Limerence, Love Addiction, False Self, Anxious/Avoidant Attachment?

[RedBasket]

Before I came across the idea of TF, I learned about all of these ideas to explain "this thing...". I do like the TF explanation because it doesn't pathologize this experience. It sees a pupose/a process and a goal where as the others don't.

But have you ever subscribed to the following explanations? If so, how do you merge that with TF thinking?

-Limerence: a state of longing and intrusive thinking for another person fueled by uncertainty and hope.

-Love Addiction: an endless search for love stemming from childhood emotional neglect, enmeshment, & trauma, that follows a predictive, roller coaster dance between the love addict and the love avoidant. The highs and lows of the experience are biochemically similar to a drug.

-False Self: the facade that a person, often with narcissism or borderline PD, shows the world because their authentic self is fragile/undeveloped/wounded due to childhood factors. (I include this because I felt I saw through my TF's false self to his core and saw mine mirrored too - we saw the vulnerable parts in each other ... I dont' think either of us is actually a narcissist or borderline, but have certain shields associated with both).

-Anxious or Avoidant Attachment Style: how you bonded with your caregivers and romantic partners when you didn't grow up with a secure attachment style of feeling seen, loved, valued as a separate person. Anxious attachment needs more validation and fears rejection, avoidant needs more alone time to "auto-regulate" and not feel overwhelmed with another.

[ssdm1]

This is interesting and I'd never heard of some of these. I've know my tf for 40 years, since we were 10 years old. We had a romantic releationship in high school, were separated for 30+ years and now have just reunited as adults.

Limerence certainly fits what I feel now and felt when we were in high school, but the TF explanation just explains A LOT of our relationship both past and present. The uncertainty and hope is something he causes/caused in me by his actions/inaction. This causes my insecurities to come out and I place that on him (the mirror thing). As a adult now I can see this and be able to work on it. I do have to keep checking myself when I fall into the insecure mode and learn to trust what he says and trust the tf process.

I also hate when I long for him and the constant thoughts of him, but I know this is just my insecurity and now I can work around it. I'll just be happy when he's home from his business trip lol.

[Just wondering]

I considered all those options back then, but the last one seemed especially fitting to the situation. I used to be a fervent defender of the TF theory, now I think it may exist for very rare few couples who manage to overcome their flaws, their past, etc. and that most of other cases are just cases of compatible psychopatologies. No offence to anyone, I count myself included. A co-dependant person meets a narcissist. Or two avoid meet one another. It certainly does explain a lot. When you add to this signs and dreams and sinchronicities, that opens the door to transpersonal psychology, a field I am still fond of because it integrates several approaches and ideologies in treating the complexity of a human mind and soul.