{"id":1408977,"date":"2026-01-22T16:37:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T13:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1408977"},"modified":"2026-01-22T16:37:00","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T13:37:00","slug":"limerence-is-bullshit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1408977","title":{"rendered":"Limerence is bullshit"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Over the past five years<\/span><\/a>, the word \u2018limerence\u2019 has well and truly cemented its position in the cultural lexicon. If you\u2019re somehow unfamiliar, it\u2019s a term used to describe the experience of intense romantic obsession or infatuation, <\/span>first coined by Dorothy Tennov<\/span><\/a> in her 1979 book <\/span>Love and Limerence: The Experience of Being In Love<\/span><\/em>. According to Tennov, key facets of limerence include \u201cintrusive thinking\u201d about the object of your desire (also known as the \u2018limerent object\u2019 or LO); \u201c<\/span>dependency of mood\u201d on their actions; and \u201ca general intensity of feeling that leaves other concerns in the background\u201d. Whether a limerent\u2019s LO returns their feelings or not is often ambiguous.<\/span><\/p>\n

The book and Tennov\u2019s arguments gained some traction in the years following its publication \u2013 according to a 1990 <\/span>Washington Post<\/span><\/em><\/a> article, Tennov was often deluged with letters from \u2018limerents\u2019 who strongly identified with the label \u2013 but interest in the idea has exploded in the social media age. Today, on <\/span>the r\/limerence subreddit<\/span><\/a>, thousands of limerents seek support from like-minded individuals on dealing with their feelings; on TikTok,<\/span>over 30,000 videos have been posted <\/span>under the limerence hashtag<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The latter platform has effectively become ground zero for this second wave of interest in limerence, with creators \u2013 mainly women \u2013 offering up explainers on what limerence is or confessional-style clips about their own experiences of limerence. \u201cHave you ever been obsessed with someone you don\u2019t even know that well?\u201d asks a creator<\/a> called Gia in one video. \u201cLike your brain is constantly thinking about them? If they text you, you respond immediately? You\u2019re constantly imagining this fantasy life with them? Well, that, my dear, is called limerence.\u201d So far, so relatable. But I can\u2019t help but wonder: isn\u2019t this just\u2026 having a crush on someone?<\/span><\/p>\n

In short: yes. Tennov, a seminal researcher on the psychology of love, coined the term in part to \u201c<\/span>distinguish between these overwhelming emotions and the more stable, domestic feelings experienced by long-term couples\u201d, as <\/span>one 2003 <\/span>Guardian<\/span><\/em> article put it<\/span><\/a>. Tennov did acknowledge that not everyone experiences the head-scrambling highs and lows of limerence (<\/span>a 2025 <\/span>survey suggested that 50-60 per cent of the population have experienced it<\/span><\/a>) \u2013 but this<\/span> still tracks, given that some people have had such frictionless lives \u2013 or so much therapy \u2013 that they approach relationships without staking their entire self-worth on the outcome (weird).<\/span><\/p>\n

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What was once an innocuous word used to encapsulate the heightened emotions that are common and normal in the early stages of a relationship has become a diagnosis<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

But as time has gone on, social media has enabled people to bastardise Tennov\u2019s work and \u2018limerence\u2019 has become yet another term to <\/span>fall victim to concept creep<\/span><\/a>. What was once an innocuous word used to encapsulate the heightened emotions that are common and normal in the early stages of a relationship has become a diagnosis, with videos explaining how to <\/span>\u201ccure\u201d<\/span><\/a> or <\/span>\u201cget rid of\u201d<\/span><\/a> limerence proliferating on TikTok. But Tennov never argued that limerence was some kind of mental illness (to this day, it is not in the DSM), and even rejected the idea that it was inherently unhealthy. \u201c<\/span>This \u2018thing\u2019 I aimed to study was a normal condition, not a pathological state, or a sign of a weak or \u2018neurotic\u2019 personality,\u201d she wrote.<\/span><\/p>\n

Really, though, it\u2019s little wonder so many people have taken the idea of limerence and run with it, given the dire state of modern dating culture. Dating apps have \u201cprivatised intimacy\u201d<\/a>, enabling a culture of disposability where people can be unkind to others with total impunity. It doesn\u2019t help that, more generally, we exist in a society shaped by neoliberalism, where individuals are forever encouraged to trample on others to get \u2018ahead\u2019. While there have always been sharks in the dating pool \u2013 people who are emotionally stunted, selfish, or just plain nasty \u2013 in our current landscape, it\u2019s fair to say they\u2019ve become more emboldened than ever.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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At the same time, as dating apps \u2013 and our neoliberal society more broadly \u2013 espouse the (false) notion that individuals have total control over their lives, it tracks that people who find themselves romantically mistreated instinctively blame themselves for their bad luck. And by \u2018people\u2019, I largely mean \u2018women\u2019: <\/span>research<\/span><\/a> shows that while men who experience repeated romantic rejection are more likely to project their frustration outwards onto women and feminism, rejected women are more likely to blame themselves.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a perfect storm. While dating apps and neoliberalism have made bad behaviour permissible, at the same time, they have encouraged those on the receiving end to see themselves as responsible for their romantic misfortune. In this context, it makes complete sense that limerence has become such a hot talking point \u2013 because it\u2019s appealing to think that finding love is as simple as \u2018curing\u2019 yourself of limerence.<\/span><\/p>\n

Of course, it\u2019s healthy to reflect on whether you had a part to play in a relationship\u2019s demise. As Moya Lothian-McLean wrote in a 2022 Guardian<\/em><\/a> article on the phenomenon of straight women casting themselves as perpetual victims of men\u2019s poor conduct<\/a>: \u201cOnly after I finally cast off cultural scripts that pigeonholed me as a person things were done to <\/em>in a relationship, rather than an actor in my own right who could take responsibility for her actions, did I experience huge steps forward in understanding how I related to people around me, and how to improve those connections.\u201d But in the intervening years, I worry that we\u2019ve overcorrected this issue.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Because, ultimately, I think it\u2019s fair enough to fantasise about building a life with someone you\u2019re dating. I think it\u2019s fair enough to feel despondent and empty when they\u2019ve left you on read, and giddy and buoyant once they reply. I think it\u2019s fair enough to think about them so much that you can scarcely concentrate on anything else. And I think it\u2019s fair enough to feel insane if they ghost you or call it quits out of the blue. It hurts to have your hopes dashed \u2013 and sometimes the hurt can upend your life. But what\u2019s the alternative \u2013 be guarded? Keep your walls up? Never let anyone in? To me, that sounds far more toxic than privately looking up the type of engagement ring you\u2019d like after a third date with someone you\u2019re really into.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s also worth noting that when it comes to discussions about limerence on social media, we usually only hear from people who have been badly hurt after falling hard and fast for someone who didn\u2019t reciprocate their feelings. In this context, it\u2019s no surprise limerence has been misunderstood as a \u2018bad\u2019 thing, or a \u2018condition\u2019 which needs \u2018curing\u2019. But there are countless people who are now in happy, healthy, reciprocal relationships who, in the early stages of dating, were also totally consumed by their feelings; who read into every little thing their partner did; who couldn\u2019t go two minutes without thinking about them. Limerence, as Tennov argued, <\/span>isn\u2019t<\/span><\/em> the evil antithesis of safe, secure love \u2013 often, it\u2019s a precursor to it. With that in mind, don\u2019t run from your big feelings. Embrace them.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Source URL: https:\/\/www.dazeddigital.com\/life-culture\/article\/69466\/1\/limerence-is-bullshit-tiktok-reddit-dating-relationships-dorothy-tennov<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over the past five years, the word \u2018limerence\u2019 has well and truly cemented its position in the cultural lexicon. If you\u2019re somehow unfamiliar, it\u2019s a term used to describe the experience of intense romantic obsession or infatuation, first coined by Dorothy Tennov in her 1979 book Love and Limerence: The Experience of Being In Love. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[76],"class_list":["post-1408977","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-dazeddigital-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1408977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1408977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1408977\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1408977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1408977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1408977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}