How has your love for your partner grown over time?

[Thinkalot]

Another post today about the myth of unconditional love prompted me to post this one. People talking about the depth of love they have for another.

 

How has your love for you partner grown and changed over the years? Or perhaps in some cases it has actually lessened?

 

You need not be in a relationship right now to respond to this, you simply need to have been in a longterm relationship at some stage.

 

I just find this stuff interesting. What makes relationships thrive, and how do they evolve?

[Fedup&givingup]

My relationship/marriage is flawed LOL. I can say that I have learned to love myself and become SO much stronger because of it. I feel like I can endure just about anything now.

[Thinkalot]

That certainly is a positive way of looking at a tough situation.

[Fedup&givingup]

Yeah...I have to always find something positive when something bad happens. It's a survival technique of mine.

 

In addition to the intent of your original post...I feel that I have given my husband relentless love. It will be his tough sh*t when I leave him, and he'll be stuck living with himself ROTFLMAO!!!!!!!!!

[sportsloving]

My love for my s/o grows everyday... and sometimes the little things he does could make me fall in love all over again. We had a few obstacles against us to begin with, and with dealing with them, communicating and just being Us, I think we are stronger by the day.

 

Unconditional love, trust, communication, respect, and truly liking the person you are with is what I believe made us what we are. And a few little sparks and the butterflies in the tummy after almost two years can't be all that bad either.

[jenny]

lol - how does our garden grow/ducks all getting in a row.

 

we're getting calmer and calmer. we're a little afraid we'll be comatose by 30, but it's the right move for us for now. with every drug free, club free, hype free night we're sort of forced to face each other, and, as it turns out, we're pretty fun without all the garbage. but simple fun, y'know? all the money we used to waste now goes into our future together...we're crass enough to equate money growth with love growth, i'm afraid. but we both used to operate on a deficit, emotionally (getting and never really paying back) and it feels good this way, so good.

 

don't get me wrong. i still *crave*him; it's just different than it used to be.nothing is in a rush anymore; it's like we've entered into pre-industrial time together. now we're planting, leaving some fields fallows, some we harvest, some fail while other flourish. blah, i did not mean to get lyrical.

 

i love thinking about this- thank you for asking these questions.

[Thinkalot]

And I enjoy reading the answers.

 

As for us, it was super intense and passionate at first...real love at first sight stuff. Then it was a mad rollercoaster of high highs and low lows, and a few BIG obstacles to negotiate. Lots of emotion.

 

Now, finally, things are getting calmer...and of course, I am getting calmer too, as I deal with my own issues. We have learnt a lot about how to communicate, and about how each other reacts and why. We've read books, we've been to counselling and tried hard to get to this point!

 

Now it is a happy, sure, deep love. The passionate sparks still happen too , just not quite as often as they did right at the start! And yes, we still fight and have temper tantrums...but they don't happen as often either!

[meanon]

It's hard to remember that long ago (getting senile already) but at first for a long time we were pretty oblivious to anything or anyone else. We had to be together (preferably in physical contact) most of the time. The bond remained the same but eventually we calmed down enough to let other people back in our lives. Now the love is different but stronger, more fundamental to both our lives in a real sense. We no longer need to spend the time communing, things which used to take a week to sort out we can resolve in 10 mins. For me the love has become a sort of foundation of support from which I can draw to achieve anything I want in life. We used to occasionally have arguments about what we wanted to do, now we know that the other will do anything to help the other realise whatever they wish. I guess it's a less needy and more selfless love.

 

The relationship has changed enormously over time with life events (having kids etc). The passion has changed, but not waned. It's less all consuming - we can wait . It seems to go in cycles. It's different in nature to those early days but it's more intense as we know each other better.

[Wolvesbaned]

We started out wonderfully - we have similar interests, similar views of the world, values, and we got along. Back then it had made complete and utter sense. We were like a force that kept together"ness" while the world threw boulders and life's path was all but obstacles. After many moments of everyday bliss and occasional outbreaks, we too were in a state of comatose slumber. Obstacles were passed and now we're in new a transitional phase - we're entering into the "real world".

 

But our relationship has changed, with our marriage at a point of an end (not too long ago). With what we're going through, I've learned my love for him is stronger than all my instinctual defense mechanisms and that I too can change. Although the future is still uncertain, we're trying (for whatever its worth).

 

My love for the first time encompasses patience, perspective and true understanding (the type that takes phases to sort out). It's funny how I can answer this question now with a feeling in me that communicates the opposite of what I'm trying to explain. To summarize (I suppose) love to me now is sacrifice; I've learned perspective.

[Thinkalot]

I really enjoy the answers...thank you. It helps me sort out the changes taking place in my OWN relationship.

[carla]

I've been in a few longterm realationships that I suppose I was in Love at the time. Turned into bad relationships. One bad one after another. Until 1 day enough was enough and I wasn't putting up with that S*** anymore. That's when I met my honey. I tell you, they say that true love is only in romance novels, they just haven't found it yet.

 

At first it was an attraction that was kinda like he's cute, he's nice and he's understanding......what's wrong with him? Then it turned into hot pasionate sex........what's wrong with him? I was emotionally falling in love with him and still wondering when the demon was going to show it's horns or what part of his body I was going to find the LOSER tatoo. I don't think that either one of us were able to admit to each other that we were a match made in heaven. Everyone else told us that we were a perfect couple, but b/c we both had BAD relationships in the past, we figured that it had to come to an end sometime.

 

We moved in together, then a year and half later we bought a house together.

Now ...... 6 1/2 years later the butterflies have flown away. But also gone away are the doubts that it will never last and this will be another rotten relationship.

Sure we know each others flaws and idiosyncrasys, we even have our pet pevees about each other. But when you compare it to the love that we have for each other

they are nothing more than a little thing that can easily be over looked. Throw alot of respect and communication with each other we know most of the time what the other is thinking. We have a connection that grew over the years and grows stronger each day.

[Thinkalot]

It's nice to read happy tales on this site.