The illusion was never that none of it was real
Why limerence is so convincing - and how kernels of truth become wrapped in illusion.
Photo by Galina Nelyubova
One of the biggest misunderstandings about limerence is that when people hear me talk about “the illusion,” they assume I’m saying none of it was real.
I don’t believe that’s true.
In fact, I think limerence is often so convincing because it contains genuine pieces of reality. Real attraction. Real moments of connection. Real affection. Real glimpses of ourselves.
The illusion isn’t that every part of the experience is false. If it were pure delusion, it would be easier to see through.
The illusion is what our mind builds around those kernels of truth.
Oftentimes clients tell me things like…
“I have never been more myself than when around this person”
“I know that I have limerence, but I think there is also love there too. I think the love and the limerence both exist simultaneously”
“I swear that it seemed like they had real feelings for me. I’ve never been wrong about that in the past. I usually can read people pretty well”
“When I am with her, I feel safer and more peaceful than I’ve ever felt. It feels like home”
I believe every one of these experiences can contain truth. I think that’s what makes limerence so hard and so uniquely painful. Two opposing realities can exist at once.
Yes, you’ve never felt more yourself.
And...
...it also became harder to access yourself when they weren’t there.
Yes, you can experience both love and limerence for the same person
And…
...love alone doesn’t determine whether a relationship is healthy or possible.
Yes, you probably did read that they had feelings or affection for you
And…
that doesn’t mean that they have the capacity or availability to act on those feelings
Yes, you probably are experiencing a moment of coregulation and profound emotional safety when with her
And…
that moment isn’t sustainable, because when you leave, you are plunged into painful dysregulation
The illusion isn’t the presence of truth. It’s the absence of the rest of the truth.
The limerent mind zooms in. It magnifies. It cherry-picks. It builds an entire worldview around selected pieces of reality while filtering out everything that complicates the story. We do it in both directions – our brain can make us feel on top of the world if we only focus on the details and the moments where they seemed to reciprocate our feelings, but a day later suddenly we can swing into abject despair when our brain can only see the moments of doubt or inconsistency. It is this very black and white thinking – this swing between two completely different worlds, our own personal heaven and hell – that make limerence illusory.
Healthy, secure dynamics do not create this fragmentation within us. We can’t build secure attachment on inconsistent moments and hope for some future that hasn’t yet arrived. Secure love doesn’t require us to constantly reinterpret reality. We aren’t swinging hourly between certainty and despair. We don’t have to build elaborate narratives around mixed signals. Reality becomes simpler and more coherent. We gradually need fewer explanations because consistency begins to replace interpretation.
So don’t mistake the illusion of limerence to mean that there aren’t real feelings, real profound moments, or real meeting parts of ourselves that we had thought long gone. It wouldn’t be as powerful as it is if there weren’t kernels of truth within the experience that we end up clinging to. But part of learning to see through the illusion is learning how to hold onto every piece at once, not just the ones that feed a particular story.
Healing from limerence isn’t learning to convince yourself that nothing was real. It’s learning to become spacious enough to hold all of reality at once. The moments of genuine connection. The affection that may have existed. The ways you felt more alive.
And also...The inconsistency. The self-abandonment. The uncertainty. The nervous system dysregulation.
The relationship that never became stable enough to build a life upon. The illusion isn’t that there was no truth. The illusion is believing that one beautiful piece of truth outweighs everything else.
We don’t stay limerent for no reason. Our neurochemicals, our hope, and our pain are interacting with a real and complex environment which can be constantly shifting. But the real illusion of limerence is that the truth which resides within it outweighs the cost of what doesn’t.
Our freedom. Our peace. Our nervous system safety.
These are the foundations love is actually built on. And they are the very things limerence takes away.
Where in your limerent story have you been holding onto one true piece of the puzzle while unintentionally overlooking the rest?
Limerence may not invent the evidence. It alters the scale.
One tender moment becomes large enough to house a future; months of inconsistency are reduced to background noise. The facts remain real, but their proportions no longer are.
Healing may begin when the beautiful fragment is allowed to stay beautiful without being promoted into a verdict.
"Healing from limerence isn’t learning to convince yourself that nothing was real. It’s learning to become spacious enough to hold all of reality at once. The moments of genuine connection. The affection that may have existed. The ways you felt more alive. And also...The inconsistency. The self-abandonment. The uncertainty. The nervous system dysregulation. The relationship that never became stable enough to build a life upon. The illusion isn’t that there was no truth. The illusion is believing that one beautiful piece of truth outweighs everything else."
Wow...that paragraph alone spoke volumes to me. My healing is ongoing. Everything contained in that paragraph sums up the struggle for recovery.
My LO, a woman I had a relationship with for several years, activated my nervous system to lengths I never knew existed in me. I did not feel it so much while in the relationship, but after it ended, it was all I felt. It was both exhilarating and a source of intense pain when I thought of her. Love, lust, loss...the idea that this relationship was my cosmic connection and that I had somehow, despite geographic and relational realities - the uncertainties as you stated -I had come to believe in my heart that this was the one I let get away even though in my mind, I could list several things as to why that was not real.
Therapy has kept me in check from staying no contact, but like an addict, the cravings are still strong.
I am managing it but it would be a lie to say I am over the limerent feelings and thoughts. The temptation is strong to reach out, but I know that would lead to more pain.