Is this love?

It’s infatuation, and it won’t last forever, so be prepared to wake up and not feel that way one day.

@Blackberry That was kind of cold wasn’t it?

If you have to ask, it’s not.

Welcome to Fluther!

It sounds like it to me! Have you had a major argument yet? That was a big sign to me of my own commitment, and hers. Does she express care about you and your feelings? And does she make you feel like you want to be a better person?

This is the first stage of love, which includes powerful infatuation and almost overwhelming lust. Allegedly it lasts at most about 36 months.

Ask us again in a year about true love.

I’m sorry :( I guess it was…..

Wow. I thought I was a love-state cynic but some of you are downright chilly!

I don’t think infatuation is the same thing as love but it’s a nice way to get there. Enjoy it!

@Blackberry I didn’t say you we’re wrong. Sorry.

@Adirondackwannabe S’all good :)

It is.

Ja, it is… but I would say, that this is the “I fall in love”-time… it could and perhaps will be real love when you are together for a longer time…

It’s a chemical reaction, but heavenly nonetheless.

This is the way it starts! You will know if it’s love when you still want to spend rhe rest if your life with her even when there are moments you don’t like her very much. When you see her ugliest side (and we all have one) and still can’t see your life without her in it.

Make her your best friend. If the two of you can do that for each other, get married. : )

I agree with @Blackberry

It’s infatuation at this stage: the predictable nonsensical bliss that comes at the beginning of a new relationship. It’s a kind of love, but it takes more time before you develop the deep understanding and trust that most people refer to as being in love. This doesn’t mean it won’t happen, just give it more time. Be open, honest, and communicate with your partner, and you might just get there. Good luck, and enjoy this part. I don’t want to say “it’s all downhill from here” because it isn’t. It gets more wonderful, but infatuation will fade. What you replace it with is up to you

It sounds like infatuation, the wonderful beginning stage of falling in love. If you think you want to persue this relationship further, make sure you find out lots and lots and lots of things about each other. What does she think about children, cats, comic book stores, heavy metal music, wearing perfume, you wearing cologne, going grocery shopping, going to the doctor, spending time with her family, gardening, keeping a clean house, cooking etc. Find out anything and everything about her. You can even play the Q & A game with her (which is where you both write down 100 questions, some intimate, some regular and ask and answer). The infatuation stage doesn’t last forever like @gailcalled said, but it’s a really fun way to get to the next stage.

The next stage is where you are really going to figure out whether you are in love. This will be a time in which you will find out whether you can leave your girlfriend on her own and not be overcome with jealousy that she will cheat on you. You will decide whether or not you can imagine yourself living with someone who doesn’t always look like a million bucks (this is all people by the way), like when they have an acne breakout, or they didn’t have time to wash their hair, or you see a little bit of cellulite on her thigh, or she hasn’t yet put on her makeup, or she gets a slightly too short hair cut, or she wears a dress outside that you think is a little too low cut. What will you think about all of these situations? This will be the time when you figure out if these small, but ordinary things are OK with you. The first time one of you gets sick with a bad cold or the flu is a telling time as to whether you will be able to be together for the long haul. People are often at their worst when they are sick, are you up to the task of taking care of her when she looks ugly, needs help to the bathroom or throws up on you and asks you to get her things and tells you how much pain she’s in? And is she willing to do the same for you when you are sick? People that are really in love with not only put up with these things, they’ll do it gladly.

During this stage, you will also have to evaluate your deal breakers. Does she trust you to go off with your friends, without her and not get jealous? Does she have a warm and loving family that accept you into their lives? Does she have nice friends? Does she smoke or take drugs (are those things problematic)? Do you both have a strong ability to communicate honestly and effectively without hurting each other’s feelings? Are your lovemaking patterns and desires similar? Do you share household responsibilites? Are your sense of cleanliness and order similar (slobs and neatniks rarely last together for example)? Are you both in agreement whether to have children or not, and when to have them? Do you both have a similar sense of humor? Do you have a similar belief or lack of belief in God? How and where will you spend the holidays? Do you agree upon how to save and spend money? These are the hard questions that they often ask you in pre-marital counseling. Often, couples who think they are in love, have never even talked about any of these super important potentially deal breaking subjects.

So enjoy the ride for now, but make sure that you start really getting to know each other in all ways. One day you’ll wake up and know for certain whether you were just having some lustful fun, or whether it’s real love. You will know and you won’t even have to ask the question. Good luck to you both : )

I hate calling it infatuation because I think it diminishes real feelings. It’s as if somehow we are faking it or fooling ourselves. We are not fooling ourselves. We really feel this stuff.

Whether it will last is another question. Sometimes people become entranced by someone and then in the bright light of the sun, they think, “What was I thinking? What could I have seen in him or her?” This might happen the next morning or in a week or a month, and people will say, “See? He (or she) was fooling himself.” His hormones took him over and he couldn’t see straight.

I believe that people can see straight when they first get crazy about someone. And it is getting crazy. The same kind of hormones get released that make you high on a drug or something. Your brain is on top of the world. You feel deliriously happy.

Is it love? Of course it’s love. I don’t care if it lasts for a day or a week or a month. I am not going to diminish it by calling it an infatuation. Nobody knows whether they are seeing clearly or not. When you first meet someone, you know nothing about them, and yet you feel these intense feelings of attraction.

As you go along, you learn more about the person. Do these things confirm or disconfirm the feeling you had in the beginning. Most likely it’s up to you. If you want to be in love, you can stay in love, so long as your partner cooperates. And if you are afraid to be in love or just don’t want it or just wanted sex, then you make yourself fall out of it.

You are obsessed with her, and presumably she is obsessed with you. That’s love. It’s love if you want it to be love. There is no magic criteria by which anyone can judge your feelings. If you feel love, it’s love. No one else should tell you any different. They will try. They will tell you it’s an infatuation, but it’s just as likely they are cynics who have been hurt in love too many times.

Don’t ask this question. Just don’t. It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. You need to follow your own feelings and your own head. You already do enough judging of yourself. Don’t kill yourself and your feelings by letting others judge you. That’s a sure recipe for unhappiness. What you feel is none of our business. Trust yourself. You’ll be much happier that way.

baby dont hurt me.

@Blackberry‘s answer was, indeed, cold. But he may be right. Be prepared to not feel the right way.
If it’s real you’ll know.

Who really knows where love starts and infatuation ends? Who can truly make a judgement call on this kind of stuff, especially if not one of the involved parties?

So I don’t know if the above is love, but it’s a good start…best wishes!

Possibly could be, I’d say give it a while and if it doesn’t seem like that feeling dwindles over time, then either it’s love or you’re a potential stalker.

I hope its a start of love for your sake, if not you can always try again……...

I don’t know but it’s romantic – and a good start.

Mood music for this question

@BarnacleBill: That brought back memories of slow dancing at the senior prom with Jimmy Bartlett under the mirrored globe.

I think because you asked the question, the answer is currently no. But keep enjoying what you have and things could change!

Thank you for all your answers so far…and I hope there may be many more to come. I found another question elsewhere http://www.fluther.com/122117/so-just-what-exactly-is-love/ which gives me another take.

What I deliberately didn’t include in my question, but now feel like revealing is that – rather then being a pair of lovesick teens, and I remember that feeling well – we are both in our 50s with a couple of previous relationships each, so perhaps a little weary and wary! We both thought we knew what love was before!

@dd65708 Well, gadzooks man! Way to bury the lead!

@dd65708 Well good for you two! My answer still stands, even more that you are older and more rational. I met my girlfriend when I was 51, it was like nothing I had felt in over 20 years.

@dd65708 That is so nice to hear that you two are closer to my age for a change : )

I shall amend a couple of things to my first answer: find out what she thinks about hardware stores (instead of comic book stores) and what she thinks about jazz, country, and opera music (instead of heavy metal).

And for the deal breakers, does she want your kids and grandkids (instead of does she want to have any children)? And will your family (and hers) accept all of these new people as “family”? Otherwise, everything else still works. : )

To follow on what @Kardamom said. Are both of you free to be in this relationship? Or are there any existing marriages involved?

She is free, though a little concerned about how family will react, whilst I am soon to be free and have no such concerns.

It’s sweet love. I wish it goes forever with you two. : )

When my eyes close it is you I see
Clear as the sound of my beating heart
Night’s darkness may now keep us apart
But in dream love shall bring you to me

There, this was written just for you if you like. :)