How do you know if you've fallen out of love?

You never stop loving someone but there will come a time where you feel ok about it.

When the butterflies fly out of your belly.

In my experience, if you are questioning your love, chances are it’s already waned.

When you come home from work to find the entire house empty of it’s contents! you can be pretty sure then! :-/

@ChazMaz…Do you think so? Do you think that people who are married for 20 years and never divorce and seem happy…still have butterflies when they are with each other? Or do you think they just look at the practicality and stay anyway?

I wonder, wmspotts…if you mean that “passion” is gone? Rather than love?

I’ve been in your situation….in my case, it was betrayal of a very deep nature. I did feel like second choice (or third..or “take a number”). For me, I felt that what happened was so painful and trust was totally gone…even though I could forgive the person, I was never comfortable with them again. My love for them had to change or it would have swallowed me up whole…I was losing myself and that is not healthy.

I think that there has to be a willingness on the offended party to want to make it work…and then the offender (for want of a better word) will also have to do some work on themselves. Is it possible for love to come back? I think it is, but it takes a lot of commitment to healing, possibly therapy and being honest enough to know if there is hope at all.

Anything is possible…you hear of couples who have been through hell and come out the other side and stronger. It’s really your call….to do what you feel is best and healthy for you. And whether the other person wants you, too. Or wants out.

I would get some counselling….even if it is only for you…to figure out what you need for your soul to be healed. I am not sure if you were talking about your partner feeling like “second choice” or you? Either way….it would help to talk to someone. I think.

After you have worked on your relationship consciously using either marriage counseling or Getting the Love You Want by Harville Hendrix.

If you just have drifted out of love, then you do not know whether you really love someone or not. You have to put some conscious effort into it.

“Do you think that people who are married for 20 years and never divorce and seem happy…still have butterflies when they are with each other? ”

Some do, some hang onto the convince of it. Love, taking on a much different dynamic.
Passion is always the first to go.

For me personally, there have been times in my past where I just knew that I no longer loved the person I was with. I could feel the difference in myself and I knew that it wasn’t going to come back.

@ChazMaz…Thanks for that….passion is the first to go. Shame, really. Though I know some old people (at a home) that still adore each other. I do think some relationships do last like that. (Okay, so I have to believe that…to give myself hope.)

@marinelife…Definitely a great book. And if you @wmspotts want to go even further, find a therapist/counsellor who does “Imago Therapy” which is the type associated with this book.

You know, I am convinced that sometimes you may not know you’re no longer in love and that something finally wakes you up and you look around and see everything for what it truly is.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir – I concur. :-)

@Simone_De_Beauvoir Good answer!

No one stays in love constantly forever. The “in love” is cyclic over years. That’s not the same as true love, which is always there keeping you close and committed.

That “close and committed” is love.

There is no definitive point. It is something that each individual must decide for his or herself. And any rule that anyone gives you, in my opinion, is pretty bogus, because there are no rules that can account for the differences between all of us.

It’s a cost benefit analysis, and only you know the costs and the benefits. You have moral and ethical concerns, financial concerns, perhaps children, issues of safety, issues of abuse, issues of abandonment—and so much more. And they are all different for every person.

When you don’t miss them like you used to.

i dont feel butterflies anymore but i still love my baby very much and can’t think of life without him, but when i was with my ex, i put up with a lot of sh!@#$%^&* and actually never had the thought of leaving him, i just wantee to work things out you know after spending 2 years of my life with him, one day i woke up and the love just wasn’t there anymore, and it just hit me, like i went to bed loving him but woke up the next day ready to move on, and it sounds impossible, i would not believe it if it didn’t happen to me but, when u love somebody you just know and vice versa, circumstances drove us away after that but even if it didn’t some thing are just not meant to be, and im glad is that way

I know what it’s like to love someone but not be in love with them or want to be romantic/sexual with them any longer. Lots of things factor in like hearing a put down one too many times, getting your hopes up for better behavior from your partner and being let down over and over again to where you are mad for believing in them in the first place, stuff like that.

Feeling like 2nd choice though is harsh because figuring how much is insecurity and how much is your partner’s lack of attention or value of you and sometimes it doesn’t matter, sometimes gone is gone. I’ve never been able to get the feeling back once any hurt or bitterness has killed the romance feeling part.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir…...Great answer! Thanks for that!

@ChazMaz @DarlingRhadamanthus @Disc2021 :)

When you know that you care more about your feelings than you do about theirs and you are uninterested in doing anything to change it, then you no longer love them enough to stay.

I put effort into my relationship with my wife every single day. She does the same.
If that stopped, we would find the problem and do whatever it took to restore the relationship.

You have a valid point Neizvestnaya. It’s a definite combination of my partner’s actions/inaction and my own insecurities. What the ratio is I don’t know, but it’s important because I can try and fix things on my end with insecurities. However, I can’t do much for the way he feels and acts.
I love him so much as a person and soul but something changed. That indefinable feeling is gone and I want it back.

@wrmspotts
Try to talk about it with him as soon as possible. If you have to then each of you write down things that have hurt you or rubbed you the wrong way even if you think they’re trivial because when the other person reads your list then some of those things might not be trivial to them. Most of us are programmed to “not sweat the small stuff” and so bitterness and suspicion have a place to take hold. I’ve come to the way of thinking of it the stuff is small then there should be small harm in acknowledging it, talking about it and getting on with the big picture. So many times I wish I had been able to do this in my past and that’s why I try now to pay attention. You never know, you might get something back :)

@Neizvestnaya gives you good advice. Work on reconnecting. Invest 15 minutes a day together giving each other your unlimited attention with not complaints or criticisms. Praise each other, hold each other if you want. I suggest no sex for the first week of this.