Love: Is it a behavior or an ability?

Booman, Like your .02c more ways than one! c.i.

Thanks for the elaboration BoWoGo. I too believe that love is a concious decision. It's interesting how words can trip you up in such conversations. To me "state of mind" goes more to innate ablitly than learned behavior but your response reads more like vice versa.

Hugs to you, too, Rae. I enjoyed the exchange between you and c.i. about the importance of a social circle. I am truly one of the most asocial people around. Mr. B is very socially outgoing with bags of friends and plans and appointments. We live thousands of miles from any family. I think that it is this very fundemental difference between us that has kept our lives together interesting -- and, in our 40s, we've been together for half our lives. Sometimes it's like we live in neighboring villiages. But it works for us.

Hello babsatamelia and thanks for joining the thread. Love IS very difficult to learn! Your post really clicked with me in that it seems that there are two different "schools" of love - the romantic and the practical. I definately fall into the practical school - I think love takes a lot of work.

Welcome to the thread (and to A2K) Verbal lee. You're absolutely right that the word "love" is overused - it has become diluted, as has the word "hate". I'm going to look for your thread to see what other people say instead of love - AFTER I listen to myself for a while to learn what I use.

Booman, your baby example is a good one - maybe especially for me. When I was a kid I never played Mommie and when I grew up I never wanted kid and I never had kids. A little more than two years ago I became a sorta-foster-grandma to a newborn and yes, I loved him without question. Then, about 4 months ago his parents left him at my house and never came back to get him. (To make a very long story very short.) Over these four months I have seen a real evolution in the way I love this boy. No question - it has been a learning process. Did I have an innate ablity to "mother" or did I not? That's what I'm trying to learn.

I thought I knew what love is, for years would have answered "willing good for the loved one", but that is a little too idealistic to last as a key description for me. For some other years I would have said "love is a product of behavior", but that's missing the innate part.

Certainly we learn to love well, and to love well does involve some unselfish wish for the loved one, but it also requires some feedback, some love back at you, or else it becomes quite sere and even possibly the opposite of love, underlain with resentment.

So now I am thinking love is a process, a continuing one, and a fragile one.

I always wanted kids, but in a general way. My career was important to me, I was young, and I didn't feel ready to have kids at all when I went to Texas about 4 years ago to help care for my sister-in-law and her newborn. When my s-i-l was 9 months pregnant, she had an absolutely excruciating headache, was taken to the emergency room, and was found to have a (large) brain tumor. The baby was delivered by c-section the next morning, and s-i-l had brain surgery the day after that.

When I arrived, the baby didn't have a name yet. I helped to name her -- s-i-l had made a list of about 25 names, and she chose the ones I said were my two favorites. (First and middle name.) I diapered, fed, and rocked baby Isabelle for a full week. And something happened.

I do think that there is something innate, something biological, that is triggered by holding, smelling, and seeing a newborn. It was incredibly wrenching to leave her after a week (I cried and cried), and I felt so intensely that I was really worried about seeing her after that -- that has died down, but I still haven't seen her, and hope to this summer, and will be curious what happens.

At any rate, my generalized desire to have a child at some point became very, very specific after that week. It was like there was a hole that I didn't know about until it had briefly been filled and then the filler wrenched back out.

Interestingly, this happened to my husband, too (thank goodness! ) so I don't think it's something purely female or maternal.

This is the innate. I think the triggers really are biological. But learning how to "mother", the verb, is something else. I recently saw something really interesting in a discussion about different types of childbirth and how mothers bonded with their newborns. One person wrote:

soz, Without that innate human need, the human species would certainly die out. However, I could never understand couples that continue to have children after children - reaching a dozen, before they realize they can't afford to support their brood. c.i.

Ossobuco, you touched on something we all have overlooked. We have discussed the need to have been loved in order to be able to love, but for love to continue and to grow, it needs to be returned and cherished. I think that is why so many marriages end in divorce and why so many marriages that continue for years and years are still going simply because of the comfort factor--the familiar.
Whether innate or learned, love is a living thing; it becomes terribly fragile if it isn't carefully tended.

Diane, You hit on the right answer, love is a living thing. It dies without nurture. c.i.

Had an interesting conversation with ex-hubby this afternoon. I called simply to ask him to remind A#1 son to call his Grandpa and it turned into a one hour conversation about our past.

When I reminded ex-hubby that our nineteen year anniverary had just passed, he was in shock. Even though our marriage didn't last, we produced a wonderful child and have maintained a great friendship.

Ex-hubby and I have loved each other for nineteen years. Only now do we appreciate that love and truly feel it.

Oh Rae, the romantic in me needs to know if you think it could work now that you both appreciate and value your love for each other.
Now that I've met you, I care so much what the answer will be. Hugs.

(((((Diane)))))

Good to see you Diane! Sorry to disappoint you, but the ex and I are much better friends than a couple. We both know this, but value our friendship tremendously. We've done a great service to our son, too, by being friends.

A#1 son is the most important part of our relationship.

Ex and I learned about 'love' because of our son.

Rae, your son is a very lucky young man. Too often, children are used as weapons; no wonder some people never learn how to love.

i think im pretty much right when i say that love is merely something that affects our brain with use of hormones and feremones in order to form attatchments with our sexual partners. its why society feels that we should form monogamous relationships....i though an apt definition, as said by al pacino in the 'devils advocate', 'love is biochemically the same as eating large quantities as chocolate'
in conclusion, i figure that love isnt something u learn, its basically an instinct developed to ensure the continuation of the human race in our evolved social development of monogamous relationships as a survival trait of our species.......lol, and NOW i sound worrying
love and jellytots -xxx-

Welcome to a2k, trixabell. I was surely drawn back to this thread by the mention of chocolate, sometimes known as being better than sex. Whatever love is, I'm so glad there is both love and chocolate!

Making love, is like a box of chocolates..... You never know what you're ge.... Oops, my mind wondered.

has anyone heard any news from boomerang?

Sorry for the long absence.

I'm back now and will be trying to get caught up on my responses later today or tomorrow. Thanks to all of you for keeping the conversation going.

Oh, no need to apologize, just hope that things are OK...?

I'd like to welcome the new posters to the thread and thank them for their comments.

To be honest, I'm feeling completely unqualified and incomptent to speak about love right now. In fact, I've even been warned off from love, told by a paid professional that "I cannot afford love (these newcomers)".

So. After thinking I'd come to a new normal and that I understood a bit more about myself and about love I now find that it is already time to reevaluate.

I hope you'll forgive me for not responding directly to your posts on this topic right now. I appreciate the fact that you've put a lot of thought into them.

I think I'll go back and reread this entire thread in hopes that it can somehow inform my current confusion.

Thanks.

Can't afford love? What happened?

Without going into too much detail and sidetracking this thread beyond recognition, I'll do this "Dragnet" style for those of you who have followed my saga:

The good news: Me and Mr. B now have legal custody of Little Mo.
The bad news: His mom is now pregnant with twins.

<sigh>