PHILOPHOBIA:
THE FEAR OF LOVE
“ “Are you kidding me?!”, said my school counselor after I told her that I wanted to die alone.“You’re only twenty. What are you talking about?””
During my visit with my school’s appointed Mental Health Professional, I had good news. After quitting my job, I began to feel peaceful for the first time in a while. Somehow, we ended up on the topic of dating. “I am serious,” I told her. “I feel calm. I don’t want anything to mess that up. Not friends, and certainly not a boy.” She rolled her eyes. “You’re young. You have so much life to live, you have no idea what the future has waiting.” Yeah, yeah, yeah. “I don’t think that my mind will change. I like this feeling of peace. I don’t think I will want to give that up in the future either.” Looking back at it, I don’t know if “peaceful” was the most accurate word to use. I felt numb. I felt as if I was floating through life. I tried to block out any emotion so that I could go through whatever the day required so I could go back to my bed with the least amount of stress possible. In my mind, a relationship looked like a source of stress. I wanted to avoid it to maintain my comfort in apathy.
My first memory of having anxiety towards the idea of love was in elementary school. Though I was attracted to boys, the idea of one having feelings for me was terrifying. I wanted to be in love like I saw in the movies but wanted to run away from the idea of love at the same time. When I got to middle school, the fear intensified. When a boy in seventh grade confessed to my friend that he had feelings for me, I nearly vomited from anxiety. When I suspected that another boy in eighth grade had a crush on me, I physically got up and ran down the hallway and hyperventilated behind an ice machine.
At the time, my explanation for why I feared intimacy so much was because of the horror stories. I saw girls having mental breakdowns over boys who had broken their hearts and heard stories of people being abused by their partner only to stay because they “were in love”. I witnessed desperate people chasing people who obviously didn’t want them due to little self-respect. I didn’t want that to happen to me. I viewed the idea of “Love” as some spell that made people stupid and led to nothing except pain. It put them in a trance where common sense flew out the window and suffering was all that remained. I didn’t want to suffer. However, looking at it now, I think the root of the fear goes much deeper than listening to cheating breakup songs and watching Tyler Perry movies.
My parents didn’t have the best relationship when I was a child. Though my memories are not clear, from time to time I have flashbacks. I remember my father berating my mother, shouting at the dinner table while she cried hysterically. I remember not knowing what I should do as a small, helpless child sitting there watching it. I remember just freezing with my head down, trying to make myself as small as possible to not make anything worse. I imagine that I must have been confused as to how my dad, the man who was always nice to me, could be so mean to the woman I loved. My entire life, my opinion of my dad had been biased because I have always been a “Daddy’s Girl”. He was kind to me, spent a lot of time with me, showered me with hugs and kisses, and gave me pretty much everything I wanted. My father was an amazing father, one of the best anyone could ask for. However, when I got older, I had to face the music and admit that he was a terrible husband. I never made the connection as to how my parents’ relationship affected me until I got older.
Looking back at it now, I realize the pattern. Even though intimacy scared me, the guys I did have an interest in were similar to my father in his relationship with my mother: unavailable and intimidating. The online journal Psychology Today spoke with Whitney Wilson, a counselor at for domestic abuse program for the John Howard Society of Toronto. Wilson spoke about how witnessing abuse as a child affects relationships as an adult. “It contributes to the construction of a child’s belief system – on how a relationship should be and what it should look like.” Joanna Iwona Potkanska, a social worker and psychotherapist who specializes in trauma said, “We tend to remain in patterns that are familiar to us. We often do not realize that the relationships we are in are abusive, especially if we grew up in dysfunctional families.” My mother and father’s relationship created an unhealthy dynamic for my future relationships to follow. I viewed romantic relationships as scary because watching my father with my mother was scary. It makes no sense to me why I would go through such emotional distress- I subconsciously believed that was what love was supposed to be because that is what it looked like with my parents. As a kid, seeing that love looked mean, I wanted to avoid it altogether.
As I’ve gotten older, my perspective changed. I now don’t have a fear of love- I am willing to give it a fair chance if I feel there is a chance at all. Despite this shift in opinion, I am still very cautious. I’ve never fallen head-over-heels for someone, even people I did grow attached to. This has even sparked some issues when men would grow frustrated at their failed attempts a woo me. However, I still believe that being in love can be a beautiful thing if the two people are right for each other. Although I have never been in love and am okay with being single (at least for the time being), I choose to believe that one day I could be with someone I am absolutely smitten by. I hold my heart close to my chest, so I know I wouldn’t fall for just anyone. However, I think one day I will. I refuse to let my past dictate my future. I refuse to settle in a relationship where I am mistreated or mistreat others- I am choosing to not be like my mother or father. I will live life to my own accord and refuse to fear what should bring me joy.
