What’s Love Got To Do With It?
Hey there, Victoria here again. I'm so glad you're back for another deep dive into the world of love and attachment. Today, we're discussing a topic that's close to my heart: love addiction.
Now, let's get one thing straight. If you've never heard of love addiction, or if it makes you scrunch up your nose like you've just bitten into a lemon, I completely understand. Love addiction, as explained by the expert Pia Mellody, is a condition where people continuously find themselves in harmful relationships, often because they can't tolerate being alone. They're dependent on others for their self-worth and identity, and they're plagued by this gnawing fear of abandonment. This fear drives them to stay in or repeatedly enter into relationships that are emotionally, physically, or otherwise destructive.
If you're thinking this sounds a lot like codependency, you're right! Love addiction and codependency often go hand-in-hand, but there's a distinction. You can be codependent without being a love addict, but if you're a love addict, you're definitely also codependent.
Now, let's get into the nitty-gritty of a phenomenon known as the anxious-avoidant spiral. This is a cycle where the love addict (the anxiously attached individual) and their partner (often avoidantly attached) are in a perpetual dance of push-and-pull. The love addict seeks closeness, while their partner pulls away, creating a spiral that only heightens the love addict's anxiety.
The symptoms of being caught in this spiral can include:
A constant need for reassurance from your partner
Fear of rejection or abandonment
Difficulty in setting and maintaining boundaries
A tendency to lose yourself in relationships, forgetting your own needs and wants
A pattern of being attracted to emotionally unavailable partners
But remember, codependency and love addiction, while related, are not the same. Codependency involves a habitual system of thinking, feeling, and behaving toward oneself and others that can cause pain. Codependent behaviors or habits are self-destructive, covering up or avoiding acknowledging the pain of unmet emotional needs from early childhood.
On the other hand, love addiction is an addiction to the feelings of being in love, the euphoria, and the “high” that comes with intense romantic relationships. It's not about the person you're with, but rather the intense feelings that person brings out in you.
So there you have it, a crash course in love addiction, codependency, and the anxious-avoidant spiral. Remember, knowledge is power, and understanding these concepts is the first step towards healthier, more fulfilling relationships. And as always, I'm here to help you navigate these sometimes choppy waters of love and attachment.
Want to dive deeper?
My free Codependency Bundle is a great place to start!
