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Post by Susan Peabody on Aug 15, 2008 14:05:38 GMT -8
Relationship addictions are often our first addictions. As I said in another thread . . . My first addiction was my father . . . Yes! most children are in love with the parent of the opposite sex, and this is normal, but when things go wrong this natural process can manifest itself as an addiction and become a template for future addictions. Howard Halpern explains what can go wrong (too much or too little attention) which results in an abnormal "attachment hunger." (In my book I call it the "hungry heart.") We just know that the Oedipus dilemma becomes an addiction with some children. This first addiction then keeps being transferred to the next person in line. In my case it was my sister and then Alan Sparks in the 6th grade. So if your addiction process starts early you may have a history of becoming addicted to school mates, sisters, brothers, uncles, aunts, grandparents, the parents of your friends. The list goes on and on. These early addictions are attachment disorders. They lead to love addiction triggered by limerence (romantic love). We should all be working on our inventory about this . . . |
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Post by Sexlessw on Aug 23, 2008 7:03:21 GMT -8
Mine was a boy in 1st grade. Loved him madly. He became the ideal of the man I was to chase for the rest of my life. Eldest child, aloof, smart, from a wealthy family.
I chased him for 12 years - even took him to my senior prom. That night never even got a kiss out of him.
Fast forward 20 years. Found him on the Internet. He was OUT AND PROUD (i.e. gay) and in a LTR with another man.
For years I could never understand why he didn't like me. Now I understand. He was gay. I can imagine it was a relief coming out and living a truth instead of a life for him.
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Post by brokenchinadoll on Aug 31, 2008 18:30:29 GMT -8
I wish I could figure out where my addiction all started.
To be honest with you, I didn't even know I had a problem until a few months ago. I never had a problem letting go or walking away from other relationships before. Just this one. Just this man. So I just assumed I am head over heals in love with him.
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Post by judy on Sept 1, 2008 4:10:37 GMT -8
brokenchinadoll - in 12 step recovery rooms there is an axiom about addictions - they are progressive diseases. They only get worse.
I have been a love addict all my life. For one reason or another it was "manageable". It took many years of recovery from another addiction to get to my core love addiction and the nightmare of the last 12 years with my POA.
Yes, I too, thought he was "the love of my life", and that's why it hurt so much. Now I just think it was the time in my life for me to face this addiction, and the 40 years of pain that preceded it.
At this point brokenchinadoll - you may have all the questions in the world. But there is just one answer.
Addiction.
I once asked my recovering sister why I should leave a POA in my life (years ago). After all, wasn't he just a sick and suffering addict like me? (although I was in recovery - he was active). Her reply?
Mush plus mush equals mush.
If I hang around with sick people I am going to stay sick.
I took her advice back then. I wish I had practiced that with the last POA.
Live and learn.
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Post by Rilly on Sept 1, 2008 6:02:05 GMT -8
I'm still trying to figure out where this love addiction all started. I can remember as early as grade school having an obsession with a particular girl. I suffered for a while, then several months later it would be another. Sometimes the feeling was very strong, and other times mild. But there was always one person at a time. Then there was the girl in High School that was my girlfriend for an entire year. We were in love. Her father forced her to break up with me because of some disagreement he had with my father. It shattered me. I thought I would end up marrying her. But we were ripped apart. I never saw her again. The withdrawal was awful. I lost my voice and couldn't speak for an entire month. I still feel the scars. Maybe dealing with this addiction problem will help heal some of that hurt that still lingers. I fell in love with my wife, and we were married. But in the first year of marriage I remember being obsessed with another woman I knew. It was someone that I had dated before I met my wife. I was second-guessing myself. Wondering if I had made the wrong choice. Then there was another. And another. Each time I was wondering if I had married the wrong person, because that new POA would suddenly seem like the woman of my dreams, the love of my life that I had somehow been deprived of being with. The pattern has continued ever since.
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Post by LovelyJune on Sept 1, 2008 14:57:26 GMT -8
Love addiction is a trick. We think we are suppose to "find" the love of our lives. But that's not what love is all about. Love is cultivated. Made. It takes a very long time. No one is perfect. You, rilly, might be more of a "romance addict" attracted to that feeling of infatuation and hungry for drama and that constant Love HIGH. Was your childhood always very dramatic or chaotic? There could have been lots of love there (as in my childhood) but if there was lots of drama (good or bad) we tend to become addicted to it.
keep searching!
T
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Post by smbeets on Sept 8, 2008 3:48:25 GMT -8
Now that I am learning about Relationship Addiction it is overwhelming. I was separated from my mother at the age of two, my Grandmother died of liver cancer at the same time and I went to live with my Father, who then married the babysitter. No wonder there was jealousy between the Stepmother and I. No wonder our home was filled with violence. Then I was sent away to live in different group homes, work farms and work camps etc. I am working on my steps, just not on line. There are way to many guests on the site and I am not sure that I am comfortable with that.
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Post by roz2008 on Nov 13, 2008 19:15:27 GMT -8
My first addiction to a person was my first boyfriend. This first relationship set up a pattern of how I "loved." I really wasn't interested in him. We were both 14. I thought he was cute, but wasn't really thinking about having a boyfriend. Soon we started flirting as 14 years olds could, and he asked me to go with him. I said yes. He was very cute, a lot of girls thought so. That set up another pattern of making looks very important. He didn't want to do what "normal" teens like to do with hormones raging. I wanted to kiss, he didn't. I think he kissed me like once or twice in our few month relationship. He drifted from me. I didn't know it, but he was gay. I don't know if he really new he was gay. I forgot just how we broke up, but I couldn't get over him. I fantasized about him all the time. I wrote him letters I never sent telling him how much I was still in love with him. As we went to high school, he became more open to being effeminate, and got those 70's perm jobs. I still loved him. I couldn't let it go. It took me years! I finally got over it when we were college aged and he introduced me to his male lover. As I did my introduction and thought about my boyfriends, I saw the same pattern. Men choosing me, and eventually dumping me, and me not being able to let go. I am glad to be able to admit this, see it, and ask my Higher power to change. So glad to share about this. But it does evoke some emotion.  |
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Post by cheri on Nov 30, 2008 2:12:10 GMT -8
My first addiction happened much later, is around 20 years old, with my first BF. My addiction history from one bf to other last more than one decade, all have different degree of addictive behavior. But unlike so called progress disease, I learned from my mistakes and the later relationship always more healthy than the former Now look back the reason why it happen, It¡¯s because of the ¡°sentimental feeling¡±. I was pretend to be strong and high achievement according my mum¡¯s expectation, and leave my weak side untouched, when I met the boy, His ¡°pity¡± on me touched my deepest string, trigged ¡°self pity¡± deep inside me. From my experience I believe the deep feeling behind love addiction is Self pity, impose the pity on others, in other words, is undisciplined Sentimental feeling. I am the only one addicted to love in my family, my mum and my sister definitely not. My mum was active for feminist movement(women¡¯s right) at this other side of the earth. I use my mum¡¯s surname as mine, very rare in the culture I came from. But the feminist movement actually adores masculine character more than feminine character, no doubt my family is very unhappy, my dad is devoted to family but live in the shadow of my mum. Jung said when the woman is unconscious, She act like men, when the man unconscious, he act like women. I think not only my mum, when I be compulsive achiever I act like man, not in touch with my feeling, when I addicted to love I am also display some masculine character too. But my mum do have addiction, she addicted to children. Now my sister is very same as my mum. Her husband a bit afraid of her, and she love her baby son too much , I read psychology book that in this case, the child is emotional abused. But I can not do anything to help my nephew.  Maybe everyone have to bear their own cross, as Robin Norwood said. Our obstacles are our pathway to God. So If things have to happen, let it be. In these 5 years, I devote to my own healing and spiritual development. My compulsive achievement behavior stopped, and love addiction stopped too. That might be different side of same coin. As I integrate my strong and weak, I integrate my light and my shadow. I still have same job, same income 5 years before, But I am much happier. I do not need to have career better than others, Nor do I need a man to smooth my heart. I just being myself and that¡¯s enough as a woman and as a human. After healing and spiritual awaken I engage in Goddess movement, from ancient ¡°Yin¡± ¡°Yang¡± to modern spirituality, discover and bring back the true feminine divine energy to earth. |
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Post by judy on Nov 30, 2008 4:34:27 GMT -8
Thank you for that post, cher. That is lovely.
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Post by primrose on Jan 28, 2010 4:20:33 GMT -8
My first addiction was my unavaiable father, and my second, my aunt, who is 10 years older than I am and was like a very glamourous unavailable sister.
Actually, I don't think I've fully got over my addictions to them, I am still recovering. My POA was the closest thing I ever found to a perfect match, I hope I never have to find another! Primrose.
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Post by geedee on Jan 28, 2010 6:26:02 GMT -8
my first real addiction was to my first serious boyfriend at age 17.
we started going out a year after my brother died but i had been obsessing about him for months. i did not obsess about the previous guy at all. (the one who became my POA recently)
i can remember being possessive of my close friends but never addicted to any of them at an early age.
i remember being told often that i would disappear into another world when i was reading or doing schoolwork. totally absorbed in what i was studying at the time, i just wouldnt hear people when they spoke to me.
I'm still like that today. when I'm really taken by something, i do indeed have a 'one track' mind.
greta
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Post by almostloverr on Mar 31, 2010 15:38:06 GMT -8
I honestly don't know how mine started. I think it has to do with my maternal grandfather (all about that in my intro post)...? He was never there, but when I was in kindergarten up until he left, we still saw him every so often. I remember having a huge crush on this guy in kindergarten, as insane as it sounds, and I got up the nerve one day to *tell* him that he was my boyfriend. Lol. Then we moved and I found another boy, with whom I "went out" until third grade and we "started up again" in fourth grade. By fifth grade we'd fallen out, but pretty much up until my freshman year of high school I would obsess over him. I actually thought up fantasies of our lives together before I went to sleep at night, that's how bad it was...I guess I've just always been an addict.
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Post by miztex on Apr 5, 2010 12:43:49 GMT -8
My first addiction? My dad. I constantly tried to cuddle, hug, talk to, or engage him in some way. But he was suffering from depression and selective mutism. Nobody there. After that, my cousin Mike, (gay), but not his brothers cause they were mean to me. Then a boy in kindergarten, and many, many more. I chased them in the school yard to try to get them to kiss me. Naturally I was VERY unpopular. My Primary POA gave me my first kiss in 7th grade. Took him three hours of pacing up and down and whining about"I don't know HOW to kiss!" before he finally kissed me. He told me that no one ever kissed him like that again. I became HIS romantic fantasy for the rest of his life.
After he came and went a few times, I had a POA in HS. He was my teacher and I was a torchbearer. I had a POA in college. He was too young, too immature, and narcissistic, but very much reminded me of Primary POA physically; who reminded me physically of my dad. Then a guy in college again(Narcissist), I found out he was Bisexual and VERY confused. (again physically similar)Then rebounded to my primary POA who rejected me(scared because I was available). Hospitalized for depression. Then I said " To hell with this stuff. I will only date men I meet who treat me with respect, are intelligent, and available. Met a few guys, no sparks, then my husband. Picked him because he REALLY listened to me and enjoyed the give and take. Also, he did NOT resemble my dad at ALL. LOL! Fine for 7 years(though stalked internet for first POA secretly)Then another professor in college. (yup, looked like dad, unavailable, tall, dark, skinny)Really lost it. Hospitalized for depression.
Then baby one arrived and became my new POA. But H and I kinda both obsessed over him together, so I thought it was o.k. Then little girl came. Took much longer to bond with her' cause she was a girl and because she was so sick for the first year. We thought she wouldn't make it. It was hard to love her without holding some back out of fear. I felt guilty. O.K. now.
Then I lost my job and we moved where we are now. And primary POA came back into my life through classmates.com. almost 2 yrs. ago.
Whew!
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icandi
New Member
Plant an Expectation, Reap a Disappointment
Posts: 12
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Post by icandi on Aug 24, 2010 15:13:09 GMT -8
This is interesting... I'm not exactly sure who my very first addiction was to, BUT I do remember being extremely obsessed and overly attached to my best friends in grade school. I can recall 4 in particular. I latched onto them (and their families) like leeches. I'd go to their homes after school every single day and stay to eat dinner with their families until it was time for them to go to bed and then I'd leave. Sometimes, I overheard their parents telling them "She needs to go home now". People started teasing me that I was a lesbian, but it was nothing sexual about it, I just had to be enmeshed with someone, anyone! If they hung out with anyone else, or didn't want to hang out with me for a day, I'd be SO jealous! Eventually, they'd feel too smothered by me and avoid me altogether. I'd just move on to my next target. Once I got to middle school and discovered Boys, they took over as my obsession. But now that I'm single for like the first time Ever, I feel myself growing more and more attached to my current best friend...
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Post by loveisamyth on Oct 5, 2010 14:57:02 GMT -8
I'm sure it started in grade school. I was obsessed with this boy named Nathan. Then in 7th grade I was obsessed with a sophomore named Mike. He found out about it and he and his friends teased me. I found a bf in 9th grade and obsessed over him until he dumped me. This pattern continued throughout my life. I was never without a b/f. I moved from one relationship to another. I always choose men who were bad boys. I didn't think I could do any better. I didn't want to wait for a good guy either. I got married to the worst of the bunch. I stayed married to him for 9 years despite my unhappiness and his abuse. I finally broke free when I no longer could stand it. I once again started my pattern. I got into another LTR with a man who was at least a descent human being. However, he was emotionally unavailable. He became impotent 4 years into our relationship. I stayed for another 3 years. I couldn't stand the thought of being alone or finding another relationship. I justified it by saying I was being loyal. I finally ended the relationship right after my 35th birthday. I was single for 2 years but I was sleeping around a lot. I desperately wanted a relationship but I couldn't find one. I thought it was me. I thought I was so unlovable. I felt like the fattest, ugliest person alive. I finally found a bf and latched onto him for dear life even though I saw red flags from day one. He lied constantly. It was the worst relationship I had ever been in. He was always breaking up with me for the dumbest reasons, he asked me to have an open relationship, his moods swung from happy to depressed weekly. I wanted to stay in the relationship because I thought it was better than no relationship at all. We were together over a year and broke up almost 2 months ago. I cried every day for a month. Just as I thought I was getting over it, I lost my job. I called him and begged him to come back to me. He had moved away and I was ready to move with him. He didn't want me anymore and I was right back to where I started. I have to say that this was the worse obsession I've ever had. I was really ready to kill myself. I had it all planned out. I talked myself out of it though for my kid's sake. I'm really afraid that my next relationship is going to be a worse obsession. I decided to seek out help. I've decided that I am not going to get into another relationship until I have recovered from this addiction. I don't know how long it will take. I've been this way all my life. I just know that I cannot continue this destructive pattern.
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Post by love on Nov 10, 2010 5:29:12 GMT -8
Interesting! : )
Mine was my half-sister. She's famous for her beauty and had a lot of big-time hot suitors.
And since she and I have no other half-sis, and she's older than me by 10 yrs, I practically looked up to her as my "idol". Until she got abused and addicted which ruined her life so I was the one who ended up in a good light and who tried many times to help her out.
Since I saw how much men ruined her life, so I never let myself fall in love or get into a deep romantic relationship. But I ended up worshiping a best friend instead (w/c is the reason I joined this group/board> to end my addiction and have a healthy relationship/communication only for the rest of my life starting now).
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Post by tizzy on Apr 12, 2011 6:27:51 GMT -8
As a kid I always had a best friend, but it wasn't until my family moved to another state that I think I started becoming addicted to my best friends. As I look back on it, I think that's also when turmoil at home really started heating up more too between my parents, so I used my friendships as a way out of the chaos and to help me feel normal like everyone else's family seemed to be.
Beginning around the 5th grade I became extremely attached to anybody that showed me the least bit of attention. I remember paying 2 of my friends $20 each just so they'd think I was great and would never leave me. I obsessed over a 7th grader who said he liked me. I stalked his house, everything. It was crazy. And I was only 10! Yikes.
For some reason by the time I got to middle school and high school I wasn't as obsessive with relationships. I think I actually became a bit anorexic, as all the other obsessions never had happy endings so I tended to hold back emotionally from people a lot. I think that's where my pattern of emotional unavailability really started. I had tried for so long to get really close to people and when I saw it didn't seem to work, I decided to not get that close with anyone. So I didn't. I had best friends and I had boyfriends but was always scared to really open up.
Now there was one guy I became totally obsessed with in the 10th grade but he was emotionally unavailable. Turns out his father abused the stuff out of his mother and eventually ended up killing the entire family, incl my boyfriend. The only one to survive was his little brother. I think this is when my love addiction and loving too much really took hold. Before he died, I used to think that if I just loved him enough and showed him how much I cared he would love me back just as much. He never did. He never said he loved me and he never even wanted a real relationship. At school he never showed attention or affection. In fact, he was still hung up on his ex. But to me he was the world. Pitiful.
After high school, there was one more guy I obsessed over and held a torch for for over a decade. The crazy thing is when he wanted a relationship I totally bailed. After that I developed limerance(?) for him and wanted no one but him, compared every guy to him. I passed up what were probably healthy men to hold out and wait for this guy to come around to wanting to be with me again. I finally saw the light a few years ago and realized how unhealthy that was and began opening myself up emotionally to guys again. But then I chose a total loser deadbeat who hit me, lied and had me end up in jail (was engaged but thankfully it didn't work, but we did have a baby) and then most recently I was with an EUM for 2.5 yrs. Again, I'm thankful I had the sense to finally break these terrible relationships off but I want to stop making bad decisions like these once and for all!
As a college student and then later as a full grown adult I've also found myself once again sometimes obsessing over my friendships with females. I tend to kind of latch on to people who give me that little extra kick of attention, thinking we're growing close, only to have them pull back. Emotional unavailability on their part? I don't know. But I am trying to stop myself from attaching so much.
Wow, writing all that was so therapeutic! I don't think I've ever put it all into words, much less writing. Seeing my life's love addiction story all laid out is eye opening. Now I can learn from it and start trying to move on.
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Post by nvr2late on May 2, 2011 14:11:45 GMT -8
I'm gonna guess my first was my dad as well.
I was his little buddy since I was the oldest and sort of a tomboy. We hunted, fished, built forts together, and I adored him. But as I got older, his drinking became total alcoholism and he had several nervous breakdowns for which he was briefly hospitalized. The older I got, the more I understood Daddy's problems and illnesses but I guess I never "got" why my parent's marriage was so rocky.
We were raised in the the type of family were secrets were kept. It was all about keeping up appearances for the relatives and neighbors. Plus, we were raised "to be seen and not heard". Both parents were well known in our small community, well respected in the church and very socially active at the Yacht Club, Masonic Lodge and church.
By the time I was 10-12, I realized what loneliness felt like: I lived in a fantasy world much of the time. I was not allowed to spend much time with my parents so I had to run off with my sister and find something to do to leave them to their cards, drinking and socializing.
And by the time I was about 13/14 I knew that my dad was in big trouble with my mom for his alcoholism and life began to get very tentative and sad for all of us. No more buddying with Daddy then. I became rebellious and sneaky since they tried to raise us with such an iron fist.
And I spent the next few years thinking I hated my dad :-(
He finally died from his drinking at age 42. I was 16 and it was over within 48 hrs. He was so critically ill we never got to tell him goodbye.
I guess it's no wonder that I fell for the advances of one of my girlfriends older brothers (he was 20 at the time, just in town on leave from the Army) who seduced me at the age of 13. I didn't really even know what was going on, but I was already steeped enough in those old Romance comics (which my best friend and I devoured daily!) that I'm sure I flirted and came on to him enough to keep it from being a total rape. Consensual, yes, but I really had no clear idea....then it was too late.
I never was without a boyfriend long for the rest of my life. That was how I found my identity, was through the boys who like me. I always had a crush on someone unavailable too. Very painful.
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darkangels3251
Junior Member
No Contact for one year-bring it on!
Posts: 78
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Post by darkangels3251 on Jun 19, 2011 7:01:34 GMT -8
Yup...like the usual, my first addiction was my dad..since he was the first man in my life, and because my mother was completely full of her self and her chaotic drama about not being loved, my dad would instead give me and my sister some affection at face front, but after realizing his double personality and how he is abusive physically and emotionally, is when I got betrayed and derailed...since then, I couldn't face reality and the dysfunctionality in the household, and that's when the man hunt started, as young as six. I remember my first crush was with my cousin who was at the time 22 while I was six, and then following after I had a crush during kindergarden, when I met this boy named Johnny Wessler. He and I were first friends, until randomly I kissed him on the cheek, and immediately we stopped talking and hanging out during recess. Since then until now (I'am in my junior year at college), I had a line of crushes and fantasies, to boys in my class, to my teachers, and to my professors/coworkers even till today. After when I hit 18, I got even severe Rebellion from my family, moved out, started having sex with multiple partners, and craved to feel that "high" with every single guy who gave me some attention. Recently I've also been obsessing about my female friend, and then my POA who just called me yesturday, telling me how much he loves me, despite the fact that he's still dating another girl. It bothers me everyday now that I'm moving on from him, and that sometimes I wonder if I'm living for the sake of love?  I never knew what life is really about, since I was preoccupied for the past 15 years with love and romance, not accepting and knowing the conditions that I'am facing, and once the reality kicks in, I go through some sort of severe depression thinking that I'am a loser in life and that I won't be able to hold a job, make it in my career and become successful.....these negative voices pinge me and hurt me sooo badly that I don't know what I'am doing with my life, I just feel like I'am walking, eating and breathing, but other than that I really don't know what to do....? |
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Post by Susan Peabody on Jun 19, 2011 14:47:15 GMT -8
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lostgirl73
New Member
Get up and try try try was my motto but now my motto is STOP TRYING, JUST STOP, and heal
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Post by lostgirl73 on Jan 26, 2014 19:53:58 GMT -8
My first love must be my dad if I follow this train of thought. He ignored me, was at work and if he was home he wanted to be left alone. He was grumpy, absent and as I got older and called him out on it he was emotionally and a few times physically abusive. He went to therapy with me in my 20s and apologized for not being there but continued to be too busy for more then 2 min conversation. He started saying he loves me and is proud of me but was never there. As he got more and more successful everyone thought I had the perfect dad but he had no time for me. My mom, I was her spouse with dad being a workaholic and we were emeshed, I kept her here, I kept her from suicide and depression and I was her spouse for a long, long time. when I wanted to change our relationship and have needs of my own she shut me out, froze me out, abandoned me and rejected me. I had many lovers, either so needy they consume me and I have to meet their needs or ignoring me and there but not there. That is my pattern. Cheaters, deceptive or too much for me. From Susan . . . my dad was my first love. According to the Oedipus Theory this is true for all girls. Unfortunately he became my Imago and I sought out men who reminded me of him. He was an alcoholic and unavailable for awhile (abandonment), then he molested me (abuse),then my mom got jealous and punished me (neglect). It all adds up to looking for dad and not getting along with women, depriving me of badly needed friendships. Always remember to factor in mom as the competition when discussing being daddy's little girl. The book that helped me was Wounded Woman by Linda Leonard. |
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Maybe everyone have to bear their own cross, as Robin Norwood said. Our obstacles are our pathway to God. So If things have to happen, let it be.
I never knew what life is really about, since I was preoccupied for the past 15 years with love and romance, not accepting and knowing the conditions that I'am facing, and once the reality kicks in, I go through some sort of severe depression thinking that I'am a loser in life and that I won't be able to hold a job, make it in my career and become successful.....these negative voices pinge me and hurt me sooo badly that I don't know what I'am doing with my life, I just feel like I'am walking, eating and breathing, but other than that I really don't know what to do....?
