I Can’t Live Without You: Love Addiction

Many girls tend to lose themselves in a relationship and become obsessed with their partner once they start dating.

They work daily to please their partner, yearning for their constant attention. But if they find out their partner is not as invested as they are, they feel disappointed and hurt.

This is actually a case of love addiction.

Charles Darwin once said:

“Species have dependencies to promote their growth. If humans do not depend on their environment, they will depend on another person emotionally — a dependence on the mother is called ‘Oedipus complex,’ and a dependence on the father is called ‘Electra complex’.”

Our “emotional dependency” can also be manifested as dependence on friends, superiors, subordinates, organizations, pets, and even inanimate objects like dolls.

People with dependent personalities have a deep, blind, and excessive craving for intimacy and belonging.

This craving is generally irrational and only stems from emotional needs. They constantly seek warmth from their partner to find “support,” and can even give up their own beliefs and personal interests.

Under this kind of internal drive, people with dependent personalities become more and more fragile and lazy.

They lack autonomy in their actions, constantly compromising in order to gain their partner’s attention and love.

People with love addiction often live a very suppressed life, which further prevents them from living for themselves, and sometimes even leads to more anxiety and depression.

Experts believe that women are more prone to emotional dependency due to their gentle and weak personalities. These women often have monotonous and simple lives, with limited exposure to people and things.

Having a narrow social circle, they easily place all their emotions and happiness on another person, making them susceptible to dependency.

However, for the person being depended on, this process is also painful, often accompanied by indescribable pressure.

In addition, women who are accustomed to dependence, once their dependent object no longer exists or suddenly stops working, will also fall into a state of anxiety and unease.

Some people alleviate the pain of not being satisfied with their dependence by suppressing their emotions, and gradually, these emotions may evolve into depression.

In fact, there are several reasons for the occurrence of love addiction:

1. Individuals lack confidence or have low self-evaluation, and are afraid of losing their partner or being abandoned.
2. According to expert surveys, people with dependency disorders have more dopamine (a substance that easily produces pleasure) secreted in their brains than normal people. Dopamine secretion is originally intended to neutralize the secretion of norepinephrine caused by anxiety and loneliness, but excessive dopamine secretion can cause addiction. In other words, the brain gradually becomes numb to dopamine and enters a state of dementia.
3. If the relationship with parents was poor during childhood, and they did not receive their parents’ love, this childhood pattern usually causes psychological deficiencies, making them susceptible to becoming adult children or childlike adults.
4. In addition to the above factors, childhood love experiences or relationships with the opposite sex can also lead to dependency.

If a person finds themselves becoming dependent on someone, after a breakup or falling into the vortex of a third party, they will usually think that everyone does this.

But in reality, it is precise because of these experiences of love, and still pursuing similar fantasies, that they are prone to a vicious cycle in their next relationship.

Once women discover that they have become dependent on something, they should find ways to get rid of this unhealthy emotional attachment.

They can start by:

Keeping a diary and regularly reviewing recent activities that they are interested in; doing things they truly want to do, even if it seems crazy; getting rid of childhood shadows; friends are not wealth, but friends are definitely valuable. When their dependency recurs, they can confide in their friends.

People with love addiction must understand that being alone does not mean being abandoned or isolated by others.

They must learn to enjoy their own time, not depending on others or certain things or behaviors.

Learning to be alone can help them objectively and correctly understand themselves, form an independent personality, and is a key step in improving their dependency.

Finally, to get rid of dependency, they should expand their social circle, meet new friends, learn new skills, and cultivate new hobbies.

This way, they will have many new pursuits in life, and not be fixed on one thing for too long.

This will ultimately help them find multiple ways to relieve their troubles and gain security and happiness.

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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.

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From The Good Men Project on Medium

What Does Being in Love and Loving Someone Really Mean?

My 9-Year-Old Accidentally Explained Why His Mom Divorced Me

The One Thing Men Want More Than Sex

The Internal Struggle Men Battle in Silence

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