbreaking.

[@amandagarciapastor6475]

​@@kerrymillar1267exactly like my case. I am anxious attached and the LO of my ex is avodidant, so he became more anxious with her. Giving ger everything I wanted

[@jimdowney6773]

Thank you for the valuable information.

[@followingfenna]

You are very welcome Jim

[@mariad1151]

If Loving You Is Wrong, I Don't Want to Be Right Song by Luther Ingram, 1972 If loving you is wrong, I don't wanna be right If being right means being without you I'd rather live a wrong doing life Your mama and daddy say it's a shame It's a downright disgrace But long as I got you by my side I don't care what your people say Your friends tell you it's no future in loving a married man If I can't see you when I want, I'll see you when I can If loving you is wrong, I don't wanna be right If loving you is wrong, I don't wanna be right Am I wrong to fall so deeply in love with you? Knowing I got a wife and two little children depending on me too And am I wrong to hunger for the gentleness of your touch? Knowing I got someone else at home who needs me just as much And are you wrong to give your love to a married man? And am I wrong for trying to hold on to the best thing I ever had? If loving you is wrong, I don't wanna be right If loving you is wrong, I don't wanna be right Are you wrong to give your love to a married man? And am I wrong for trying to hold on to the best thing I ever had? If loving you is wrong, I don't wanna be right If loving you is wrong, I don't wanna be right I don't wanna be right if it means being without you I don't wanna be right if it means sleeping alone tonight I don't wanna be right if loving you is wrong I don't wanna be right, oh-oh Source: Musixmatch Songwriters: Homer Banks / Raymond E. Jackson / Carl Mitchell Hampton

[@followingfenna]

I'm not sure loving can ever be wrong, but it for sure can hurt like hell :)

[@mariad1151]

@@followingfennaYes, for sure. In old artwork & literature, Cupid is sometimes depicted as demonic. Limerence, & infidelity, must be as old as love itself.

[@mariad1151]

I wonder who changed the concept of "Crystallization" as originally outlined by Dorothy Tennov, originator of the concept of limerence. I wonder why it was done. The beautiful concept, or explanation, of the solidification of the first bloom of romantic love was originally conceived by French writer Stendhal. It is a metaphor based on what happens to a branch left in a salt mine that left alone is transformed into something beautiful.. literally crystalized Limerents see beauty in their beloved. It's a process. Flaws are even transformed by the lover's gaze. Unconditional love pours out from the limerent once it takes hold. That is the original & more true description of a beautiful limerent experience described as Crystallization; everything about LO becomes cloaked in beauty & desirability. (Crystallization is not the dark pathology in that errant description. IDK how, why, or by whom that was drawn up. ). We limerents are NOT crazy.

[@followingfenna]

It was done because some people tend to suffer tremendously, more than others in a more pathological way and "this" destroyed lives and families when they fell in love . Love is still beautiful, being in love is magical but for some people with attachment wounds it also can be very unhealthy, to put it mildly , and this , called limerence, we have to take it seriously.

[@mariad1151]

Isn't it fair to limit limerence to a state of mind or a state of being? Often temporary for folks who couple. Because once behavior is called limerence, it's mislabeled. Stalking is stalking; cheatging is cheating; gaslighting is gaslighting. Limerence is an internal & inert state. Once behavior or action is in play, it becomes something else IMO

[@mariad1151]

Question: If the first throes of love is not considered limerence as 50% of the population experienced according to Dorothy Tennov, & limerence is universally considered pathological nowadays, then what bonds couples? I wonder if that is what is causing the breakdown in coupling that the dating coaches talk about. It seems relationships nowadays are encouraged to be formed by rational principles, not feeling. How did (do) non limerents bond? To me, that bonding is less than; it is diseased. It's the coupling of old--like arranged marriage for wealth or political reasons. Are folks coupling based in mere friendship & shared interests & no one feels compelling & overwhelming attraction & desire/limerence? What a shame!

[@followingfenna]

Of course people come together because they feel attracted and butterflies, as it should, , and for me, if people are happy, go for it. The problem is people in limerence ( and I'm not talking about the early stage of healthy pair bonding) are misserable, suicidal and suffering. And then it's my duty to inform them about what is going on and how to get happy / their life back. Fortunately most people don't ever get to experience the missarable addictive horrible limerence pain.

[@mariad1151]

​@@followingfenna Yes, you even help us here on KZbin, & I appreciate that. You're really the only one I trust on the subject on KZbin. Every influencer on YT seems to make up their own definition & parameters of limerence. It's a thing or it's not. I'm listening to Tennov on audio book, tho I've read the book before, & she distinctly states limerence is NOT abnormal or pathological. She states she is one of us! It's maddening to hear folks making up their own definitions & criteria for limerence. There is a very old, ugly guy on utube who cheated on his wife & went back to her after his LO was done w him, & he's built up a whole psychology of his own based on his own personal experience. He's the one who defines crystallization as some false memories in a marriage/relationship; Tennov did not. Her definition of crystallization was based on Stendal's--the first knowing/realization of love. Moreover, Tennov was putting together a theory, not trying to appease a cuckolded wife. Crappy Childhood Fairy, another influencer, says limerence is loving someone you can't have. She does go on to make up other things too that I won't stipulate here. Regardless, Tennov speaks distinctly of a husband who was limerent for his wife throughout their marriage & until she died. He remarried & was not limerent for his new wife. So CCF is clearly making stuff up--saying limerence is what it is not. This is a problem for us. The agony of limerence is something I know all too well. But it has an element of ecstasy, too. Perhaps it's not possible to have one wo the other. Beyond that, it's simply a state of being. Folks can be liars, cheaters, stalkers, psychopaths & limerent, too. It doesn't mean limerence is or causes those other pathologies. Limerence is its own (misunderstood) thing.

[@mariad1151]

Isn't this a bit of an obviscation? One's partner falling in love w someone else is real. Why would anyone say it's not? What do people do? Deny it & move forward? Who is to say what love is real & which is not? This is confusing. Back in the day, folks had affairs--men mostly. They stayed married. What is that? Can one love two people? Obligation taking precedence?

[@followingfenna]

Of course the being in love part is real, but I've seen devastating situations where people would leave their kids and after the affair ended, since the statistics are against them, they could not reconseil with their kids, limerence can really mess up people's lifes. I'm not against poli relationships but trust is often broken when people have secret affairs.

[@mariad1151]

TY Fenna. You are the best. I can't unwind this one. This is all a ploy & gaslighting as far as I see it. Crystallization is gaslighting bc if someone sees a relationship in a specific way, they are entitled to their perspective. To say otherwise is gaslighting-- to impose one's own perspective & say the other is crazy. Children should be given their due consideration. Loving outside a marriage is not an excuse to be cruel to children. That's something completely different. "Limerence" in this context is not something that can be understood. The only way it can make sense is by describing the limerent as crazy. The limerent may just love another. Limerence is not an excuse for bad or cruel behavior, but it's not pathology in & of itself to love another. I guess this is to question the reason for delegitimizing one love & not the other. Who makes these decisions? The spouse? The counselor? How is anyone else qualified to make a judgement? Love is completely subjective. Is it manipulative & a power play to say someone else is limerent, no?