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Why is Unrequited Love so Painful?

Jennifer McDougall
6 min readJul 2, 2022

I understand your pain. I know how much it hurts to love someone who doesn’t love you back. It sucks and can make you feel like your world is ending. But it isn’t!

Why is Unrequited Love so Painful
Photo by Leon Biss on Unsplash

That other person doesn’t want to be with you (and yes, there are reasons why that might be). But here’s where things get tricky: You’re not actually in love with this person — you’ve just in love with an idea of who they could be but aren’t yet. You’re projecting a fantasy onto them based on what’s possible between two people and what you think would make you happy, but in reality, it probably wouldn’t.

Unrequited love can make a person feel incredibly hopeless and helpless.

Unrequited love can make you feel incredibly hopeless and helpless.

You may have convinced yourself that if you try hard enough, the other person will realize how much they love and need you — but it’s not true. You’re not in control of the other person’s feelings, and they might never feel the same way about you. You can’t force someone to love you, be with you, make a decision, or choose one thing over another. The only thing that matters is what THEY want and feel — not what YOU want or think should happen.

Unrequited love can cause you to have a warped sense of reality.

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Jennifer McDougall
Jennifer McDougall

Written by Jennifer McDougall

Host of Life Refined podcast 🎙️ Personal Growth | Self-Improvement | Wellness 💡 Helping you level up your mindset & life. https://linktr.ee/jenmcdougall

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