Concept in Definition ABC

Limerencia refers to all the symptoms associated with obsession in love. This word was introduced in the 1970s by the American psychologist Dorothy Tennov in her book "Love and limerence, the experience of being in love". The theses defended by her author were based on hundreds of interviews over the years.

The process of infatuation has been praised in the literature and in the movie theater and somehow we have an idealized image about love. However, this feeling sometimes has some unkind ingredients: obsession sick towards the desired person, the follies of love, the distortion of reality and a whole string of feelings confused caused by the chemical cocktail produced in the brain in the infatuation stage.

Main features

- The mental state of limerence is not voluntary, since the attraction towards the other is not a deliberate action.

- In popular language we do not use this denomination, but we use some equivalent expressions: being madly in love, blinded by love and other similar statements.

- The loved person becomes the central axis of the lover and any other feeling or concern takes a back seat.

- In the psychological order, a series of symptoms occur: lack of appetite, obsessive ideas about the loved one, irrepressible desire to satisfy their needs, fear of possible rejection and perception distorted image of the desired person.

- The individual who is in the phase of obsessive infatuation lives his own fantasy world (it is not strange that they speak of "butterflies in the stomach "and all kinds of metaphors are used to describe this state of confusion).

- From the cerebral point of view, limerence presents some significant alterations: dopamine, phenylethylamine, serotonin or norepinephrine are neurotransmitters that are altered in the infatuation. The activation of these substances makes it possible to explain the tremors, sweating and nervousness of the lover.

For some experts in human behavior, limerence is a disease

The emotional instability described above is currently considered a version of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). The OCD of love is opposed to the idyllic image of platonic love.

Although in our culture we have accepted the normality of crazy love, from the point of view of psychology and psychiatry obsessive behaviors express a mental disorder.

Fotolia photos: lalilele13 / nuvolanevicata