People who have loved more than once, was it ever as intense as your first love?

[alsudduth]

Yes and Yes. I would say I have been in love 3 times. You love each one passionately and differently, but it's always with a crazy intensity.

 

The other thing about love, is that I feel like you truly love someone when even if it doesn't work out, you still love that person. There is always room for them in your heart regardless of whether you are a couple or not.

[jen1447]

Perfectly articulated and bang on.

 

I also think that as you grow both in age and in experience your views on love grow, as well as your capacity to love.

 

Who I was at 19 and in love is different than being in love again at 45. That's not to take anything away from past loves but rather to acknowledge that love has the ability to expand and shift but is just as intense and wonderful as the very first time.

 

 

Great points. My first real love back in high school was extremely intense (and devastating when it failed), but it's just as intense now w/one of my GFs (I love all my significants in different ways ), but the main difference is how I handle that love personally. A very young person deeply in love is like a child wandering thru a minefield, but a grown person deeply in love knows all the safe pathways thru it.

[Got it]

Yes and Yes. I would say I have been in love 3 times. You love each one passionately and differently, but it's always with a crazy intensity.

 

The other thing about love, is that I feel like you truly love someone when even if it doesn't work out, you still love that person. There is always room for them in your heart regardless of whether you are a couple or not.

 

I disagree. I loved my ex husband, of that I am sure, but I do not love him now. I loved him as the 17 year old when I met him, I loved him as the young adult that I was, immature in thinking but consistent in feelings, I loved him for many many years.

 

But love does die out. Love, that is not nurtured, developed, and grown will die out.

 

While I love him for the person he was in my life, for the memories that we have shared and the growing up we did together, I can't say he is in my heart or I love him.

 

It is just about thinking back fondly and being thankful for the experiences.

[leavesonautumn]

Yes.

 

My first love was my high school boyfriend, I honestly believe that even if he didn't move away after we graduated, we would have broken up at some point just due to changing and maturing. I felt like I loved him intensely... then I met my third boyfriend at age 21 and fell very hard for him, very quickly. The problem with the intensity was that it was a roller coaster. It was a high like no other but the bad times caused a lot of stress and pain. The love still felt intense and I felt like I'd never be able to meet anyone the same way I felt for him. What I learned was that was a good thing. I never, ever want anything like that again. It was obsession, toxic and unhealthy. It took a while to realize it was an abusive relationship and while I forgave him, I don't hold any love for him in my heart anymore. Which proves to me it wasn't "love" anyway.

 

With my current boyfriend, it does feel intense but there's a calmness to it, I feel at peace. I'd much rather have this feeling then that intense "I need you now and always" feeling.

 

It's not that you can never feel anything as intense as a previous love, it's that it's different every time.

[anna121]

Yes. First time is always intense. But each time after that has been equally, if not more, so.

 

Remember too - intensity fades over time and you are then left with the relationship good or bad.

[SilentiousBird]

Yes, sometimes even more intense, but also sometimes a little less intense. Each time I've fallen in love, my feelings surrounding it have been different, just like each person has been different.