I’d had a crush on him for about a year and a half, although I didn’t realise it until he split up with his girfriend, also a friend of mine, and my immediate visceral reaction was “HOORAY! At last!” followed quickly by “gosh I hope it doesn’t take him too long to get back into shape for a relationship” and, lagging far behind, “oh, and I hope my friend is all right.” That made me realise just how much I liked him, and I was pleased (and a bit embarrassed) to find out that he’d fancied me for just as long, and that was one of the reasons he decided to break up with my friend.
We went on our first date-date in January and by the next morning we were making plans to go on holiday together in March. The first few weeks I kept catching him staring at me with a slightly stunned and dazzled expression that I’m sure I was wearing when I looked at him, too. We said “I love you” out loud for the first time (and not immediately after sex, that kind of “I love you” doesn’t count!) about a month in, and we just got engaged two weeks ago. I still have the same happy-shocked feeling I’ve had since he agreed to go out with me the first time.
Hmmm - our first date lasted 23 hours. I was totally infatuated within a few minutes of us meeting - our chemistry was pretty electric. And the fact that we could sit in a Denny’s and talk from 11 at night to 5 in the morning and never even feel tired was pretty wild.
But I *knew *I loved him probably within the first month. It seems like I’ve always known at this point - but I’m trying to not be overly dramatic.
I’ve been in love a few times, and it’s always been love at first sight. Although not necessarily at ‘sight’, as two of them were online and phone conversations before actually meeting in person. I wish I knew what caused it, because sometimes I’d like to pick and choose, you know!
Aw, this is cute, I know exactly the look you’re describing. Best of luck in your marriage.
I’m curious about those posters who answered 6 months or more, none of them have posted to the thread. Was it a slow growing love that snuck up on you, or did it take you that amount of time to admit it to yourself?
It was weird for my husband and me. We met on Match.com. I had drinks with him one night, then dated another guy for a month. When that fell apart, I had drinks with my (now) husband again, but dated a different guy for a month. When that fell apart, I went on a real date with the man I ended up marrying, and we’ve been together since then. He didn’t really open up when we were out for drinks, but when we actually had a real date, and I got to know him, I started to fall for him. It still took me a couple months after that date to realize I “loved” him, but I knew I would marry him by the time we had been together for 5 months. He proposed on our one-year anniversary. We’ve been married since January and this August, we will have been together for 3 years.
Within a month, probably more like 2 weeks. It kind of hit us both like a lightning bolt. We were living across the country and chatting and phoning an awful lot (after ‘meeting’ here on the board) and it just felt right in every way.
Within a month I was scheduled to fly out to meet him in person. When my sister asked me where I was going, I showed her his picture and said, “I’m going to meet the man I’m going to marry.” Which I’m sure just sounded nuts to her since I’d never had any desire to get married at all.
When I stepped off the plane and saw him in person for the first time, I knew without a doubt I’d spend the rest of my life with him. He describes that first meeting the same way, we both just felt this incredible connection.
We did a lot of back and forth flying the next couple of months, then we met in Mexico for a week to spend vacation together. While we were there he gave me a promise ring and asked me to move in with him. I accepted and a month after that he was in PA helping me load up a U-haul to drive across country.
Together 10 years, our 7th wedding anniversary will be this summer. Still happier than pigs in shit.
It wasn’t ‘love at first sight’ but it was pretty dang close.
I think it was a week or so after I met SWMBO that I realized that I wasn’t going to be happy unless I was with her. This led to several months of dating which she ended with a very long letter (25+ pages) describing precisely why we would never work out together.
So, I decided that my only course of action was to pack all of my belongings into a bunch of bags and show up at her front door saying, “Hi! I am moving in with you.”
That was more than 25 years ago, so I guess it worked out OK.
Pretty much this. We were together 5 years, we’ve been apart for 9, and I still love him.
I’ve loved others since, but it’s not been the same; I’ve never again felt that immediate visceral wrenching upon meeting someone, as if something inside had suddenly slipped into place.
I chose “at first sight.” It’s not a perfect description, but it’s close.
She was hired at the company I worked for in 1993. Our mutual boss introduced us and I immediately had a “Whoa!! Who the heck is this??” sort of feeling. Of course I liked the way she looked, but I’d met plenty of cute girls before and never felt anything remotely like that. I can’t unequivocally state that it was “love” right then and there, but it was definitely something; exactly what, I can neither define nor describe.
We shared all of about 20 seconds of small talk that day, but already I had vowed that this was somebody I must get to know better. Within a week I was 100% convinced I would be spending the rest of my life with her. I didn’t share this news with her right away, but I did let her know I was interested, and periodically reminded her I was still interested, until she finally broke down – almost a year later! – and agreed to a date.
On the date, she confessed she’d felt something that first time we met, too, but stubbornly stuck to her personal don’t-date-coworkers policy until she couldn’t stand it any more. We got married in 1997 and are still going strong.
I chose 6 months+. I am too emotionally reserved and controlled to have ‘love at first sight’ or permit myself to be ‘in love’ without knowing someone pretty well. Being attracted, wanting to be around them all the time, wanting to know them better, affectionate sex… don’t count as being ‘in love’ to me. There have to be a lot of basic compatibilities and trust before I consider it love.
I recognized that I had strong feelings for my BF soon after we started seeing each other, but it wasn’t until we’d together for a few months that I really started to feel like I knew him well enough to love him. By a year we had both confessed our feelings and we knew we were going to be together a long time.
I chose 3-6 months, because by then I guess it was clear, but since we met when we were 19 and in those first couple of months we both moved to university and were living on our own for the first time, etc, it’s kind of hard to say that I really loved him (even though we were saying “I love you”). I think it just takes time to get to know someone before you know you really love them.
Lust, however? That we had aplenty! The physical attraction was immediate for me - a couple of months before I ever spoke to him, actually, and that hasn’t really changed, even a decade later!
