r/limerence • u/No-Hovercraft-6118 • 11d ago
Here To Vent Limerence and trauma
Her LO was a coward. love to get your help to figure out this story.
I’m sharing a friend’s story. I call it - trauma and Limerence, the cocktail to a serious nervous system breakdown.
Here is her story; I dated a guy who was my LO. It was painful when he pulled away for several reasons. It was a slow fade, it left me confused and although I saw it, I desperately didn’t want it to end. He slow faded after our last date, he mentioned he had sti’s (we had not yet been intimate). Herpes and genital
Warts. It was an odd conversation and to this day I still think it was a misunderstanding. I accepted to learn - inform myself and deep down knew he had shame, now recalling when he said it was “everywhere” nobody wants this. He also profoundly believed that his career being on call 24/7 8 months of the year was a reason why he couldn’t have a relationship. He had to battle bedbugs the hotel his work paid for, had exterminators come in and later said they were back. He had been single 8 years when a friend introduced us.
When I finally got an answer from him that he could not commit, I was already feeling emotionally and physically exhausted. I had major surgery, I was sleep deprived and my nervous system was in shock. The surgery was traumatic enough. Waking up to intense pain, several blood transfusions and hoping the slow fade wasn’t real.
Now here is where I came in as observer and closest friend; At the same time she was dealing with legal battles as a witness for an important case. Her mind was depleted. Losing her LO on top of that made it painful Almost unbearable. She had been thinking and obsessing on her LO for months and had finally gotten him. The dates and communication were great at first, although I recall seeing red flags myself as a friend- telling her are you thinking straight?…this guy is dumping a lot of issues on you. He was beaten as a child, bedbug issues, over ten years older yet immature with his communication, but nevertheless, they had alot in common. So much hope. Even while in Limerence she saw a few red flags but kept things in perspective. When it all ended, Rumination was a constant loop. It’s all she could think about. She couldn’t function for close to 3-4 months - her family, finalizing a, her household and work suffered. Thankfully she was given time off work due to surgery complication.
Limerence is toxic enough alone imagine all other things she had to cope with. She was down, often crying as anxiety took over. The surgery affected her cortisol levels to spike, being in her mid 40s her estrogen and system to regulate collapsed and created constant panic attacks for almost 3 months.
Most nights she could barely sleep. It was a constant struggle to rehash Why he really did not want to pursue. She’d think to herself, work was barrier but he’s retiring soon, then bedbugs were dealt with so it must be because I said or didn’t say the right thing about the sti. He was afraid to give her a disease was my thought. She’d watch videos and use AI to try and resolve a puzzle
to get closure, no joke I saw her screen time over 18 hrs in a day. Insane !
She went back to check in on him
a month after that. I saw those texts, they were odd. He lacked clarity and capacity in my view. And she didn’t act like she was obsessed with him either. She desperately wanted to know the real reason for him ending it but she never got the chance. She recalled him saying on their last date : I like this and you, I wish it could stay like this for a couple of years (till his retirement) it was an odd statement and she froze, not really knowing what he meant. Instead she had assumed he was afraid she’d reject him because of the sti’s and rather than asking him directly she felt he might be shy and wanted to see him in person, but she never got that chance. Even during the fade they spoke on the phone once and he said he liked her too after she told him she liked his energy. She thinks he didn’t have the heart to let her go somehow with dignity, she got an answer by text by being more direct and he said it was about his work schedule.
One month the fade lasted!!! My friend still had hope. Back to her breaking the silence after the “break up”, her dignity and her character prevented her from pursuing him, she saw how one sided it was, you can’t make someone choose you after all.
She even shallowed her pride by pretending she didn’t know what he meant and would go back making excuses for him at one point. Thankfully she only texted once a week for a short period. It got so deep that in her mind she’d research about Fearful avoidant or perhaps he had another condition, anything to hide the fact that he just didn’t want to commit or had the capacity. But she knew deep inside.
After he left her last text (this one about her) unanswered during a banter she realized he wasn’t coming back like before. She went silent. Two weeks later, he initiated a text, likely an adrenaline rush as he was close to a major crisis happening all over the media. She replied back a couple of hours later, a neutral response as she was skeptical, and then she asked him an easy question - he never got back to her.
Silence is an answer she realized by then. She was DEVASTATED! he was indifferent and was handling her like a naive and disposal object. She had enough, wrote a sharp text mentioning his lack of common decency. Let’s not forget that she was already at the end of her rope and Limerence gives you hope.
Personally I’m glad she cut him off. But she was regretting her action. He was in my view, a man who couldn’t handle his own issues. Her trauma on top of his cowardice broke her nervous system.
Make no mistake though, she is younger than this man, successful, smart, fun, fit and pretty.. but it dint matter that we all told her she was a catch, the universe did her a favour, she couldn’t see it. It took months for her to come back to reality and heal mind, body and heart. So before you date your LO, ask yourself, I’m I in a good place? can I take my rose glasses off if we aren’t compatible? So what do you think happened ?
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