What is Philophobia,and how to Overcome the Fear of Falling in Love

  Why am l afraid to fall in love could it be Philophobia, a condition where you are afraid to fall in love or engaging in a romantic relationship. In some more extreme cases, philophobia can even lead someone to be afraid of loving family or friends.

Those who have ever fallen in love or are in love know that love is such a wonder and a beauty. For some reason, there are situations in life that we cannot avoid and one of them is our ability to fall in love. Even when the circumstances are not favorable or when the person is not right, the feelings take place unconsciously

It's that thing that happens when two people are talking about the universe and then they all laugh and one lightly touches the other's arm for just a second and then let’s go. That, yes, is a sign that someone is into the other

For some Love is a terrible Force, a great Power not to leave naively unguarded, a little like a panther or a wild animal that could at any moment, if  not careful, give  a devastating scratch or worse,  jump to the throat and then devour us to satiety. Love life is not always easy for some, and these people sometimes end up missing opportunities or being too insecure and never revealing their feelings just because of fear.

How is your relationship, does it only last a maximum of a few weeks? Maybe you should think about what that is and if your partner was the problem. Or if it's something else: your fear of getting involved and falling in love with someone. People with philophobia get fears as the relationship get more serious.

What is philophobia?

Philophobia is simply the fear of falling in love or engaging in a romantic relationship. In some more extreme cases, philophobia can even lead someone to be afraid of loving family or friends.

The act of falling in love can be one of the most incredible experiences that human beings can feel, but for a philophobics, it can become a situation that produces a terrible sense of discomfort and high levels of emotional and physical stress.

All phobia implies fear, extreme fear before a given situation. Fear awakens in us the need to defend ourselves from what we consider a threat or attack, activating with it a series of behavioral patterns that help us deal with this intense fear.

When it comes to philophobia the fear is so intense that it creates different defense mechanisms. Just as a person uses a weapon to defend themselves when they feel attacked and in danger, a person suffering from philophobia uses different defensive modes of behavior when they feel they are about to fall in love.

This anxiety disorder can have an effect on the social and emotional life of the person who suffers it. In severe cases, the philophobic may not only avoid potential love affairs but may stop relating to co-workers, neighbors, friends and family.

Causes of fear of love

Many people can suffer and end their relationships, including going through a certain depression and getting back to life, this is natural, but people who suffer from philophobia often have stronger symptoms, including physical symptoms such as dry mouth, nausea, breathing breathlessness, shortness of breath, sweating, panic attack, shaken hands, crying crisis and other variations when thinking about getting involved in another relationship.

There are people who fear to give themselves up, falling in love or establishing strong personal relationships. They only live without commitment, they talk little about themselves, they avoid showing themselves as they are, and they put an “insurmountable barrier to not feel vulnerable.

Out of fear of rejection, these people who are afraid to love avoid any kind of affective involvement, despairing only at the thought of it coming to pass. If the disease is not treated, people can avoid marriage at all costs for fear of divorce or seizures. Therefore, those who suffer from philophobia should seek the help of a psychologist and psychiatrist to find the causes of this fear and cure them. See below what are the main causes of fear of loving.

Heartbreak

The biggest cause of philophobia is when a person has already suffered a disappointment of love at some point in their life. When you are betrayed or someone you have much appreciation ends with you, you run out of steam, it seems that everything around you will dissipate and succumb, but that feeling tends to improve over time. They say that time heals everything, does not it?

Usually yes, no matter how long it takes, but if over time the wounds remain latent and ardent as if they were recent and this stops you from moving on with your life, meeting new people and becoming emotionally involved again, it may be that you are suffering from philophobia. If you’ve gone through series of disappointments you cannot trust anyone else and you always insist on comparing all your new partners with the people you've become involved with, even though they may be completely different.

You tend to spread to the four corners that all men are equal, that none of them will compliment you as you need and that, as incredible as they may seem at first, sooner or later they will break your heart. Living in this expectation that something bad will happen and that you cannot give yourself completely to anyone is not healthy at all. This can interfere with your physical and mental well-being, disrupt your work performance, studies, and the relationships you maintain with your loved ones (family and friends).

To overcome this you must know that everyone goes through disappointments and that everyone can move on, forgetting the past and allowing themselves to love again.

True love, there is only one

Another cause, similar to the disappointment of love, is to have had an intense, strong and true love and to believe that it was the only one of your life. There are women who believe in true love and soul mate, and when they meet that man they claim to be the chosen one, the one who will be that person, who provides everything she needs to be happy and fills her completely, they feel as if they are irreplaceable.

Of course, each person differs from the other and no relationship is the same, but that does not mean that you will never find anyone else better or you will have a relationship as happy as what you had.

In fact, it is not the "best", but rather enough to make you happy and fulfilled. The next relationship you have does not have to be the best, it just needs to be healthy for you. If a woman loses a partner she imagined to be the real one, her soul mate, she tends to close and be disappointed with love, as if she would have no one else in her life, and develops a certain fear of loving again.

Having this thought is the first step to actually not finding anyone. A woman needs to accept what has happened and know that this is not the end, that many possibilities will come, just as she will meet other interesting people along the way.

Low self-esteem

Another cause for the fear of loving, a little less common, is low self-esteem. Women who are not satisfied with their body or their personality tend to have very low self-esteem and this disrupts their loving involvement. The fear of love can be traced to this lack of self-love.

If a woman cannot see her physical attributes, her strengths, qualities, no one will likely see, too. This sense of self-contempt can make her close and give up on love, imagining that she will never find anyone who accepts her and likes her as she is. In some cases, this fact is a motivator for her to grow and look prettier, but in others, this can cause her to sink even more.

Negative experience

An intensely negative experience in the past may have triggered the reaction and caused the condition some therapists believe. The patient who suffers from philophobia has wounds from a divorce (personal divorce or Divorce from parents) watching parent fight or break up or witness domestic violence in their infancy prevents them from any potential situation of being hurt again by a lover.

Culture and Religion

Under certain circumstances, many cultures and religions place relationships between men and women as illicit and frown on romantic love. This can cause intense panic in the mind of the person who possesses philophobia since they firmly believe they will incur the wrath of the elders or God if they have feelings or thoughts about love.

What are the most common symptoms?

There are several opinions regarding this disorder. But it seems that what triggers Philophobia is a bitter failure of a past relationship that has not been overcomed. At a physical level, symptoms become very obvious when they are in the presence of the opposite sex, of whom they feel physical and emotional attraction for.

They cannot keep any relationships or stay committed. They are so afraid of love that they cannot open up to anyone.

Their well-being often depends on the answers they receive from the person they love. This can keep them tense and anxious all the time. They can be extremely possessive or, on the contrary, can ward off their loved ones with their detachment.

The person also experiences severe anxiety due to commitment pressures: restlessness, shallow breathing, increased heart rate, nausea, and chest pains are some physical symptoms that can be attributed to philophobia.

Panic and anxiety attacks are also common.

What behavioral patterns can we identify in a person suffering from philophobia?

To justify themselves that they should not get involved in that relationship anymore They tend to look for defects in the other partner.

Many philophobics are infatuated with unattainable relationships, they fall in love with unreachable people to convince themselves that they can love, but that it is the circumstances that do not make that relationship assessable. 

They seek to relate to people who are very different from them, thinking that in this way the union will fail and they will not feel the pressure to leave the relationship only because of their fears.

They tend to do things that set in disputes with the other person, just to upset the partner to leave the relationship in this way it is not them who leaves the relationship.

They isolate themselves emotionally when they feel that the other person is getting too close, falling into behaviors such as avoiding phone calls, ceasing to see them regularly, making up excuses. 

They avoid social contact to the point of isolation and they always have new affairs

Extreme anxiety, fear and nervousness at the idea of ​​falling in love or establishing an intimate connection with someone

To disfigure themselves with scars, burns, tattoos; consciously bringing to the last degree of obesity and rendering their appearance unattractive.

Change as individuals, for the worse, shows aggressive actions in relation to those who like them; they become sadists at home, feeling that they love their partner much more than they would like.

Who is affected most?

Women, as well as men, can be affected by the philophobia. The intensity of the female victim is much higher than that of the male. It because women have high emotions compared to their male counterparts. Making the affected have complexes which include feelings such as humiliation, resentment, sadness, helplessness, and frequent sad memories. Philophobics often feels helpless and does not seem to be able to overcome all the consequences of what happened. A person often blames himself for leaving and becomes angry.

Those affected do not do so on purpose and do not find that unusual. We can say that the real fear is not in the fact of loving or not, but it is a fear associated with a whole range of factors. Fear of losing individuality, fear of not being a free person, fear of being abandoned, and fear that their partner will not meet expectations. They just do not find great love because they are masked and they think that's just the way it is.

This uncertainty about love can also affect other behaviors. Love like any other emotion comes to us without choosing when and how. To us fear the is not specifically to feel love or to be loved but, there is a whole history behind linked to past experiences that have led the person to feel that they are better without that commitment. Philophobics often cannot show feelings in many situations.

Treatment of philophobia

Philophobia and any other phobia can be cured. Drugs and medications may be prescribed. However, these are not a permanent solution. Other therapies that provide long-term healing are needed. The treatments that can be used for philophobics are desensitization therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy, hypnotherapy, neurolinguistic programming and antidepressant medications

Cognitive-behavioral therapy

Identifying and changing thoughts, beliefs, and reactions regarding that original source that triggered the phobia with the help of a cognitive-behavioral therapist. Cognitive therapy is an approach with a high success rate and that is highly effective in this type of situation. In this type of cognitive behavioral therapies. First, the therapist work teaching patient to recognize their thought that makes them reach a conclusion that is not very useful for them, that is the thoughts that leads them to have dysfunctional thoughts and behavior (Philophobia). The therapies get patient to be able to reflect on their way of thinking and then they will help the victim put into practice techniques to destroy this mental process and replace it with another, more constructive one.

Affective desensitization therapy

It consists of exposing the patient to the object or situation that causes fear (in this case, romantic relationships) until it is desensitized. The therapist can even use technology to simulate this interaction and thus prepare the person for real-life situations.

Affective desensitization is used to treat phobias of all kinds. It is about learning to relax while imagining scenes or exposing the patient to the object or situation that, progressively, are causing greater anxiety. Virtual reality is very good here."The repeated presentation of the stimulus causes the patient to progressively lose their capacity to evoke anxiety and consequently physical, emotional or cognitive discomfort". The technique is very effective in combating classic phobias, chronic fears, and some interpersonal anxiety reactions.

 What can I do if I think I have philophobia?

If you have philophobia there are some things you can do for you to fall in love or to maintain romantic relationships:

Face your fears

Avoiding the conditions that cause fear is not the solution, but rather aggravates the problem. As mention above, philophobia usually appears after a traumatic experience with a previous partner, so to have negative emotional memory gradually fade away is to be open to love again and your social contacts. So exposing themselves more to love helps that frightening. Therefore, we cannot refuse to love only because it produces fear.

 Learn to manage emotions

We must try to leave behind irrational thoughts created by past experiences and future expectations. Live the present, enjoy relaxation, listen to music, practice mindfulness. Mindfulness is aimed at providing us with a method to learn to manage emotions, reactions, attitudes, and thoughts in order to face the situations that life presents us, through the practice and perfection of full consciousness. These are activities help us reestablish emotional control in our lives. People who practice mindfulness on a daily basis show better control over emotions and behaviors during the day. Feelings alter our thinking and can go overboard if not mastered. We must drive them through emotional control thus being able to modify our emotional and sentimental state, when necessary.

Express your fear

Communication is a key factor in any relationship and to be able to feel stronger when dealing with philophobia. You should try to open up with trusted people and explain what is happening to you, why we feel this way and how we feel. Keeping all the negative feelings we experience is highly dangerous and discouraged. The simple conversation with that close person can make you see things differently and will help you to better understand the reactions and therefore emotional stress will be reduced.

Give yourself time

It is not a good idea that we want to overcome our fears overnight. Some people try to remedy their state of anxiety by rushing, wanting to fix everything in a day this is impossible. Emotional wounds can take a few days, weeks and even months to heal. If you are still emotionally devastated it dangerous forcing yourself to relate to others in an intimate way. Precisely, to overcome a phobic disorder, the first thing we must do is give our mind time to adapt to the new changes. Take the time to properly focus on your life, do not get overwhelmed, we must learn to live with ourselves, discover new sensations, and of course, find ways to be happy and little by little, you will overcome

Get help if necessary

Psychologists and psychotherapists are specialized in treating this type of emotional disorders. As philophobia is an anxiety disorder caused by previous negative experiences, family or relational, it is recommended to go to a health professional if it is not possible to overcome it alone. They will give you guidelines so you can better understand where your fear comes from and manage it to get rid of it. Cognitive behavioral therapy and emotional desensitization have proved very effective in overcoming phobic disorders.

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