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What is the difference between loving someone and being "in love" with someone?


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So my ex gf broke up with me because she was no longer "in love" with me but loved me still. My question is there really a huge difference between being "in love" and loving someone? Does this always happen in long term relationships? Like does the "romantic love" eventually just die down and become that realistic love that every married couple has? I think she just wanted to get that "romantic" high from someone new and forgot what true and real love is about. I loved her, but I also didn't feel that initial excitement romantic phase love for her. Does this always happen? Any opinions on this? We were together for 3.5 years.

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So my ex gf broke up with me because she was no longer "in love" with me but loved me still. My question is there really a huge difference between being "in love" and loving someone? Does this always happen in long term relationships? Like does the "romantic love" eventually just die down and become that realistic love that every married couple has? I think she just wanted to get that "romantic" high from someone new and forgot what true and real love is about. I loved her, but I also didn't feel that initial excitement romantic phase love for her. Does this always happen? Any opinions on this? We were together for 3.5 years.

 

People get bored after being in long term relationships. It's too routine and boring and sometimes people just want to feel excited again. So its normal. Tough, but you have to accept this.

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dannykeyz831

She loves you like how she loves her mom, dad, siblings. Being in love with someone means loving them romantically.

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Sav, once again, is right. All relationships go through this and it shows maturity plus understanding to work through this. More commonly it is attraction buy yeah.

 

PS Not to jack the thread, Sav my ex f is from Singapore :p

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Sav, once again, is right. All relationships go through this and it shows maturity plus understanding to work through this. More commonly it is attraction buy yeah.

 

PS Not to jack the thread, Sav my ex f is from Singapore :p

 

:confused: Judging from your age (20+?) I would think that I dont know her :D. I'm only 19 and have only a few friends older than me.

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Digon,

 

There is a difference. Some people have different priorities than others and if you follow certain cliches, you can pretty much deduce them. Basically "in love" is that sweaty palms, butterflies in the stomach, heart beats faster feeling. It's the feeling you get when the relationship is new or there's lots of drama or just a heightened excited to see them feeling. To love someone is different. To me, loving someone means that they mean alot to you and you would go out of your way to do things just to make them happy. You would feel responsible for them in a way and generally it's more of a long term feeling.

 

Some people are what I call "in love with being 'in love'". That was, they will abandon perfectly good stable relationships where they love someone and that other person loves them back to pursue something new because they do feel that "high" anymore. I've seen it in men and women alike. It's the reason why supposedly girls like bad boys and guys like bad girls. You can be "in love" because there's lots of drama. They seem exciting. They will never love you because the love part will seem boring in comparison. Love is meant for long term, because once you love something you never want it out of your life.

 

And if you like science, I'll even break it down to you this way. Look up the chemicals "dopamine" and "oxytocin". Dopamine is the high you feel in love. People who smoke do so to feel it and people who use cocaine do that to feel it too. Oxytocin is love. It's what makes you bond with someone. Mothers have a surge of it when they hold their babies and there are experiments that should that people who had one-night-stands DO NOT secrete this as opposed to people in long committed relationships.

 

If your ex didn't understand this after 3 and a half years, she's just being immature. Let her find out the hard way why she'll always have something missing in her life. Good luck to you.

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What's the difference?

 

The "I love you, but I'm not IN love with you" speech usually means that there's someone else. That's the difference. I've been on here a while and I've NEVER seen a thread that started out with the "ILYBINILWY" speech and not have someone else in the picture, or someone waiting in the wings.

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What's the difference?

 

The "I love you, but I'm not IN love with you" speech usually means that there's someone else. That's the difference. I've been on here a while and I've NEVER seen a thread that started out with the "ILYBINILWY" speech and not have someone else in the picture, or someone waiting in the wings.

 

Ouch, the way you put it. But then again, the someone else is a person that your partner seeks to feel "in love" and "excited" again. After awhile she's gonna get bored and there goes the relationship. :bunny: It's just immaturity in my opinion.

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in love - consumption

loving - investment

 

 

The way I look at it is that 'in love' is feeling a certain way. Like if the relationship is going great and everyone is happy horny etc, that is 'in love'.

 

loving, as a verb, is investing in the relationship, patching things up, supporting each other, keeping the relationship is good health. This is active and requires effort.

 

 

Your ex admits that she's not "in love", she doesn't want to invest anymore (therefore no longer loves you).

 

Logically, she wants nothing to do with you.

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This is just my opinion. I dont think there is a difference between love and inlove. You either love someone or you dont,its as simple as that. The feelings i had for my ex and previous ex's have all been the same love feelin,theres no other feeling involved,yeah theres the excitement part which we all have at the beginning of a RS but i dont class the excitement as the "inlove part" Basically im saying inlove and love is the same feeling,people just define it differently,but like i said,its only my opinion.

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Well I've dated people I was excited to see and made me feel good in the first stage of dating which was very nice. However, I've only had a few men who released butterflies in my stomach, fast heartbeat, sweaty hands and such at the mere thought of them.

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Oh we definintely did have that sweaty butterfly feeling when we first met. It was amazing and awesome and we worked well together so that's why we were together for so long. But then she got bored and didn't feel "in love" when I just think she is being immature and doesn't understand what truly loving someone means. That long term love where you try to work through things and patch things up. I think she forgot about all that and tried to seek a new high. (There was another man) And she claims he makes her happy when she seems him but then is depressed as hell when she doesn't and she says she misses me when that happens. She failed to realize our strong stable relationship was what she sholud have been focusing on patching instead of diverting her attention to just some fling.

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It is situation I guess but still it is pretty simple that in most cases there is immaturity in the person saying this line and also very good chance there is someone else in the picture.

 

God knows when I got something along the "I love you, but not in love with you..." line there was someone else for sure.

 

@Sav

 

Yeah she is 23 right now I believe. Sure do miss the Singapore food though :\

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Digon,

 

There is a difference. Some people have different priorities than others and if you follow certain cliches, you can pretty much deduce them. Basically "in love" is that sweaty palms, butterflies in the stomach, heart beats faster feeling. It's the feeling you get when the relationship is new or there's lots of drama or just a heightened excited to see them feeling. To love someone is different. To me, loving someone means that they mean alot to you and you would go out of your way to do things just to make them happy. You would feel responsible for them in a way and generally it's more of a long term feeling.

 

Some people are what I call "in love with being 'in love'". That was, they will abandon perfectly good stable relationships where they love someone and that other person loves them back to pursue something new because they do feel that "high" anymore. I've seen it in men and women alike. It's the reason why supposedly girls like bad boys and guys like bad girls. You can be "in love" because there's lots of drama. They seem exciting. They will never love you because the love part will seem boring in comparison. Love is meant for long term, because once you love something you never want it out of your life.

 

And if you like science, I'll even break it down to you this way. Look up the chemicals "dopamine" and "oxytocin". Dopamine is the high you feel in love. People who smoke do so to feel it and people who use cocaine do that to feel it too. Oxytocin is love. It's what makes you bond with someone. Mothers have a surge of it when they hold their babies and there are experiments that should that people who had one-night-stands DO NOT secrete this as opposed to people in long committed relationships.

 

If your ex didn't understand this after 3 and a half years, she's just being immature. Let her find out the hard way why she'll always have something missing in her life. Good luck to you.

 

 

Wow that was very interesting to read. I think I agree with pretty much everything you wrote. Actually I do agree with everything.

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