Can you love someone you havn't met?

Conjurus, it is because there are different kinds of love.  I have met people in my mispent youth (and not so youth) who have made my heart leap into my mouth, made me obsessed and think about them all the time, made me want to do anything to make them happy, want to spend all my time with them, generally have the flu like symptoms one associates with being in love.  But...sometimes, these were BAD people to be 'in love' with.  So, when you start getting these worrying symptoms, you take a stap back.  You look at the situation and realise "okay, if I keep hanging out with this guy, I know I will fall deeply, deeply in love, but I know he is going to break my heart just like the last guy did, cos he's a baaaad man".  So you call, you say "you're cute, but I can't see you anymore" and you walk away, probably with a good old cry, but knowing it's the right thing.

And then you meet someone who you think is great, who you get on brilliantly with, and who you think is a potential.  And you hang out with them because they are a good guy, and you are so similar, and you get to know eachother, and before you know it it is three years later and you realise that you are going to be with them for the rest of your life and you have a love with is a million times stronger than your 'love' for the others.  You made a choice. You took control.

Vicky

Yes you chose to not see the guy anymore, but right then, at that moment, did you choose to turn your love off? If so that's a cool ability. I just dont have that ability. If I love someone, I cant help it even if they do have bad things about them.

Yes you chose to not see the guy anymore, but right then, at that moment, did you choose to turn your love off? If so that's a cool ability. I just dont have that ability. If I love someone, I cant help it even if they do have bad things about them.

It's not a cool ability, it's just something that has to be done.  And it's not instant, I was cut up for weeks, but I can certainly say that I don't love him anymore.  It has taken a long time to realise that this is possible, but it is.  It's kind of like when your favourite footballer leaves your team.  You are devestated, because you just worshipped him, but when he signs for the opposition you have to force yourself to forget him, and you do.

My God, there is a football analogy for everything! 

One of my best girlfriends is miserable because she's all alone, but yet she rejects every guy we try to set her up with, i.e. doesn't even go out with in the first place because he doesn't meet her "criteria".  She refuses to try online dating as well.  She is convinced her prince charming is just going to fall from the sky and sweep her off her feet, like in the movies.  You just want to smack her and go "life is not a frickin fairy tale!!!"  She's 29 and she's not a daft girl, so I just don't get it...

She's not miserable because she is all alone, she is miserable because she chooses to be, and because she thinks that being in a relationship is the most important thing in the world, which it isn't.  She may be 29, but she is daft.  I have a male friend who is 30 who is similar.  He does loads of internet dating, but never gets past the first date. Even when he does he constructs some 'problem' with her and doesn't see her again, because she isn't perfect.  Perhaps we should introduce them!

Vicky

Yes you chose to not see the guy anymore, but right then, at that moment, did you choose to turn your love off?

It's not real love because in order to really love someone else, you have to love and respect yourself first, and that includes distancing yourself from people you know you don't deserve.

It's strong feelings that you chose to step away from knowing that they'll wane with time and space and you do so because, on a mature level, you know it is not in your own best interest to nourish those feelings.

It's sort of like, when you drink alcohol when you know you have to get up early the next day.  You learn to stop drinking at a certain point and go home because it spares your having a miserable hangover the next day.  It's not that you don't enjoy alcohol or hanging out with your friends, just that you enjoy hangovers even less or their negative consequences outweigh the positives of getting utterly hammered so you call it an early night.

She's not miserable because she is all alone, she is miserable because she chooses to be, and because she thinks that being in a relationship is the most important thing in the world, which it isn't.  She may be 29, but she is daft.  I have a male friend who is 30 who is similar.  He does loads of internet dating, but never gets past the first date. Even when he does he constructs some 'problem' with her and doesn't see her again, because she isn't perfect.  Perhaps we should introduce them!

Vicky

Yeap, that's her pinned- she thinks she must be in a relationship to be happy.  I try to tell her to just get involved with things she loves that make her happy and she'll be able to meet someone along the way.  But she doesn't see that way! Sounds like we should introduce your friend to my friend! 

Yeap, that's her pinned- she thinks she must be in a relationship to be happy.  I try to tell her to just get involved with things she loves that make her happy and she'll be able to meet someone along the way.  But she doesn't see that way! Sounds like we should introduce your friend to my friend! 

Oh, I know people in their 50s like that!  Still not getting the message, with a string of divorces and broken relationships and sadly, often enough, kids in tow. 

Im just trying to understand. When I love someone, Im stuck on them until they get rid of me. Probably one of my faults. Ah well.

You can call me Jess

Jess, I hope that you never have to do as several of us here have had to have done, and that everything works out with this lady in the UK.  But, and I am sorry if I sound patronising, but me, expat, phatbeetle, we are ladies who are (I think) about 10 years older than you, and I know I have...how shall I put this...been around the block a bit.  I've had every relationship problem known to man (test me!) and I happen to think that *most* of the time it takes a bit of experience to know when to walk away, and to learn that it is possible to walk away.  And until you meet the right person (again, I hope you have already) then you need the ability to do that.

Funnily enough, I am watching 'West Side Story' as I am writing this.  When I was 22 I thought it was beautiful and romantic.  Now, I am screaming at Maria to bloody well run!!! 

Vicky

Eh there's overlooking flaws and then there's putting up with abuse/infidelity/incompatibility in life goals.  My ex was pretty much a value meal of all three, and I loved him when I left him.  It took me a couple years to stop loving him, but leaving him was one of the best things I did for myself.  I wish I left him sooner, but what's done is done.

The love I felt for him was a lot different than the love my husband and I share.  My ex and I were like friends who slept together.  We never really had the intimacy (emotional, spiritual, life, not sexual) that I think you need in a relationship.  There was always a wall.  Don't get me wrong; I think friendship is a very important part of a relationship.  It's just not the only element.

When someone says that they overlook flaws, I hope they mean personal habits, shortcomings, personality issues/minor flaws and not the biggies like contempt, abuse, cheating, or forcing the person to sacrifice personal dreams and goals.

Im just trying to understand. When I love someone, Im stuck on them until they get rid of me. Probably one of my faults. Ah well.

You can call me Jess

That would really suck if you were married to someone else or had a family with someone and then 'fell in love' with someone else.

Funnily enough, I am watching 'West Side Story' as I am writing this.  When I was 22 I thought it was beautiful and romantic.  Now, I am screaming at Maria to bloody well run!!! 

Its the best thing she can do!  Run far, far away!!!! 

A boy like that, he keel her bruther!

Its the best thing she can do!  Run far, far away!!!! 

Snap!

My mom was 22 going on 35 when she was younger.

We asked her the story of her and Dad once.

So she told us chirpily - she's always been a happy, practical soul.

She mentioned they'd been going out a couple of years when he proposed.  

We said, 'Oh, Mama, what if he hadn't asked you to marry him?'

She didn't miss a beat.  She said, 'Then I'd have found someone else to marry.'

And she would have!

In June, she and Dad will celebrate their 45th anniversary.

I had a teacher once who told us she had only known her husband for 2 weeks before running off to Vegas to tie the knot. She said "Why would I wait when I have the rest of my life to get to know him?" They were married for over 40 years, and she said she was still getting to know him a bit better every day. 

I had a teacher once who told us she had only known her husband for 2 weeks before running off to Vegas to tie the knot. She said "Why would I wait when I have the rest of my life to get to know him?" They were married for over 40 years, and she said she was still getting to know him a bit better every day. 

My mom's parents were a bit like that.  My gran was a French tutor in a big house where one of my grandfather's sisters was working as a domestic.  My gran was relatively new, from France (she was brought up in a Catholic orphanage), with no family, so my great-aunt invited her to a dance (back in the days before TV and computers!).  My grandfather saw her talking to his sister across a room and told his pals, 'See that lady there in the cherry-print dress talking to Delia?  Well, I'm going to marry her.'  They all laughed at him, but he said, 'Excuse me, gentlemen, while I ask my wife for a dance.'

Being the eldest boy who had a total of 9 sisters, my grandfather was an exceptional dancer.

My gran said his sister introduced them, he asked for a dance and she said the moment his feet started moving she just knew.

3 months later, they were married and were so until he died 44 years later.

In fact, it's possible to love all kinds of things you've never met - handbags, shoes, money, lipsticks, clothes, etc.

Well shoes, of course. Though sadly I have fallen in love with the photo of a pair of shoes only to be disappointed in the physical connection when we meet in person. Back to Zappos with you!

On a more serious note, I have had great connections online and on the phone with people only to have it not be as good in person. The energy of a person when you are face to face is very different than over the phone, skype or email.

But I don't think I could sustain a LDR anyway. I need the physical connection. I've broken up with people in my own town when the physical fades away.

Luckily for me, I'm only going to the UK for grad school.

I do wish I would fall in love, though! But I just don't know what country I'll be living in after grad school.