Four signs you're afraid to fall in love
Four signs you're afraid to fall in love
Are your fears keeping you single?
In my previous posts in ‘Finding Love in Midlife’ (which is a sub-section of ‘From Midlife With Love’), I shared about my past penchant for unavailable men, why I kept falling for them and how, eventually, I changed the habit of a lifetime and found healthy love with someone who was emotionally available.
Or rather I gave you the smallest snippet of my journey because the full story of my transformation is a long and tortuous one.
To quote from my previous post:
I had to heal my self-worth wounds, grow in self-esteem, come out of denial about my relationship patterns, understand my fears about falling in love, overcome my attachment disorder, find the courage to change my relationship dynamics (not easy but doable, with support), let go of a whole load of stuff, learn about boundaries from scratch, understand why I pulled and then pushed and why certain men triggered my childhood stuff, stop fantasising about a Mr Perfect who didn’t exist and understand how to date and relate as a grown-up rather than a wounded child.
I’ll be unpacking all of these points in subsequent posts but today I’m going to touch on fear, exploring how the F word sabotages our relationships and why many of us, often unknowingly, are afraid to open our hearts to real love.
Firstly, though, let’s make sure you’re in the right place.
If you relate to any or all of the points below, it could be that you’re afraid to fall in love:
You keep falling for emotionally unavailable people, by which I mean commitment-phobes, people who already have partners, those still hooked on an ex, people who are detached from their own feelings, who are numbing their feelings with excess alcohol, food, drugs, work and so forth, those who are immature, flakey, evasive, serially unfaithful, dishonest or difficult to pin down.
You push away anyone who shows signs that they want to commit to you - the emotionally available and mature people, the healthy ones, the nice ones, the reliable people, those who show up on time, follow through on their promises and say what they mean. You mess them around or you run for the hills, scanning your surroundings for your usual type (the commitment-phobe mentioned in Point 1).
You keep yourself so crazy busy with work, hobbies and activities that you don’t make time to date or pursue a relationship. You keep saying that you’ll get around to it after your next big work project, holiday or sporting event, but that moment never comes and the years pass by.
You sign up to dating apps or websites but soon lose interest, rarely getting beyond the initial conversation stage, or you sign up to new activities that might bring you into contact with potential dates but you either don’t go (too busy) or give up after the first or second attempt.
I did all of the above for many years, without having any idea that I was deliberately (albeit subconsciously) scuppering my love life.
In fact, I thought I was open to love.
Me, scared? No way
I was often dating, or thinking about relationships, or eyeing up the good-looking bloke on the far side of the pub.
But as I discovered after delving deep into my psyche, my apparent desire for a relationship was actually a smokescreen, because deep down, I was scared to death of an intimate connection.
This fear showed up in the ways I mentioned above.
I kept falling for unavailable people because these relationships were guaranteed to go nowhere - there was no prospect of true intimacy with commitment-phobes and therefore I wouldn’t have to address my fear of getting hurt. These scenarios also felt family (they reminded me of my family of origin).
I kept pushing away the good guys because behind my sociable, flirtatious, sometimes forward exterior, I didn’t want to risk getting hurt.
And I kept myself super busy, mostly with compulsive work and exercise, which meant I never had to date or face my fears of falling in love.
I wrote about the origins of my fears in a previous post (‘Why do I keep falling for unavailable men?’) and I’ll summarise them here.
My first experiences of committed, close, love relationships were with my early caregivers (aka my parents) and they led to hurt, pain, abandonment and rejection, so why on earth would I want to do that again?
Also, from witnessing my parents’ troubled and ultimately broken marriage, I surmised that committed relationships, marriages and the like, did not lead to happiness. Rather, I deduced, they led to misery and the woman in particular ended up feeling trapped, suffocated, imprisoned and burdened, her dreams of freedom, independence or a fulfilling career smashed to smithereens.
Understandably, I didn’t want any of that.
So I would avoid love by swerving the available blokes and gluing myself to the unavailable ones or avoiding dating altogether.
Facing our fears
If you identify with the above and if you want to be in a healthy and loving relationship (because contented singleness is wonderful too - I was happily single for a good while, until I’d had enough), there is a solution.
It’s not an easy path but, from my experience, there are no short-cuts when it comes to dismantling the messages from our past and healing the relational wounds that formed the bedrock of our dysfunctional romantic patterns.
As Robert Frost wrote,
‘The only way out is through’.
But the good news is that change is within your reach.
With courage and self-awareness, you can write your own love story, the beginning, the middle and the end, rather than let others - your parents, your toxic ex, or someone else who impacted your life in negative ways - write it for you.
This is why I show up here, on this Substack - to share my experience, to bring hope to those of you who’d like to find healthy love and to share some pointers to guide you towards the light at the end of tunnel.
I look forward to continuing to share everything I’ve learned on a 20+ journey from self-harm to self-love and a healthy marriage. I hope that you stay tuned.
Before I go, here’s an exercise for you. I’d like you to write a list of your fears when it comes to romantic relationships. What are you afraid of? Write everything down. Here are a few ideas from my own experience: of being suffocated, trapped, losing myself, making the wrong choice, losing my freedom, being rejected, abandoned or hurt, being seen … the list goes on.
Now, write your list.
Next time, we’ll look at how these fears dictate our dating patterns so that we can change our relationship dynamics, do things differently and get happier, healthier results.
Until then.
Addendum
I know I said there were no short-cuts but I do have two options to accelerate your journey while you wait for my next posts.
Take a look at my book, How to Fall in Love
Join a free workshop I’m hosting on Zoom on Tuesday June 25th on ‘How to Date with Courage, Clarity and Confidence’ (you can also access the recording for free). Sign up live or to receive the recording here.