Limerent individuals – and sometimes their spouses – arrive for a session puzzled about why limerence isn’t simply fixed by their relationship. They wonder how they can be consumed by someone who is ambivalent or unavailable, while a loving partner is in the next room, having been attentive and present for years.

Underneath the obsessive thinking and fantasizing, there is an old question from one’s earliest years that has never been settled: Am I really worth loving? For limerence to exist, the answer has to be in doubt. Ambiguity and mixed messages received from a colleague, an acquaintance, an ex provide the fuel to reproduce the mystery from childhood, using this person as the test case. For anyone in limerence, questioning their own worth and lovability is painful enough; sitting with the unanswered question is excruciating. Therefore, finally proving one’s worth with an object for whom you hadn’t been the subject feels like it could be the closure you’re looking for. And it could be, that is, unless this person continues to be inconsistently attentive or you encounter another person who unwittingly forces you to confront the question again as if it had never been answered.

A consistent, loving partner can’t fulfill this need; their consistent love doesn’t even pose the question. Being passively chosen every day by someone who clearly loves you registers very differently from being actively chosen by someone who, thus far, has not. Further, the push-pull dynamic with the limerent object necessarily gets played out at home. Frequently, the limerent partner pulls away during a moment of intense longing, potentially causing their loving spouse to reinforce their attention, which paradoxically makes them even less of an object of interest to their limerent partner.

In the midst of a dream, the limerent person is caught in an unconscious quest to end their agonizing confusion about their worth, unable to distinguish fantasy from reality. It’s a lot to ask of a spouse to be understanding as their limerent partner longs for someone else. And, the limerent partner typically doesn’t want to wake from the dream; they believe they need to stay in it for as long as it takes to reach its resolution. Therapy for limerence can help to gently rouse the limerent person enough to realize that the only way to truly know one’s worth is to find out for oneself. Only as the dream fades can one’s limerent partner be more present, with a fuller sense of self and clearer about who they have waiting at home.