Limerence vs. Love vs. OCD: What’s the Difference?

Have you ever had a crush on someone that was so intense and massive it was hard to think about anything else? Did you daydream about that person all day long, ruminate on every interaction, and analyze every small thing that unfolded to look for signs of their interest? What did they mean by that? Their voice sounded different today; are they losing interest in me? 

If this sounds familiar, you might have experienced limerence. 

A viral TikTok by creator Danielle Walter describes limerence this way: an “unhealthy obsession or infatuation without the facts.” Walter adds, “Your friend who gets obsessed with ‘Jerry’ after their first date and is thinking they’re going to get married—that’s limerence.”

Read on to find out what limerence really is, how to distinguish it from love or lust, and learn whether a larger mental health issue such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) could be driving the phenomenon.  

Struggling to stop obsessing about a romantic partner? We can help you cope with obsessive infatuation. Book a free call to learn more.

What is limerence? 

Limerence has become somewhat of a buzzword on social media lately, but it was coined by psychologist Dorothy Tennov in the 1970s. Tennov was looking for a term to describe obsessive feelings for another person when a mutual infatuation doesn’t exist.

Tennov defined limerence as “an involuntary interpersonal state that involves an acute longing for emotional reciprocation, obsessive-compulsive thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, and emotional dependence on another person.” 

Limerence vs. love vs. a crush: What’s the difference?

It may be confusing to tell when you’re experiencing limerence vs. being in love or simply having a strong crush that includes lust. Let’s examine the similarities:

• Love, limerence and lust all involve intense emotions related to desire for another person
• These feelings can influence they way you act and think (i.e. trying to impress the person you’re attracted to)
• There’s no set “cause” for love, limerence, or a crush; these feelings can kick off at any time
• The early stages of falling in love, just like limerence, may involve a lot of thought about this person who has entered your life, and anticipation about the potential between you two.

But there are also key differences. Limerence is all-consuming (and often not in a purely positive way). It goes beyond a healthy crush, which you can experience while still having the head-space to think about numerous other parts of your life. 

What’s more, love requires a meaningful connection with the other person; it develops and is sustained over time. Limerence, on the other hand, is usually one-sided. The person you’re infatuated with is referred to as the limerent object (LO). Your LO may or may not have mutual feelings for you—and the uncertainty is key here. In fact, when it comes to limerence, the uncertainty of how your LO really feels about you is what fuels the intensity of your interest.

Commons signs of limerence:

• Rumination: Becoming consumed with thoughts and feelings about your LO, whether you want to be or not. 
• Interference with daily functioning: This includes having trouble focusing on work, school, or your other responsibilities when obsessive thoughts about your LO take hold. 
• Neglecting family or friends: Your obsessions may take up time that used to be spent on other relationships. 
• Idealization: Limerence may cause you to view your LO as perfect.You put them on a pedestal and don’t acknowledge their flaws.
• Emotional highs and lows: This can look like euphoria when your LO makes contact or shows interest, followed by an intense fear of rejection of debilitating anxiety when they don’t. 
• Physical signs: These may include energy spikes (and falls), loss of appetite, and trouble sleeping.

The three stages of limerence

Limerence often unfolds in three distinct stages.

• Stage 1. Infatuation: The initial period when a crush forms. 

• Stage 2. Crystallization: The crush intensifies and turns into limerence; obsessions begin.

• Stage 3. Deterioration: Limerence begins to fade. This may be because you get rejected, your LO starts dating someone, or your feelings simply go away on their own. In some cases, although it’s not the norm, limerence deteriorates because you enter into a happy ending with your LO. That means you have moved past the obsessions to establish an honest, healthy relationship.

Understand that this framework isn’t scientific, but merely a common process that people who experience limerence go through. And there’s no set time frame for each stage or how long limerence lasts. Some people may find themselves in the crystallization stage for weeks, while others spend months in it.

Is limerence a mental health condition?

Limerence isn’t something you can get diagnosed with. It’s just a description of a feeling or a state of being, according to Tracie Zinman-Ibrahim, LMFT, CST, and Chief Compliance Officer. Your parents might refer to it as lovesickness, while your Gen Z sister might call it being “down bad.”

That said, limerence can be more common in people who have other mental health issues such as anxiety (or anxious attachment), PTSD, and OCD.

How limerence relates to OCD

Obsessive thoughts and feelings about a specific person are a key indicator of limerence. That sounds similar to obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), right? If you’re unfamiliar with OCD, it’s a chronic mental health condition in which a person experiences obsessions, a.k.a recurrent and unwanted thoughts, urges, feelings, sensations or images that cause distress. People with OCD respond to these obsessions with compulsions, which are repetitive behaviors or mental acts done in an attempt to ease discomfort or neutralize distressing thoughts.

OCD obsessions can be about anything or anyone—including, yes, a romantic interest. In fact, there’s a subtype of OCD called Relationship OCD (ROCD), in which repetitive thoughts commonly center around a romantic partner or relationship. There’s usually a significant amount of fear, doubt, and distress involved.

People with ROCD frequently brush off their symptoms, assuming they are just a normal part of dating and the anxiety that comes with it. But it’s important to be able to spot when obsessions and compulsions are at play so you can get the proper help.

Common ROCD obsessions:

• “What if we fall out of love?”
• “That other couple seems so happy. Is something wrong with us?”
• “What if they cheat on me?”
• “They’re not texting as much lately; are they losing interest?”
• “If we break up, it will destroy me.”

Common ROCD compulsions:

• Constantly re-reading texts or DMs
• Ruminating and constantly replaying interactions in your mind
• Excessively researching what the person likes to do and where they hang out
• Seeking reassurance—asking friends or even your therapist to validate the person’s interest in you
• Taking relationship quizzes online to determine if you’re “meant to be together”
• Spending hours on relationship forums to feel better

How do you stop feeling limerence?

Remember that limerence is just a feeling.

Many people get over their obsessive crushes without guidance from a healthcare professional. Here are a few tips to do so on your own:

• Work on self-awareness. Step one to managing limerence is identifying what’s going on. Once you understand that you’re experiencing obsessive infatuation, you can take a step back to better assess how you want to proceed. For some people, that clarity is enough to pull them out of the limerence rabbit hole.
• Establish romantic standards. If you find yourself continually experiencing limerence, examine what’s been fueling your romantic interests. Do you tend to fall for unavailable partners? Are you continuously falling for people without creating a bond first? Practice getting to know your crushes before infatuation takes over. This also helps ensure you don’t build up a “perfect” crush in your mind that you put on a pedestal. 
• Maintain your own independence. Actively prioritizing your own interests and other relationships can go a long way in reducing the infatuation. 

If your limerence has become too uncontrollable to manage on your own, it’s okay to need some extra support from a therapist. For those with OCD, exposure and response prevention therapy (ERP) is highly effective at reducing symptoms so your life isn’t ruled by obsessions and compulsions. ERP is a behavioral therapy that requires active participation in certain exercises called exposures.

A therapist who specializes in ERP will guide you as you carefully confront your obsessions with your LO and then practice response prevention techniques so that you don’t engage in counterproductive rituals and compulsions in an attempt to find relief.

ERP is highly individualized to each person’s needs, but Ibrahim shares some of the exposures she has designed for therapy members—things that directly trigger feelings about the LO: “It could be listening to romantic love songs. It could be watching certain movies, like romcoms,” Ibrahim says. “It could be writing scripts about a worst-case scenario, imagining that this was not the perfect person for you.” You’ll then sit with any discomfort and resist the urge to do compulsions. 

ERP may sound hard—and it can be, especially at first—but developing an ability to accept uncertainty and doubt is life-changing. If obsessing over a crush is causing your difficulties in your everyday life, there’s no shame in reaching out for help.