Love Addiction Symptoms

It is one thing to be hopelessly in love with your partner and completely different thing to be obsessed with them! Love is a feeling which is strengthened by companionship and friendship. Obsession, on the other hand, is all about controlling and possessing your partner.

Not many realize this, but just as an excessive craving for alcohol is called alcohol addiction and needs to be treated immediately, an uncontrolled urge to fall in love or become obsessed with one's partner, is termed as love addiction. Yes! just like any other obsessive compulsive disorder, it needs treatment too. The below given symptoms will help you identify this problem and seek immediate medical attention.

What is Love Addiction?

If you look at any healthy relationship, it goes through certain stages. The initial attraction leads to dating and getting to know each other phase. This is followed by a feeling of emotional intimacy and further the bond is made stronger by sexual ties. Commitment and a shared future are sought after by the two people in love. Now compare this with a love addiction.

In many cases, it is one sided love. A person who suffers from obsessive love disorder may actually start feeling attached to the person he is attracted to, without even knowing them. The initial feelings of attraction are so strong that the addicted person starts to idolize the other person. The obsessed person starts thinking that only this one person in the entire world can make him happy. For him, this new person in his life is absolutely perfect, with no flaws whatsoever. In obsessive love addiction, it does not take long for a person to lose touch with reality. Such a person lives in his illusionary world and due to his obsessive attachment, may experience a lot of suffering or may resort to unacceptable behavior.

Another case of love addiction is what we see in relationships. When one of the partners becomes so possessive of the other, that he makes it almost impossible for the other one to live freely. The obsessive partner starts to control the life of the other, gets jealous without any rhyme or reason and may try to isolate his partner from all friends and family.

Symptoms

Knowing the symptoms is very important so that steps can be taken to get over this relationship issue. Here are the most commonly observed symptoms.

• A string of unsuccessful relationships
• Inability to survive without a relationship, leading to one relationship after another
• Lack of care, love and attention during childhood
• A lot of anger inside due to abnormal childhood
• Hiding sensitivity, emotionality and pain from others
• A feeling of loneliness and detachment from everybody
• Inability to trust anyone
• Perceiving sex and love as being equal to basic needs such as food
• Living a double life
• Trying to control and manipulate others
• Avoiding all kinds of problems
• Using love, relationships and sex to compensate for failures in life or to get over pain
• Readiness to do, give up or sacrifice anything to hold on to a relationship
• Maintaining a calm exterior to hide the inner turmoil, anxiety and depression
• Displaying a high risk behavior
• Possessing a frantic personality
• Willing to indulge in sex in return for love

As soon as the symptoms are recognized, one should start seeking obsessive love treatment. As love addiction is a way to get over one's feelings of inadequacy, emptiness and loneliness, an addicted person should try to get engaged in activities which add meaning to his life. Taking up a hobby and working for people in need are some of the ways to beat this addiction. Building bonds with friends and nurturing relationships with one's family, instead of solely depending upon the romantic partner for emotional fulfillment will do wonders for love addicts. However, getting over any mental illness, on one's own, is almost impossible. Moreover, a person might suffer from love addiction withdrawal symptoms too. So, going in for psychotherapy should definitely be looked at, to treat this disorder and to ensure healthy relationships in the future!