Many with this label feel like healthier relationships, self-love, and self-control are a far-away dream. It is important to note that “love addiction” has not been classified as an official diagnosis. Many mental health professionals take issue with attaching the designation of “addiction” to what is considered a passion-related behavior. However, the term “love addiction” can be very useful in understanding specific problematic relationship patterns and behaviors.

Intensive Workshop: Break The Pattern Of Love Addiction

According to Dye, including love addiction in the DSM could also inspire more psychologists to receive formal training for unhealthy feelings and behaviors around love. As a relationship progresses, this addiction-like dynamic between two partners usually subsides. But a person who may have an unhealthy relationship to love may not want those initial feelings of intensity to go away. Addiction starts with a choice—a choice to use a drug or take a drink. But that’s a choice many of us have made without becoming addicted. In fact, about five out of six people who try a drug will not get hooked on it.

Signs of love addiction

Addiction can have a detrimental effect on communication, potentially resulting in tension, confusion, and discord. Poor communication skills and misunderstandings between partners can further strain the relationship and hinder the ability to rebuild trust and emotional intimacy. “One time, I was on Tinder numbing my feelings away and I told this dude that I matched with, ‘Hey, I shouldn’t be on here. I am a love and seggs addict,” said another Tiktoker with the handle Stephanie Rey, using internet slang for sex. If you believe that your well being is at risk because of mental health issues that you can not safely manage, you should speak to a licensed therapist. Circumstances like these, and others, can lead to an adult life spent craving attention and reassurance.

What Is Love Addiction?

They are fearful of being alone or rejected, so they endlessly search for that special someone to make them feel whole. How could I be addicted to something that I had never experienced? This “Love Addiction” term on-boarded so much shame and anxiety. I have had relationships with other people when a partner and I break up repeatedly and get back when you love an addict together. I find myself in rocky and/or dramatic relationships with highs and lows (romantic, family, and friend relationships).

Like other addictions, love addiction is often the result of insecure attachment patterns. Love addicts tend to select partners who have a fear of intimacy and will neglect the relationship. Yet, the love addict maintains a fantasy that everything will get better, their partner will change, and they will finally receive the love and fulfilment they so desperately crave. In cases where anxiety exists, meditation and cultivating self-love can work wonders to bring the focus back to the individual suffering, while allowing them to build self-worth and fill the void. For trauma, therapists in inpatient rehab facilities can both help provide helpful insight, while recognizing unhealthy patterns from childhood or adulthood that can impact diagnosing unhealthy patterns or behavior.

Types of Love Addiction Dynamics

There’s always some idealization in a new relationship, but true love endures when that fades. As the relationship grows, we develop trust and greater closeness. We want to share more of our time and life together, including our problems and friends and family.

• In a healthy relationship, the ability to enjoy some “me time“ can be as valuable as your experiences together.
• These feelings of euphoria may lead to infatuation and even obsession.
• They are solely driven by not only a psychological but also a physiological need to continue using, and those drug, or alcohol-related needs are their number one priority.
• This fantasy becomes like a lifeline and it keeps the relationship going.
• This can be damaging to both partners, as the codependent partner may become resentful.

Love and an unhealthy attachment may coexist or be hard to differentiate. Because with addiction, we tend to idealize and often happily self-sacrifice for our partner. When differences and serious problems are largely ignored, minimized, or rationalized, we’re not really seeing or loving the whole person. Denial is a symptom of addiction and supports a compulsion to cling to the relationship.

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