Question of the week: Can a relationship survive if one person loves their partner more than the other loves them back?
Women have been told for generations — usually by their mothers or aunts or grandmothers — that they should “marry a man who loves you just a little more than you love him.” It’s depressing and old school and just plain bad advice, if you ask us. But perhaps we’re naive — is it overly optimistic to assume that it’s possible to love your partner exactly the same amount as he or she loves you back? Sure, we understand that feelings ebb and flow over the years — even from day to day or minute to minute. But we’re talking about the macro level here: Is it even possible to find someone who loves you equally to the way you love them? If it is, should this be the ideal? And can a relationship survive if this ideal is not achieved? Finally, is there ever a situation when it would be better to love more or less than your partner?
Share your thoughts in the comments section below. Feel free to share your gender, age, and relationship status if you feel it’s pertinent to your answer (and we think it probably is!).
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November 30th, 2012 at 5:36 pm
I think the primary mistake here is to think that there’s a simple binary spectrum of “into” and “not into”. People get into relationships in different ways. Are you into it because of hot sex? Deep friendship? Comfort? Children?
Even if we pretend that different ways of being “into it” could be compared directly, it doesn’t mean that they’re comparable.
A relationship will work if both people get most of their needs met, and if both people are willing and able to work to meet their partner’s needs. If you won’t do that it doesn’t matter how into them you are, it’s not going to work.
November 30th, 2012 at 5:38 pm
Ok that second paragraph is hella awkward. What I mean is:
Even if we pretend that different ways of being “into it” could be compared or quantified directly, that doesn’t mean that two people at the same level but on different axes will mesh.
December 1st, 2012 at 3:25 am
I incline toward “better to be the one who loves less,” but not because I think it’s objectively better, it’s just an inclination. Probably explains why I’m single. And that’s OK. I’m lonely, but I also don’t want to rearrange my life right now in a way that would make room for anyone else. I’m sure it also matters that I’m a straight woman in her 30s.
December 1st, 2012 at 8:49 am
Relationships seem to have a subtle but brilliant push/pull mechanism that make them ‘work’ in the beginning. Then after a while you have to consciously chip in in order to keep it afloat. If you’re not willing to be part of that, don’t enrol. This is where it usually ends, when one partner feels, accurately or not, that they are doing all the work. When it comes to love in a spiritual sense, I wonder if it isn’t the same thing..it usually ends if one person feels like he or she is doing all the loving. / Female late 20′s.
December 1st, 2012 at 1:05 pm
i feel like women tend bear the responsibility of failed marriages. marry a man that loves you more. marry a man that’s older and never younger. marry and never let yourself go. advice like this about power dynamics might’ve been important for dependant women, but it’s not the type of relationship i want or need… i don’t like to control and don’t want to be controlled either. isn’t that realistic?
December 1st, 2012 at 1:22 pm
I think Evan hit the nail on the head. This article implies that it is always possible to measure how much love someone feels but love is not quantitative.
That being said, I think most solid relationships will have two people who have close to equal strength of feelings. But, there are also plenty of examples of when one person feels significantly stronger than the other. And no. I don’t think this will make the healthiest of relationships. Both parties may decide to muddle through because the pros of the relationship outweigh the cons of the imbalance. But I think it is more likely that the person who feels less strongly will eventually move on to greener pastures or the person who feels more strongly will get tired of being/ feeling like a sap.
December 4th, 2012 at 9:25 am
I think there is a difference between being needy of the other person and loving them a lot. Love is not neediness, love is that selfless feeling you get towards the other person. I’m going to stop trying to describe love any more because it’s impossible!
I am 26 and recently married, but I’ve been in a relationship with my husband for 8 years. I think we love each other equally, and always have. However the issues have been where I have been more needy of him than he is of me. Things balanced out when I sorted out my issues and felt I could stand on my own two feet. I felt so independent I nearly split up with him. But then I realised that just because I felt independant didn’t have to mean being single. And I stayed with him because I love him and freely chose to be with him.
I now find myself with a chronic, disabling illness, and again more dependant on him than he is on me. But it is still working, because I make an effort to be as independant as possible, to never take him for granted and to thank him regularly for what he does for me. There is still a feeling that we are a team, that we both have something to give to our life together.
December 4th, 2012 at 1:00 pm
I’ve certainly heard of this statement.
Just because it’s a cliche, it doesn’t make them false. A cliche is…because it happens more often than not.
December 4th, 2012 at 1:40 pm
Yes, but wouldn’t you then be more tempted to cheat on him? Is he OK with an open marriage?
Single woman 30
December 6th, 2012 at 10:13 pm
Well, before my current relationship with my fiancee (with whom it feels pretty equal), I’ve only ever been in relationships where I was way more into it. So I don’t know about being with someone who loves you more, but I think a relationship is probably better when both people love each other equally.