Love leads to listening, freedom, warmth, care, and mutual support. It’s sharing dreams; it’s facing challenges together. It’s pooling resources for mutual benefit. It’s providing a safe place for each other and for any children with whom you share your life.
Love is not love when:
- Coercion is threatened or used
- There are attempts to seclude or cut off from family and friends
- Betrayal is threatened or used
- Love is used to trap, manipulate, or possess
- Confinement is threatened or used – car keys hidden, doors locked, plans cancelled without consultation or knowledge
- Privacy is denied (rooms, cupboards, purses, phone, computer, email, conversations)
- Traps are set to test fidelity
- Stalking, watching, tracking of any manner is threatened or used
- Attempt at important talk repeatedly escalate to shouting matches
- Violence of any kind (physical, sexual, emotional, psychological) of any degree of severity is used
- Warmth, kindness expressed to others (old friends, family, former colleagues) is given as the reason for jealousy and conflict
- When the use of alcohol or legal or illegal substances deplete mutual resources and lead to aberrant behavior or conflict
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