“Even though we are together, I still feel alone.”
“Being alone is bearable; loneliness while in a relationship is painful.”
“It is a lonely feeling when someone you care about becomes a stranger.”
Sadly, most people who have been in a long-term relationship recognize the feelings being expressed in these statements. And sadly, most of them don’t know how they got to a place in their love relationship where they feel so alone and unloved. And worst of all, they don’t know how to come back from it and re-establish the intimacy and emotional connection they once enjoyed.
What Happened? The Fantasy Bond
I have been writing and lecturing about the fantasy bond for many years now. The fantasy bond, a term originated by my father, Robert Firestone Ph.D., is a defensive adaptation that develops in infancy when the baby is solely dependent on a parent for survival. At times when the infant perceives the parent as being absent or unavailable, the child deals with their distress by forming a fantasy of being connected with their parent. This illusion of attachment calms them and offers them relief from the sense of threat they are experiencing. In the words of Robert Firestone, “the fantasy bond acts as a primary psychological defense, partially alleviating anxiety and offering a false sense of security and safety.”
This defense continues to serve a person through stressful situations in childhood, adolescence and into their adult relationships. The fantasy bond tends to show up most powerfully where people feel the most vulnerable: in their romantic relationships. In the beginning of an intimate relationship, people are typically unguarded and spontaneous. But as the relationship develops and becomes more meaningful, they tend to feel increased anxiety from being vulnerable and open to their partner. Old insecurities can arise and fears of loss can be triggered. The more they feel invested, the more they feel they have to lose.
So, they are caught in a dilemma: they are drawn to being close and intimate, but they are also afraid and self-protective. People often resolve this conflict and relieve their anxieties and insecurities by forming a fantasy bond with their partner. This offers them an illusion of being merged with and connected to their partner. However, as they form this imaginary unit, they gradually substitute a fantasy of love for genuine affection and closeness. This eventually takes a toll as the fantasy bond replaces the actual love and intimacy between two people. As both partners sacrifice more and more of their individuality in order to maintain the illusion of being one, they become emotionally cut off from their own feelings and insensitive to those of their partner.
Formation of the fantasy bond leads to communication breakdowns within a couple. As they fail to see each other as individuals, their conversations become less personal and meaningful. Their communication becomes superficial and practical. They seek comfort in discussion of the same narrow range of topics. They may become dismissive and impatient when the other talks or may not listen at all. When each partner no longer sees the other as who the other is, they both lose the ability to communicate the way they would with any other person. Instead, they relate to each other with less compassion, empathy, interest, and understanding.
How to Re-establish Love: The Five Mindsets
In their book How to Feel Loved, The Five Mindsets That Get You More of What Matters Most, happiness scholar Sonja Lyubomirsky and relationship scientist Harry Reis lay out a clear path of how to not only experience the love coming toward you that already exists, but also how to actually cultivate loving feelings toward you from others. Truly feeling loved, they’ve discovered, differs widely from the actions usually associated with loving, being loved, and falling in love. These experts offer a radical, hopeful, and science-backed shift in how to think about love, revealing that feeling loved isn’t about making yourself more appealing or lovable; it’s about exposing your full and vulnerable self as well as encouraging your loved one to reveal their full and vulnerable self.
The Five Mindsets that these authors present also offers a means by which to challenge the fantasy bond by reestablishing communication between a couple.
- Sharing: showing our vulnerabilities and inner world, not just the polished parts.
- Listening-to-Learn: making space to truly tune in to another and listening closely to what they have to say.
- Radical Curiosity: being genuinely interested in another and being curious about details that shape their world, their beliefs and interests as well as their fears and flaws.
- Open-Heart: being kind and affirming to another for who they truly are.
- Multiplicity: embracing the messy complexity in all of us.
These suggestions enable a person to see their partner with fresh eyes. The mindsets encourage each person to set aside assumptions they may have about their partner, to stop judging or dismissing them in any way. As Harry Reis said in a recent interview, “The listening-to-learn mindset is the idea that you need to really pay attention so that you can actually learn something about the other person. You need to be curious about what they’re saying. And then—and this is the important part—you need to encourage them to go deeper. One of the most powerful things you can say is a simple three-word phrase: ‘Tell me more.’”
The Five Mindsets support the individuality of each person, thereby allowing them to show up as an autonomous person once again. Following these suggestions helps to counteract the destructive impact of the fantasy bond. As communication between a couple deepens and they once again delight in their interpersonal exchanges, real love returns and replaces the fantasy of being merged with each other.
In the Webinar How to Feel Loved: A Conversation with Dr. Harry Reis, I discuss the Five Mindsets with Dr. Reis and how they act to challenge the fantasy bond, restore love with your partner and stop you from feeling lonely in your relationship.