J. Peirano: I feel guilty because my boyfriend loves me more than I love him

Nina’s boyfriend accepts and loves her exactly as she is. And she feels guilty about it. Can she learn to deal with it better?

Dear Ms Peirano,

I’m 27 and I’ve had a boyfriend for 6 months. For a very long time I have wished that someone would love me for who I am and stand by me. He’s also a real lover. And now I have that and should actually be completely happy. But I feel constrained.

He keeps telling me he loves me and then he waits for my reply. I don’t really want to tell him I love him because I just like him or love him. I really loved a man once and it was different.

I need a lot of time to myself. It’s stressful at work, and afterwards I just like to read a bit or do some sports. He always asks me what’s going on and I have to explain myself. Then he’s so understanding. He says that for me it’s probably just because I have so much stress at work and when that’s over I’ll be more open to him and feel more.

That makes me feel guilty. Because honestly, I don’t know if I’ll ever love him like he loves me. I often think about whether I should break up because I don’t do him justice and also feel pressured. Such a weird mix.

What do you think: Can I develop more feelings towards him?

Many greetings

Nina G

Dear Nina G,

it sounds like you’re feeling quite guilty! You feel that you should have stronger feelings for your boyfriend because he feels and expresses such strong feelings towards you.

But it is the case that you cannot create feelings and certainly not force them. Imagine someone who has been intensively involved with psychology for decades, meditates regularly and also often reflects on himself and his behavior. Actually, one would think, these are good prerequisites for not having any “undesirable” feelings and instead having more of the “desirable” or “right” ones.

The truth is that if he or she just doesn’t like someone because of the lack of chemistry, no one can turn it off and instead like or even love other people extremely – even if there are some reasons not to do so.

dr Julia Peirano: The Secret Code of Love

I work as a behavioral therapist and love coach in private practice in Hamburg-Blankenese and St. Pauli. In my PhD, I researched the connection between relationship personality and happiness in love and then wrote two books about love.

Information about my therapeutic work can be found under www.julia-peirano.info.

Do you have questions, problems or lovesickness? Please write to me (maximum one A4 page). I would like to point out that inquiries and answers can be published anonymously on stern.de.

But we can practice two things (and you also learn that in therapy). First, we can accept our feelings as they are. And that’s not easy sometimes, because we all have feelings that we consider negative or disturbing, that we might be ashamed of, or at least feel small-minded and shabby about.

Feelings that are not accepted tend to grow stronger. I once had a patient who had an obsession that she might accidentally kill someone. She was very peaceful and the thought frightened her greatly. And just because she didn’t want to have that thought, it got stronger and stronger. You could also say: Yes, sometimes I’m afraid (or even have a secret desire) to kill someone. And I allow myself the wish or the feelings. But of course I don’t do it! This creates more of a “so what?” feeling, which is very helpful.

Second, we can align our actions with what we think is right. Because we have control over our actions and we also have responsibility for them. That is, you can imagine that sometimes you want to kill someone (and allow yourself that fantasy), but you know that you won’t do it because you don’t want to.

And that eases the situation. For example, you could allow yourself to love your boyfriend as much or as little as you happen to be loving. It’s best not to think about it too much, but rather see if the relationship is good for both of you. Again, you might get a kind of “so what” feeling when you find that you’re not feeling as much as you might reasonably be feeling (sounds weird doesn’t it?).

What matters is how you behave towards your friend. And of course it would be good if you stick to the agreements and a kind of fairness code (eg to be faithful when that has been agreed, or to work for the relationship).

However, since your friend provides closeness by giving you a little less freedom than you would like, you automatically take on the distance part. And that’s why it’s harder to feel love and long for closeness. And he fights for closeness and therefore feels it more strongly. It would be best if he retired and let you do it.

How about practicing differentiation, like telling him you don’t like it when he reads or observing your feelings, or if he suspects that you’ll love him more soon after your stressful streak at work is over? That almost sounds like a debtor relationship, where the creditor is waiting for the debtor to finally have money again and be able to pay back. And that’s what hurts love, too.

Make sure that you have more freedom for yourself and your feelings, for example by planning time for yourself from time to time, in which there is no forced end. If you can come to your boyfriend yourself when you’re ready, it will probably feel better.

And one more thing: get rid of the idea that the one who wants more closeness loves more. There can also be self-related reasons behind it, that someone wants more closeness and does not give their partner the necessary freedom. The reasons could be fear of being alone, boredom or not knowing what to do with yourself. But that doesn’t have much to do with love.

I hope this is of some help to you to free yourself from the entanglement.

Best regards

Juliet Peirano

source site