The Pain of Loving Someone More Than They Love You (2024)

The Pain of Loving Someone More Than They Love You (1)

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When you fall in love, you hope that the way you love will be returned to you in kind. You want your love to be reciprocated, to be unconditional, to be fulfilling. You want someone to care for you, nourish you, and cherish you in the same way you do for them. In the most idealistic terms, committed love in a relationship is about two people who wish to join as partners in life, who support and encourage each other, who hold each other up and have each other’s backs, who see the future as only possible with their partner as an integral part of it, and who believe that their own life is made more complete because their “other half” is with them forever.

Many people do find what they’re looking for. They find the right person do whatever it takes to have that person in their life and by their side through whatever and wherever life takes them.

But what happens when this kind of love eludes you?

Sometimes, for whatever reasons, you just don’t meet the right partner. Sometimes, it's about not being in the right place at the right time. Sometimes, you may not be ready to meet someone and allow them into your life and you pass each other by. Sometimes, after you’ve been burned or hurt in relationships, the thought of meeting anew person is the furthest thing from your mind. The bottom line is that there are many variables at play in meeting a person you want to be with for the rest of your life, or never meeting such a person.

Finding love is easy when it’s mutual. You both are looking for love at the same time, and you recognize that long-term, committed love is very different from any other kind of relationship. In such a long-term relationship, you look for someone who shares your ideals, goals, and plans for the future. Finding the right person can be easy, but only if you’re on the same page.

But often, we don’t meet people who share our perspectives, and so we get stuck and/or frustrated by our inability to find a fulfilling relationship. Sometimes our own vulnerabilities, anxieties, and behaviors block us from moving forward to find healthier, more satisfying relationships. Sometimes, we really don’t know what we’re looking for. Sometimes, we’re stuck in a pattern of repetitive relationships that never seem to get us where we want to go.

So what happens when we find ourselves in yet another relationship in which we love our partner more than they love us? You may wonder, “How did this happen again?” Perhaps being in any relationship (rather than none at all) was really your goal. Maybe you don’t recognize the signs of someone who's not looking for the king of relationship you are. You may be wondering why, if you care so much for this person, they aren’t they getting it: Why don’t they care for you in the same way you care for them?

Here are some essential points to help you see your relationships more clearly — what’s really there and not just what you want to see — and hopefully, beyond the cloud of emotion that often obfuscates the reality of the situation.

There’s love, and then there’s love. What it all boils down to is the degree of intensity of love. You and your partner may just love differently. Certain components of love (such as the romantic component) may not be shared equally. That’s not to say that your partner doesn’t care for you, but maybe not in the same way you care for them.

For some, just being with someone they love and care for a great deal is enough and all they’ll ever need. Some people know they love more than their partner loves them but hope and believe they can change their partner’s feelings over time. In other words, they may deny that there is an imbalance in the way love is expressed. Can you accept this imbalance in a long-term relationship? Hoping to change your partner’s behavior may be an unrealistic expectation, and may ultimately result in frustration, disappointment, hurt, and anger. This is an essential piece to be aware of from the very beginning.

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Your partner makes plans and decisions without you. Sometimes it’s fine for each partner to make unilateral plans and decisions. But if you’re talking about sharing goals and plans for a future together, making decisions unilaterally won’t work. If this happens a lot, it should be speaking volumes to you. It may mean that your partner is not willing to share the most important parts of their life or to include you in their future. The way they see it, maybe you’ll be around—and maybe you won’t. In other words, you fit into their life and their needs in the here and now, but who knows if that will hold for the future.

Your partner is interested in your personal life but not as much as you’d like them to be. Sure, they want to know about you, but they may not need or want to know the nitty gritty. Who you are in depth is not that important to them; it’s just more information. This may sound a bit harsh: After all, there are some perfectly nice people who just may not need to know another person in depth. They like you; they care about you. There’s enough there to have a solid relationship for the future. That’s not what I’m talking about. You would think that someone who falls deeply in love with you would want to know everything about you—the good, the bad, and the ugly. They can’t seem to get enough; everything about you is precious. So when someone doesn’t want to know too much, and lacks interest in you, your plans and goals, what is passionate to you and what makes you tick, or is just indifferent, pay close attention: Yes, they’re with you now, but knowing less about you may make it easier to walk away from you, and the relationship, at any time.

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How come much of the effort of the relationship rests on your shoulders? You take the initiative more often and make most of the effort to get things done. Your partner is frequently passive and/or doesn’t care enough. You are often the one to keep the relationship interesting; to creatively find ways to engage your partner. A partner may easily settle into a routine of being with you without looking to expand and develop the relationship. They may even resist any effort on your part to “grow” the relationship. You may find yourself working overtime to please your partner, to gain attention and praise from them. If you’re always making sacrifices to please them, and to make life more comfortable for them, you may end up feeling as if you’re giving up too much or even giving yourself away in order to get attention, recognition, and love. If you are exhausted from trying so hard and not getting much interaction or interest back, it’s time to stop and really think about what you’re doing.

Do you feel like you’re competing with your partner’s friends for their time? Your partner may choose to actively pursue relationships outside of the one you share together. While there’s nothing wrong with keeping old friends and spending time with them, the notion that you have to constantly compete with friends (and/or family) for your partner’s time and attention should raise red flags.

While a romantic, committed relationship often finds a couple spending more and more intimate time together, a less interested partner may continue to spend a lot of time with friends and balk at the idea that these relationships are coming between you. While it’s important for each partner to have their own lives and to maintain a substantial amount of time for themselves, it’s essential that they remember to designate large chunks of time for each other in order to cultivate the caring and intimacy necessary to “grow” the relationship.

The takeaway is never to ignore how you really feel. If you know what you want and need in a relationship, you should never dismiss your feelings, or, worse, settle just because you want a relationship to work, or because you just want to be in a relationship, period. The truth is that, try as you might, you probably won’t be able to make your partner into someone they don’t want to be. If you feel disappointed, frustrated, and unfulfilled because you love someone more than they love you, don’t ignore it. You deserve to have a relationship that feeds you in every way.

The Pain of Loving Someone More Than They Love You (2024)

FAQs

Why does it hurt when you love someone more than they love you? ›

We may also have different attachment styles and love languages, and these both influence us in feeling that in our relationships, what we have is much more than they can see when you love someone so much. Naturally, these differences can provoke feelings of loving someone more than they love you.

Is it wrong to love someone more than they love you? ›

What it all boils down to is the degree of intensity of love. You and your partner may just love differently. Certain components of love (such as the romantic component) may not be shared equally. That's not to say that your partner doesn't care for you, but maybe not in the same way you care for them.

What is the most painful love there is? ›

The most painful love there is, is the love left unshown. A love that cannot be expressed, affection left unknown. The love that withholds touching, afraid of what it would say, and the most painful thing about unexpressed love is, it never fades away.

Why does it hurt when the person you love doesn t love you? ›

You may experience a strong desire to be with the other person, but the person you want to be with doesn't feel the same. One can't force a person to love and so, the one who unconditionally loves someone, can't force the latter to love them back. And hence, the experience of unrequited love can be very painful.

When you love someone so deeply it hurts? ›

These negative emotions are part of an adaptive response and healing process," he says. "If you love someone so much it hurts, take time to sit with that. Try to understand why the need is so great. There's something going on here that's bigger than this particular relationship."

How do you stop loving someone more than they love you? ›

How to Stop Loving Someone and Start Moving On
  1. Acknowledge the truth.
  2. Name your needs.
  3. Accept the significance.
  4. Look forward.
  5. Tap into other bonds.
  6. Go inward.
  7. Give yourself space.
  8. Accept that it takes time.
Jan 14, 2020

What happens when you love your partner more than they love you? ›

Taking you and your devotion for granted

If your partner feels that you love them more than they love you, they will find it easy to take your love for granted because they know that you will continue to love them no matter what.

Who loves more intensely? ›

Some say that women love harder due to their strong emotional capacity and empathy, while others argue that men are just as capable of loving deeply and passionately.

What is the saddest part of love? ›

The saddest thing is that love does not mean the relationship will survive. Love is not enough. You can love someone and yet they are totally incompatible with you. You can love someone but not be able to get past the bad stuff they've done.

Is it true that true love hurts? ›

In the past few years, psychology researchers have found a good deal of literal truth embedded in the metaphorical phrases comparing love to pain. Neuroimaging studies have shown that brain regions involved in processing physical pain overlap considerably with those tied to social anguish.

Who gets hurt most in a relationship? ›

While breakups hit women the hardest, they tend to recover more fully. Men, on the other hand, never fully recover. Women experience more emotional pain following a breakup, but they also more fully recover, according to new research from Binghamton University.

Can you ever stop loving someone you truly loved? ›

While it may feel impossible and certainly takes time to stop loving someone, it's absolutely possible to do just that. In fact, you may find that in no longer loving this person you open yourself up to the possibility of loving others — and even yourself.

What are the signs someone doesn't love you? ›

They avoid spending time with you

They cancel plans without rescheduling, no longer initiate date nights, or consistently choose to spend their weekends with people other than you. They evade interaction with less texts, calls, and FaceTimes, or don't wait up to walk together after class.

What is it called when you love someone but they don t love you? ›

Unreciprocated or unrequited love is when you long for someone who doesn't share your sentiments. Perhaps you have romantic feelings, sexual attraction, or an intense desire to be close to someone, but they don't express or acknowledge the same interest.

What is it called when you love someone more than they love you? ›

Think of it as a milder subset of unrequited love. It's not that the person you're dating straight-up doesn't like you back. They're definitely into you. Just.

What is it called when you love someone but they don t love you back? ›

Unreciprocated or unrequited love is when you long for someone who doesn't share your sentiments. Perhaps you have romantic feelings, sexual attraction, or an intense desire to be close to someone, but they don't express or acknowledge the same interest.

What happens when you give too much of love to someone? ›

Consequences of loving someone too much. Loving someone means, you respect each other's boundaries. Loving too much means – you dismantle those boundaries, stop taking care of yourself, and do everything for your partner just to make them happy. You only end up destroying your self-worth and the love is at stake.

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