Why Can’t I Love My Partner? Am I Not in Love Anymore?

By: Christian Gonzalez

Andrea M. Darcy

Lately are you worried and asking ‘why can’t I love my partner?’ Does it mean you are not in love anymore? Or can the situation be fixed?

[Really low because your relationship is struggling? Want help, fast? Book an online therapist on our new site and be talking to someone as soon as tomorrow.]

Reasons Why You Can’t Love Your Partner

If you are struggling to have the connection you want with your partner, and wondering why you are not in love anymore, here are some of the possible reasons why.

1.You don’t share the same values.

If there is one major reason relationships go wrong both in the short and long term? It is contrasting values.

Personal values are the things we hold as most important in life. If your value is family and your partner’s freedom, or you value honesty and he or she discretion, then you’ll have constant conflict.

Note that many of us never take the time to identify our real values. We can spend half our life trying to live out the values of our parents or peer group, or dating those who have values we think we ‘should’ have and then wondering why the relationship isn’t working. 

Read our article on ‘The Power of Personal Values‘ to start identifying yours.

By: Lady Orlando

2. You’re not in love anymore because you rushed in.

When it comes to meeting someone, rushing in based on physical attraction and ‘chemistry’ is a game of Russian roulette. Will you or won’t you share personal values once the buzz wears off? When we get to know our own values then learn to look for the other person’s values first and foremost, we avoid a lot of false starts.

3. You don’t actually know what love is.

Are you sure you don’t love your partner, because it’s not like the movies you have seen or the books you have read? Newsflash – real love is nothing at all to do with what the media portrays. For starters, it doesn’t fall out of the sky perfectly formed.

And real love requires work to maintain. We have to communicate, troubleshoot, and grow. Read our ‘Guide to Healthy Relationships‘ for a reality check.

4. You have intimacy issues that are nothing to do with your partner.

Is it not that you can’t love your partner but that really you struggle to love, well… anyone?

Intimacy issues stem from difficult childhood experiences or even childhood trauma.  And they mean that we have psychological blocks to love that won’t shift, no matter how good looking or wonderful someone else is.

If you are constantly in short term relationships, or can’t find the ‘right’ person, if you always tell yourself it’s them, not you? You might want to read our article on ‘Fear of Intimacy’.

5. You are going in different directions.

By: Trevor Choi

If we don’t take the time to figure out our values, we can get to middle age before they are hard to avoid. Suddenly one partner realises his or her values, and wants to make big changes like go volunteer in another country or take on a big job. The other is at a loss with this ‘new’ person.

Of course for love to last you also need to grow mostly in the same direction, and at relatively the same speed. If one person becomes obsessed with self development and the other person just wants to come home and watch TV? There is only so long that is going to work.

6. You are blinded by ‘your pattern’. 

Sometimes we can’t love our partner as we are stuck in a bad pattern of relating. The pattern is so strong we are not even seeing the other person clearly. This can look like, ‘they want to control me, I am a victim’, or ‘they don’t listen to me, I am bored’.

These patterns, or what schema therapy also calls ‘themes’,  connect to the ways we learned to relate to others when growing up.

Even more sobering, we tend to be unknowingly living out the same drama we have with one of our parents.  Read our article,  ‘When Your Partner is Like Your Parent’.

7. Your core beliefs are stopping you.

By: Dimaz Fakhruddin

Core beliefs are the assumptions we make about the world, others, and ourself as a child. Unless we take the time to identify and question such beliefs we live our lives as if they are facts.

If our core beliefs are negative, they can sabotage all our attempts at love. An example of this is a core belief that ‘I don’t deserve love’. This can arise from parenting where love was not given freely, or a sibling was preferred. Or it can come from trauma like sexual abuse. It will see you push away anyone trying to love you.

8. You are scared to love your partner.

Another common core believe is ‘love is dangerous’. This would come from a childhood experience like a parent passing away or leaving. If you have this core belief, the more a part of you wants to love someone, the more you might shut down and feel nothing.

9. Your sense of self is weak and it sabotages love.  

Do you have a pattern of meeting someone, thinking he or she is the one, throwing yourself into the relationship, then feeling totally lost?

Love becomes very complicated if the truth is that we have an unstable identity. We get caught up in patterns of codependency where we try to please the other, and then feel overwhelmed. Or we might even have borderline personality disorder and be suffocated by your own emotional outbursts.

10. Your anxiety is blocking love.

Many of us suffer form what is called ‘anxious attachment’. Translation – relationships make us super anxious. And the anxiety becomes so big we aren’t sure we are in love anymore.

Why does this happen? Again, it’s a parenting thing. Attachment theory states that we need a stable caregiver we can rely on or we grow up into adults with attachment issues.

How do I know if I am or I am not in love anymore?

It can be hard, if it’s been a long relationship and you still trust and respect each other, to understand if there is still enough love to continue.

It can be very useful, if you both agree to it, to see a couples counsellor. They will not tell you what to do or what to think, but will help you communicate with each other in an open and safe way. Together you can get to the root of the issue and decide on the best way forward for both of you.

Would you like to see a couples counsellor? Harley Therapy connects you with some of the top couples therapists in central London. Not in London, or the UK? Our sister site harleytherapy.com means you can do couples counselling by online no matter where you live. 

Still have a question about ‘why can’t I love my partner’ or ‘am I not in love?’ Use the public comment box below. Note that all comments are moderated. 

Andrea M. Darcy is the editor and lead writer of this site. She has written hundreds of articles on dating and love, and used to run a course called the ‘Dating Detox’. Find her on Instagram @am_darcy