Hooked To My Honey
I promise this isn’t going to be a soppy ‘I love him’ post, he knows that already so I don’t need to do that here, but I do want to talk about a differs perspective on love here.
I have more than once in recent times asked him a question that I know he hates, but the answer is actually very important to me and gives me an insight into what he genuinely thinks about our future. It’s a question that I have never asked a partner until now and the reasons why I asked it are far too numerous and detailed to start describing here, but lets just say that our relationship got to a point where it seemed like the best question to ask. That question was simply “what does love mean to you?”
Seems simple, right? But I don’t think it is at all. Can you describe a feeling? Can you easily describe why you feel the way you do when you look at someone you care about? What makes you say those words “I love you” in that moment?
The biology and neuroscience of love is well known and well documented. It only takes a quick search on Wikipedia to get a full understanding of what’s happening to your brain and body when you see your lover and get that ‘butterflies in the pit of your stomach’ feeling. But a detailed explanation of these biological reactions was not what I was looking for when I asked him ‘what does love mean?’. In fact, if he had answered it like that it would be safe to assume that we wouldn’t be together for very long (in my opinion of course).
There absolutely is an element of biology to love, but I genuinely believe that that biological reaction dulls over time. Love needs to be far more than just biology. How else can marriages and commitments last lifetimes? Yes, it is love, but it not the biology of love.
I had the unfortunate luck of having a very awful accident befall my father in the autumn of 2015 and in this horrible time, I look back on it now and I do not see the horribleness of the blood and the hospitals and tears, (by the way, thankfully he is now back to full strength), instead I remember something else. I remember seeing true love for the first time.
My Mum and Dad have been married for over 35 years now and I can safely say that they no longer get butterflies in their stomachs or any other biological reaction of love every morning when they wake up and look at each other. My Mum would go so far as to say that the only biological reaction she gets in the morning is sleeping fart from my Dad (they have a wonderful sense of humour!).
Nevertheless there was another emotion that was very prevalent during this bad time and that was fear. It completely took my be surprise but it was real. To me their love was no longer the butterflies in the stomach feeling but instead it was the fear. Let me explain.
Each day, for the last 35 years, they have both fallen asleep in each other’s arms and ultimately woken up beside each other.
Each day, for 35 years, they have supported each other while raising 3 kids and 2 dogs along the way.
For 35 years they were there for each other, cheering each other up whenever one of them was in a bad mood.
For 35 years they would care for each other whenever one of them was unwell.
For 35 years they would sit and listen to each others woes whenever one of them had a bad day at work, and reassure each other that it would get better.
For 35 years they sat at the same dinner table each evening and slowly watched the other grow older, but each one proud of what they had achieved together.
Now, it has reached the point where the biological reaction of love that was very present in the early stages of their relationship was replaced with fear, the fear of spending another 35 years without that other person. The fear of going to sleep each evening without the other one beside them and perhaps worse was the fear of waking up the next morning and having to face the day without them. Yes, I’d even imagine that my Mum would ultimately come to miss the sleeping fart from the Man that has helped shape and define her life.
So when I asked my boyfriend of 1.5 years what love meant to him, the answer I was looking for was not the butterflies in the stomach but more along the lines of what I had seen, perhaps the real definition of true love.
I look at him and picture what our life might look like over the next 40 years.
I look at him and think that there is no one else that I would rather wake up beside and that I struggle to fall asleep in our bed when he is not there.
Yes, I look at him and I still feel butterflies but I know that I have felt these before with others; this is different. This may be the closest to true love that I think I have been. This love is the fear of not having him in my life, to not be able to cheer him up if he’s feeling down, to not be there for him when he is ill and care for him till he is better, to not be there to watch each other grow old and to not be able to build a life together that we can both be proud of.
This is why I’m hooked to my honey.