dtcw 28 lim retreat

7/30/2019 DTCW 28 Lim Retreat

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The recommendations of advice-mongers can be harmful when they presume volition. Because limerenceoccurs in persons ordinary in other respects, limerence is not appropriately categorized as derangement inthe sense of mental illness. Although not pathological in a psychiatric sense, it is, however, both irrationaland involuntary.

Limerence Retreatwas written for a classroom project. It consists of dialogues by six fictional characters eachof which represents a different personal vantage point with respect to the experience of limerence. Althougheach participant initially viewed the phenomenon from a different perspective, they achieved a measure ofagreement when they were exposed to quantities of raw data in the form of personal testimonies.

But puzzles remained.

Copyright 1999 Dorothy Tennov

Lottos Cupid & Venus


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TheL imerenceRetreat

by

Dorothy Tennov

In this play, six people talk about love, especially about unrequited romantic attraction. Three havesuffered, two are currently stricken, one has had never had the experience.

Initamong

ially, each sees the world of love from a different perspective. Two believe that romantic love occursordinary people, people who are not psychologically disturbed. Two others perceive addiction to

love madness as a moral issue because some people let themselves be addicted.

Each member of the group received a booklet containing a research report. They were also instructed toread written testimonies. The members of the group were being paid. They knew that they were beingmonitored. They also knew that they have been selected from among many other applicants by scientistswho study the workings of the human mind. Except for one detail, the researchers practiced no deception.

LLimerence is an identifiable and invariant condition that afflicts persons identicallywhenever it occurs and is mainly characterized by a unique form of cognitivepreoccupation. The condition is commonly referred to as being in love, romantic love,

or passionate love. Those terms may also refer to states other than the state identified as limerence.

Limerence can and often does exist apart from an overt relationship between the limerent person and the

person who is the object of limerence (LO).

It can be completely hidden.

Limerence reorders the motivational hierarchy with consequent disruption or neglect of other interests,relationships, and responsibilities.

Limerence can occur at any adult age and tends to be long-lasting once it takes hold. It is not known howearly in life it may first occur, but it has been reported to occur for the first time in late adulthood..

People who have not experienced limerence lack an experiential base with which to accept its existence.


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Limerence bears no known relationship to personality, race, religion, social status, education, sex, or othercharacteristics of the limerent person.

Limerence intensity is a function of interpretations of the behavior of its object (LO) regarding probabilityof reciprocation. Reciprocation is that behavior of LO which is interpretable by the limerent person asindicating a similar yearning for merger in a committed and mutually loving relationship.

For some, limerence is irrational, silly, embarrassing, and abnormal. For others, it is an extremely desirable

state that promises, and some-times brings, in the words of Stendhal, the greatest happiness. Many whilein its throes claim they cannot imagine life without it.

Limerence is sexual in that LO (the object of the obsession) is of the preferred gender. The aim of a personin the state of limerence and sometimes the consequence of limerence is the establishment of amonogamous sexual partnership.

There is only one LO (at a time). Interviewees categorized by other criteria as nonlimerent often stated thatthey found themselves in love with more than one person at a time.

Nothing said about limerence should be interpreted to imply anything at all about other forms of affection,love, sex, or other type of bonding.

You will spend much of your time reading as many of these personal testimonies as possible. Make your

selections arbitrarily, returning any previously read. Take notes as you read, but do not include identifyinginformation. Use the numbers on the front of the envelope in referring to specific people.

In the course of the Limerence Retreat weekend, the panelists are thus presented with overwhelmingevidence that the condition as described in the report is a reality for many people some of whom, however,manage to hide it from others. The characters discuss legal and social implications as well as the personaldilemmas that might result were limerence to be generally recognized as a distinct state.

ISADORA: an artist, hopelessly and continuously in love (i.e., limerent).

DR. SELLARS: a psychiatrist currently experiencing limerence for a patient.

NANCY: a business manager, she is a nonlimerent woman who stirs up limerence in others.

NELSON: a divorce attorney, never-limerent and disbelieving.

PERRY: a journalist, he is happily free, friendly to all, idealistic, and romantic. He cant imagine that therecould be a love experience unknown to him.

RUTH: was formerly limerent, but is so no longer. She is married, a mother, and a biologist. She would notlike to become limerent again.


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Furniture arranged for discussion. A bar with juice, coffee, and donuts is step up in the corner. Whenthe curtain opens five members are sitting about reading, talking, sipping coffee. All hold copies of a

white, magazine-sized booklet. The tone is friendly, but somewhat formal. A moment after the curtain

goes up, Isadora enters. Scarcely looking at the others, she begins to speak. Her first speech departsfrom what has been going on: it is louder and addressed to everyone in the room.

ISADORA

(Holding the Report in her outstretched right hand) These are the results of a scientific study on love!

Until I read this, I thought that it was my personal destiny to be unhappy in love yet never to want to bewithout it. This Report could be my autobiography.

PERRY

(Seated across the room from Isadora and directing his remark to Dr. Sellars) I found the very idea of a

scientific approach to love insulting to intelligence and to humanity. Furthermore, reading about

neurotic peoples endless love lives was, to say the least, distasteful.

ISADORA

But the cases described were true to my life.

NELSON

Not mine! I think the whole thing is a delusion. They can get anyone to say anything in interviews.

NANCY

I agree. The love madness described in The Report is too irrational, too . . . automatic. I believe we

control our destinies through free will, not that we can be overcome by an uncontrollable evolutionary

force.

NELSON

People should have better control of themselves.

PERRY

(Addressing all) I disagree with the idea of applying science to the spiritual. My experiences of love are

beautiful.

ISADORA

Mine, too, despite the agony.


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DR. SELLARS

Dont close the door on science so fast. Humanity today is faced with problems created by human

action. The more we can learn about ourselves, the better chance well have of solving the problems we

ourselves have created.

RUTH

Weve got ourselves in a mess by things weve done and things we havent done.

NELSON

Like having babies on the one hand . . . .

PERRY

And not killing off the scientists on the other.

RUTH

Perry, you dont know what you are saying.

DR. SELLARS

Love is an aspect of human nature about which we know very little.

NELSON

If we dont stop increasing our numbers world wide, we wont survive. Yes, Im theoretically in favor of

understanding and controlling human reproduction.

ISADORA

A True passion does not spread itself around. It is focused.

RUTH

One person . . . . . at a time.

ISADORA

When a relationship goes bad, I look for a new man to be monogamous with.

RUTH

That one person may not be your lawful spouse.

ISADORA

It rarely is. Sometimes. Furthermore, its monogamy as far as love is concerned, but not necessarily asfar as sex is concerned. Sex (looking at Nelson as if appraising his potential as a lover) has sometimes

been my only distraction when love went wrong. I wanted monogamy, but the pain of a lovers rejection

sometimes drove me into the arms of others for solace.

NANCY

According to the Research Report, marriage ends the pathologically intense love madness.


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RUTH

Not marriage, reciprocation.

NANCY

Theyre different?

RUTH

There are other reasons for marriage than love.

NELSON

Money.

ISADORA

I never felt sure of my second husband. I was in love with him before our marriage, during our marriage,

and after he left me. But I was never, not for a single instance in seven years of marriage, sure of him.

PERRY

We are asked to believe that Cupid aims his arrows to the sky and where they eventually fall is a matterof happenstance. I find that hard to accept. I dont believe in getting trapped in an unrewarding relation-

ship or enduring an obsessive longing eternally unfulfilled. My most loving relationships have always

been freely entered and as freely dissolved.

ISADORA

Damn it, Perry. Its not a matter of believing in it. I dont BELIEVE IN IT either; its something that

happens to me. I dont DO it.

RUTH

It sounds to me, Perry, with all due respect, that you may have had intense love affairs, but what looks

from the outside like love madness has escaped you. I should say, you escaped it.

PERRY

(Feeling somewhat insulted)

Or transcended it. My relationships have been so beautiful it is impossible to imagine better.

NANCY

Ive never been obsessively in love, but surely my experience was as bad or worse. I was the object ofover-possessive and demanding attractions. They were impossible to deal with and impossible to satisfy.

They invaded my privacy. I once lost a friend I had valued before the mania overcame him.

NELSON

I know what you mean. You cant be nice to it. Its insane. When I see the signs, I am not kind to it. Or

polite. I take off.


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RUTH

Your rejections may have been more kind than you think. Simple courtesy looks like possible

reciprocation to the lovesick eye. Friendly contact prolongs the agony.

ISADORA

Wait a minute, Ruth. I grant its inconvenient to be loved by someone you do not love. Ive been there.

But there is no comparison between the annoyance of a pestering lover and the anguish of a brokenheart. Nelson, I think you were a beast, a cold, unfeeling beast. Ive had lovers like you unloving,

uncaring . . . cruel.

NELSON

Sorry, but I cant will myself to feel something I simply do not feel!

NANCY

(To Dr. Sellars) Granted that being rejected is not fun, neither is being trapped in someone elses vision.

The more you give, the more they want.

ISADORA

(To Ruth) They dont understand.

NELSON

Maybe not, but I know me. Pardon my saying it, but if you want to know the truth, the whole thing is a

neurotic delusion they bring on themselves. I say I dont want a long-term relationship. I dont lie. They

know.

ISADORA

Being told and knowing are two different things.

NANCY

Shes right, Nelson. We say it, but they dont hear. Whenever I try having a relationship with someone

in love with me, no amount of saying how much I liked them has any effect. Their whole existence

centers on me. They invade. They want me to give up all other aspects of life.

NELSON

(To Isadora) I admit I like the favors they so enthusiastically bestow. (To Nancy) But not their

unreasonable demands.

NANCY

They smother.

ISADORA

Nancy, you and Nelson are without human compassion.

NANCY

But they say it gives them pleasure for me to take their gifts.


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NELSON

Almost as much pleasure as I get from receiving them.

ISADORA

Thats not funny and thats not the issue. You act under false pretenses.

NANCY

No, never that. I tell them how I feel, that I dont love them in the way they want me to. Sometimes I

even promise to be faithful, and I keep the promise. Would you have me lie?

PERRY

Honesty is the very essence of love.

ISADORA

No. Yes. I dont know. Im not sure.

DR. SELLARS

(To Isadora) Could it be that nothing they could do would be right?

NELSON

(To Perry and Nancy) So why not have some fun.

PERRY

No, that would be taking advantage.

NANCY

(Changing the subject) We are three women and three men. Nelson has made it clear that limerence orlove madness never happened to him. I say it never happened to me. On the other hand, Isadora is and

Ruth was but isnt. If it occurs to some and not to others, to which of us here has it happened? What

about Perry and Dr. Sellars?

PERRY

I cannot imagine a love with intensity greater than some I have experienced. But it was not neurotic, not

foolish, and not based on false premises. It was not madness.

NELSON

(Ignoring Nancy) It still sounds to me like a breakdown. Why not call it an illness?

NANCY

(Interrupting and ignoring Nelson) Dr. Sellars, by my calculations, you must be the third non-

experiencer.


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DR. SELLARS

Ill hold my response to that for now, Nancy. Nelson, its not appropriate for lay people to try to answer

the question of what is and what is not a mental illness.

NANCY

(Flirting) Okay, expert, you tell us. Is it normal or is it an illness?

DR. SELLARS

(Responding to Nancy) Nor would it be appropriate for me to make a pronouncement on the issue.

NELSON

Why not? Youre human arent you? Did they know you were going to clam up when they let you in

here?

RUTH

We agreed to be honest.

DR. SELLARS

I only meant that psychiatry has not, to my knowledge, made a pronouncement on this subject.

PERRY

We are asked to believe that when this love madness strikes it is the same for everyone. I say thats

against nature. People dont operate that way. Each person is different. There cant be a distinct

condition that affects everyone in exactly the same way. I disagree with The Research Report. I knowthe deep love I have felt, the beautiful tenderness and concern I have experienced feelings which can

be felt for more than one at a time are the natural way. My problem with you, Isadora, is that you

submit yourself to this neurosis.

ISADORA

You say that because you dont know it. For me, life would be nothing without it. It gives meaning to

life. On the practical side, since we are pledged to honesty, can anyone tell me what I should do to

attract and entice my lover?

NANCY

Dont be jealous.

NELSONDont cling.

NANCY

Give him space. Dont smother.

RUTH

Dont let him know.


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ISADORA

Hide my feelings?

NELSON

I think shes got it.

NANCYIf he sees how interested you are, your cause is lost.

ISADORA

Yes, they leave when I bare my soul.

NANCY

I know how they feel.

RUTH

According to The Report, everyone said they were in love or had been in love. Only their stories didnt

quite hang together.

DR. SELLARS

Thats why a new word was needed. Some think limerence comes from the limbic system, the part of

the brain that current neurological theory holds is where love takes place.

NELSON

Yeah, and some think it comes from limerick, a comical poem.

DR. SELLARS

Only the first letter is derived from love.

NANCY

Isadora, how can you continue to love someone who gives no response? I thought that obsessive love

dies when hope dies.

ISADORA

It does and it doesnt. Maybe if I never saw Bill, if I moved a thousand miles away, well, 5000 miles

away, and other attractive men showed interest in me, or I became thoroughly wrapped up in my work,

then it would die if he didnt write. But we live 20 miles away, hes married to a cousin, and I see him at

least once a month at family functions. Beside, I cant believe he does not feel for me.

PERRY

But you say he gives no evidence?


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ISADORA

No evidence that would mean anything to anyone else. Its in his eyes. I know how we look at each

other. Last Christmas we were alone together in the hallway for a moment before the others came.

PERRY

Last Christmas! Nothing since then?

ISADORA

Nothing by your standards.

NELSON

If he really cared, hed do more than look at you.

ISADORA

What I tell myself, what I cant help feeling even though a part of me sees it as you do and agrees with

you, is that he is being responsible to his family.

RUTH

His very rejection of you makes him appear more attractive.

NANCY

In other words, he cant win no matter what he does.

ISADORA

It doesnt make sense. It just is! Second-hand, it seems terrible, but I cant imagine life without it. It is

intensely beautiful.

RUTH

(Remembering) Yes, theres a kind of sustained thrill that you can feel throughout your body. They talk

about walking on air because thats what it feels like.

NELSON

Its sexual desire when fulfillment is likely.

RUTH

Its sexual. But its a special kind of sexual. Its not . . . genital. Its a desire for total merging of mind

and body in which the sexual aspect is only part of it. Thats not what happens, but thats what you

want.

DR. SELLARS

(Interrupting) I believe it is time for our lunch break.

RUTH

Were late!


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(All are engrossed in the letters. Dr. Sellars hands Nelson the instructions. Nelson reads, then walks

over to the phone with which members speak with the scientists.)

Hello? This is Nelson. Look, I had an emergency call and was almost two hours late. Missed the letter-

reading. . . Yeah. . . . In my room. . . . Yeah, Ill tell them. (He hangs up and turns to the others.)

Slight change of plan. Youll have to do without me for a while. Im to take the box to my room andread there. Ill join you later.

(The others reluctantly replace their letters. Nelson takes the box and leaves.)

NANCY

The personal experiences described by the letter-writers have convinced me that there is a mental state,

call it romantic love, being in love, love madness, limerence, or whatever, that completely dominates the

thinking and the desires of otherwise normal and reasonable people.

ISADORAI am not alone, not entirely crazy.

NANCY

If its so specific, then there must be something that can cure it.

RUTH

Or bring it on. Its beautiful, gives meaning to life for all the torment of yearning and rejection, there

was something about it that was . . .

DR. SELLARS(To himself) Wonderful!

ISADORA

Necessary!

DR. SELLARS

(To himself) Beautiful.

ISADORA

Spiritual.

RUTH

It gives meaning to life. Every aspect of existence is part of it. I see now that much that had seemed

romantic was meant to be taken quite literally. The letters tell of agonies that match those of the

tragedies of fiction.


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PERRY

It crops up in every opera, film, popular song . . .

DR. SELLARS

Yet I wouldnt want the hand on the button connected to a mind obsessed with love.

RUTHNor would I. Isadora, what do you think? Would you worry if the mind of a person responsible for other

lives were caught in the absolute obsession of love madness?

ISADORA

Well, you make it sound like an illness. But if you mean the passionate love I have felt, maybe intense

love sharpens the mind.

PERRY

Yeah? What if the pilot of your plane is smitten for the pretty and shapely steward? Suppose she rejected

him just before take off?

ISADORA

I dont know.

PERRY

Did you notice their gratitude? Almost every letter began, Thank you for telling me I am not alone.

DR. SELLARS

Or they say, You described exactly how I feel.

ISADORA

Exactly. What I would not give for a potion, not to cure myself with, but to induce it in him for me!

RUTH

It would be a cure.

ISADORA

A painless cure. A beautiful cure, a cure by ecstasy.

RUTH

My husband and I would take it on vacations for second honeymoons or blissful weekends provided

there was also an antidote that freed our minds for work come Monday morning.

DR. SELLARS

The myth of love potions is found in every culture.


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PERRY

It could solve the problem.

NANCY

I wonder how Nelson is reacting to the letters.

RUTH(Looking at her watch) We should soon know.

PERRY

I must confess. When you asked about me, I spouted double-talk. Now I know I never been a victim of

the love madness those letter-writers told about. I have loved deeply and truly, but never with the

obsession they described.

NANCY

That makes three who have never yet been love-mad. Three and a half, counting half of Ruth. Perry,

when you counted yourself as limerent, you assumed Dr. Sellars to be unfamiliar with the experience tobalance things out. But now that you are on the other side . . .

(All eyes turn to Dr. Sellars.)

DR. SELLARS

Yes, I have had the experience described in the report and confirmed by the letters.

PERRY

Currently?

DR. SELLARS

Yes.

PERRY

Then will you tell us about it? Have the letters changed any of your opinions, Dr. Sellars?

DR. SELLARS

I wasnt completely sure until I saw the letters. I still have doubts about methodology. For example,

why, if many do not experience limerence, are all the letters from people who have experienced it? Im

not entirely comfortable about it, but the data do support, as you say, Ruth, that the condition existswithin otherwise normal people.

RUTH

And that it is distinct?


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DR. SELLARS

Yes.

NELSON

(Enters and takes his seat. he nods slightly.) Dont let me interrupt.

DR. SELLARSWell, what say you now?

PERRY

Do you think the testimony in the letters proves that limerence exists?

NELSON

It proves that a certain form of mental illness is prevalent and that the deranged are pleased to believe

that they belong to some sort of privileged and special group. I also can see that some talented writers

like to pour it out to book authors. I admit that some are good writers. If they were more stable

personalities they would write for a living. Okay, okay, Im convinced. In sum, the testimonies in theletters strongly support the conclusion that some people come down with this disease called limerence.

Furthermore, the letter-writers do appear otherwise almost normal.

ISADORA

Does that mean you no longer think me batty?

NELSON

(Moving toward her with mock seductiveness.) You could say that.

ISADORAAnd why was it so difficult for you to come to this conclusion? No one else seems to have had your

problem.

NANCY

Not quite true. I may not have expressed it so emphatically, but until I read the letters I secretly feltmuch the same as Nelson. I didnt want to believe it was so prevalent, and I didnt want to believe it was

not something they could control through will.

NELSON

I didnt want it to be true because I was a cad on the other end of it. I could imagine one of my loverswriting each letter and it made me sick. I didnt want to know how they felt and I didnt want to know

how I had trampled on their vulnerability.

NANCY

I identified with the object of the letter-writers amorous yearnings. Maybe I didnt seem as brutal as

Nelson, but underneath I was. Just as brutal. I didnt realize how they were feeling.


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ISADORA

Yes, you were brutal. Will you be different in the future?

NELSON

I will give them no hope from the start. And I wont sleep with them.

NANCYI wont see them again. I wont accept their gifts.

NELSON

I wont let them work for me.

NANCY

I wont let them take me out and Ill never ask them for favors.

PERRY

Ill explain that I am not limerent. Ill give her the Report to read. Ill imagine her writing such lettersand Ill close the door against her false love. Because limerence is not love. I think that if I had to state

the lesson Ive learned from all thats happened here Id say I learned that limerence is not love.

ISADORA

It is love, and yet youre right. In a way, it isnt. Everything is a matter of getting him to respond. Being

limerent for one person doesnt rule out being the LO of another. Scarlett OHara was limerent for

Ashley while Rhett Butler was limerent for her.

DR. SELLARS

Psychiatry has dealt with this issue since Freud, but never with clarity. Or even honesty.

RUTH

And lets not forget sex. There have been a number of recent exposures of therapist-patient sex. The

professions have condemned it but anonymous questionnaires are still showing alarmingly high rates.

DR. SELLARS

Yes, sex between patient and therapists has been discovered to have been incredibly frequent.

ISADORA

The limerent woman is putty in the hands of her therapist LO.

DR. SELLARS

Todays guidelines are unequivocally against it. But it has been controversial. Some therapists actually

tried to defend the practice.


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NANCY

It makes me shudder to think of it. Maybe because Ive done my own share of using their limerent

attentions to my advantage.

NELSON

Seconded.

ISADORA

I tried therapy many years ago and it almost killed me.

DR. SELLARS

Do you want to tell us about it?

ISADORA

No LO in my life ever did such wrong things.

DR. SELLARS

Wrong?

ISADORA

Things that made it worse. He drew me in, encouraged me to tell him how I felt, then demeaned me formy feelings and finally rejected me. Rejected me but refused to release me. I was caged. Now I can see

that he was relatively well intentioned, but that was not how he appeared to me then. When I told him

how I could not keep from thinking about him and that therapy had long since given way to chances just

to be with him, he accused me of being mentally ill.

NANCYA psychotherapist accused you of being mentally ill?

DR. SELLARS

The man was frightened. But he was also incompetent. He should have understood what was going on or

he shouldnt have been a therapist. I am very sorry. For him and for you. Within these walls, and on thebasis of this experience we are sharing, I condemn many in my profession and will not try to excuse it.

But there are people who do not know the experience and when they dont, and have not seen the letters,

they are not in a position to understand.

PERRYYet some understand. I have a friend whose psychiatrist gave him a copy of a document similar to the

Report. She said that here was something she couldnt treat. That was how I first heard of it. My friend

said he admired the therapist for the way she had handled the situation. I didnt understand what he was

talking about at the time. Now it makes sense.

ISADORA

Being in therapy almost guarantees limerence on one persons part or the other. Or both simultaneously

but unbeknownst. Or beknownst.


19/33


PERRY

Thats what the British psychiatrist said, the one with the funny name.

RUTH

Melitta Schmideberg.

PERRY

Yes, Melitta Schmideberg. She noted that therapy conditions are conducive to romance. Dim lighting,

two people alone talking of intimate things. What can you expect?

ISADORA

How you feel depends on how you think that all-important person feels. But when you know that you

both feel the same you rise blissfully above all other cares. Nothing else is important.

RUTH

As far as the issue you raised earlier is concerned, Dr. Sellars, the letters surely were from people in thethroes of it because they are the ones who would want to write.

ISADORA

Need to write.

DR. SELLARS

I understand. Its a skewed sample.

RUTH

What they tell us is that it is not rare.

NANCY

I wonder whether, of the two ways of killing love madness -- ending hope or reciprocation -- whether

we might give some consideration to the second method. Suppose I pretended reciprocation. Wouldnt

that turn off his romantic passion?

RUTH

Theoretically, maybe.

ISADORA

No it wouldnt. At least not for long. It would bring him ecstasy for a while, but I doubt if you could

keep it up long enough to be convincing. Then, as you started pulling away, his passion would bestronger than ever. Hed notice little things. Marriage doesnt even necessarily cure it because you cant

always be sure of your spouse.


20/33


PERRY

In one letter I read, the man said that understanding limerence changed nothing except his feeling that he

was uniquely afflicted. He said at first he thought it would help him get over it, but to his surprise, it

didnt. He had bought a copy for his LO, not so shed understand what he was feeling, but to support hiscontention that it was not the way he was feeling. He knew that if she thought he was limerent, she could

never become so for him.

RUTH

If I ever feel those feelings coming on, I run. So far, its worked.

NELSON

The plot thickens. In a world in which everyone believed what we have come to believe about romanticlove, no one could admit to being in that state because if LO learned about it, reciprocation could never

occur.

RUTH

And if an employer heard about it, you might lose your job.

NELSON

Journalists might make guesses about political candidates.

NANCY

If the condition could be determined through some kind of blood test or urine test, or from a hair sample,

forensics might get interested in order to establish motives for crime.

NELSON

That a spouse is limerent for another could be grounds for divorce. But only if it could be proven. Heresanother point. At this moment, we are among the very few who know about this.

ISADORA

Readers of the Report who have themselves experienced limerence also know.

NELSON

Yes, they, too. And the scientists who put us here. But I saw little evidence that the letter-writers

recognized the implications that we have been discussing. In any case, its still a relatively small group.

The rest of the world is the way we were this morning. True, we had read The Report, but it was theconfirmation in the letters that really changed things. I thought it was a mental illness and I still think it

might fall into some diagnostic category although Im ready to admit that a limerent person is not

generally crazy, only specifically so. After all, crazy means out of control, and so does involuntary. But Ithink it isnt rare and the most unnerving part of the letter-reading session for me were those letters from

people who became limerent for the first time later in life. One woman was first limerent in her eighties!

And a man found the meanings in the words of popular songs changing for him in his forties when he

first fell into it. That means no one is safe. It could break out anywhere at any time.


21/33


RUTH

(The phone rings and Ruth answers it, listens, and then turns to the group.)

The Foundation director has asked us to stop here. Its late. Again we are to eat in our rooms and not

talk. We can roam around the hotel, but what they want us to do mostly, is think, maybe even jot downsome of our thoughts. When we come in tomorrow, we are to try to pick it up from here and to try to

come to some conclusions, or at least suggestions about further implications. They also said that the

letters would be available in this room through the evening.

(All exit.)

(When the curtain opens, all are seated obviously having just convened. Dr. Sellars is reading a sheet of

paper on a clipboard.)

DR. SELLARS

We are instructed to begin with a round robin as we did at first yesterday and to have each in turn

address the following questions:

(1) How should counselors and therapists deal with a person suffering from unrequited love?

(2) As the non-responding object of amorous attention, what is the best way to behave?

(3) Would you support blood or urine test for people with responsibilities like presidents and airlinepilots?

(4) Because the state of being in love affects productivity and general efficiency, should laws exist

to prevent persons afflicted with obsessive attractions from holding responsible positions, e.g., ingovernment?

(5) What, if any, changes in social customs and laws would better fit the existence of limerence as

now understood?

NELSON

If anyone had suggested such questions yesterday morning Id have thought they were crazy. Im ready

now to take them seriously. But Im speaking out of turn. Whos first?


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DR. SELLARS

Why dont you start?

NELSON

Okay, Ill take the questions one by one.

First, how should counselors deal with limerence in their clients. The only thing I can think of is to shareThe Report. And dont add to their problems by calling them insane, but dont get involved with it

yourself.

Second question, how to treat the love-mad person if you are the object. Ill stay with what I said

yesterday: Get away and give no hope. Anything else will only get them in deeper and threaten your

own privacy.

Question Three: should research attempt to find a way to detect limerence physiologically. Id favorlearning more with a view to-ward handling it better, but I can foresee dangers if others could detect the

condition and it couldnt be hidden. Ill pass for now on the rest, maybe say something about them later.

Id just like to add that personally, I expect to make changes in my strategies. As a divorce lawyer, I

thought learning more about this subject would help me professionally. Thats why I applied. For

example, I will be less likely to see either my own or my opponents clients as totally bonkers when theyshow signs of limerence. And I wonder about custody cases. In one of the letters, the woman said she

regretted limerence because of how it affected her behavior toward her children. She was less attentive. Ifeel weve opened up a can of worms. Maybe it would be better to try to put the lid back on. As a person

who is seldom confused, I am confused.

NANCY

Counselors and therapists should give the afflicted respect. Non-reciprocating objects of amorous

passion should cut off the relationship. Testing for love madness would be an unwarranted invasion of

privacy. The major change in me is that now Im afraid of it. Love madness is a bigger monster than I

thought. And I would not want it to happen to me.

PERRY

There was intensity in the letters. As a counselor I would never forget that aspect of it. Id also be on thelookout for hidden limerence and Id encourage the person to talk about it. Id give assurance that a

person is not crazy for having strong feelings. As LO, Id have to leave, but Id pray for them. I would

not support research to determine limerence objectively. Im not sure Id support any research on the

subject. Lots of things affect productivity and efficiency, but I wouldnt want the government poking

around or employers to have that power over employees.

RUTH

(Interrupting) Ive thought of something important. Its about detecting limerence in others. It frightensme that it can be secret. And something else. Suppose I came to work for you, Dr. Dr. Sellars. As

someone who knows about obsessive love madness, that it exists in otherwise normal people, that it is

involuntary, long-lasting, and can be hidden, consider your reaction. Suppose you and I work togetherand are mildly attracted to each other. We work late together one night and go to supper afterward. Our

mutual attractions are somewhat strengthened, but no hurry, no urgency, and lots of other things to keep

us busy. A few weeks or months go by. One of us, either one, tries to initiate further contact, but, theother is too involved with other things and begs off. Thats it. All is normal. The one who made the

advance went on to advance elsewhere and put the whole thing out of mind. Our working relationship


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has not changed. Lets say I made the advance but you were too busy. Your rejection didnt bother me

and I remained as friendly as before. But now, since you know about how love madness operates andknow it can be hidden, you get the idea that Im obsessed with you. So every time we meet in the

elevator and I innocently say hello, you feel spied on. You imagine me writing diary entries about how

we met in the elevator.

NANCY

I get it. What you are saying is that a person who knows what we now know about love madness could

get mistaken ideas about someone who in fact is casual.

DR. SELLARS

Youre positing a new kind of delusion.

NELSON

But I see what you mean. When I leave here and return to my lover, I will wonder, whatever her

behavior, whether she is not harboring the kind of extreme and tenacious attraction the writers of the

letters described. If I accept the implications of The Report and the letters, then either I will exploit her,since I know Im in the drivers seat, or, not wanting to be the object of such suffocating attention, throw

her out. And if she tries to tell me her feelings are only friendly I may not believe her. I will find it hard

to believe anyone ever again. It can be hidden and it must be hidden.

PERRY

But if its hidden, what difference does it make? Why should you care?

NELSON

I wouldnt have cared before reading those damned letters!

DR. SELLARS

How, then, Isadora, would you answer the questions?

ISADORA

With sympathy and understanding, thats how counselors and therapists should deal with person in love,

and they should never say LO isnt worth it. I would want the love potion, but I would not want secrets

disclosed through medical tests.

RUTH

Since my answers to the questions would not be much different from most of those already given, Id

like to pose some new questions: Is it possible for people in general to understand limerence as we do? I

refer to the fact that some of our views have changed in response to the letters. Second, what would ittake for people generally to adopt our present viewpoint? Third, and most important, what would be the

consequences? In other words, the issue is not only what we think should be done, but what we think

might be done. No, I wouldnt go for urine tests, but I disagree with Senator Proxmire that love issomething we dont need to know about. I think the change in Nelson in all of us in this short time,

shows the value of knowledge. I hope, Dr. Sellars, that you can cheer us up. How do your answer the

questions?


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NANCY

I guess its up to you, Dr. Sellars, to get us out of what looks to me like a dead end.

DR. SELLARS

Ill do what I can. Ill start with the original questions, then go on to consider yours, Ruth. It distresses

me that how therapists should deal with limerent patients is almost exactly opposite to the way they have

been trained to treat them. Part of my reason for wanting to attend these sessions was because of doubtsthat had already begun to grow in me. I, too, agree with Nelson that therapists are best advised to supplytheir patients with a description of limerence and with the honest statement that we do not know of any

treatment for it. I was gratified to learn that there are psychotherapists who actually do this. I think that

therapists have, unknowingly perhaps, exploited their patients limerence. I recall discussions atconventions in which therapists discussed reasons why patients remained in treatment for sometimes

very long periods and also how negative reactions to patients were sometimes felt. Now I think it must

be questioned whether a patients reluctance to terminate treatment might sometimes be due tolimerence. And I think negative reactions are the inevitable result of being in the role of nonlimerent

LO. Freud interpreted limerence as a part of treatment. He called limerence for him by the patient

transference. Reactions to the patient positive or negative were called countertransference. The

implication was that the feelings for one another that developed within therapy were not quite real. Theywere transferred from other situations. Today, therapists in training are taught to discourage

transference.

ISADORA

How do they do that?

DR. SELLARS

At first, by the original Freudian rules, therapists kept themselves literally in the background. They sat

on a chair behind the couch and revealed as little as possible about themselves. Under those conditions,

limerence was rampant. The therapist was a scarcely perceivable, Godlike figure about whom the patient

was allowed to imagine all kinds of things. And they did. To prevent limerence, or what they still calltransference, they sit facing the person and reveal more of themselves. Thus a patient is unable to project

as much.

ISADORA

When you see that large photo of wife and kiddies on the desk, its a message that quashes what might

otherwise be taken as that initial sign of hope to which limerence attaches itself. But therapy still seems

a very dangerous place.

DR. SELLARS

I think youre right. And it works both ways. As you noticed, I have been reluctant to talk about myself.In the beginning, I was pretty threatened. You were right, Isadora, I am currently limerent for a patient. Ihave also been the uncomfortable LO of other patients. And I am ready to attest to limerences

negatives. It is both distracting and uncontrollable. Despite my training and experience, despite having a

family I love dearly, despite hearing untold lectures on transference and countertransference, despite myawareness that my LO is unsuitable, despite knowing that the very condition is falsely based, a foreign

object in my consciousness, and despite apparent success in hiding it from everyone, only presentcompany excepted, I am as caught up in it as Ruth was and Isadora is. If I ever get free of it I will

thereafter nip it in the bud. If I ever get free.


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RUTH

You might escape if you can catch the bud before the blossom opens and involuntariness sets it. But

getting back to what we mentioned earlier, I am concerned about the problem of assuming limerence

when it isnt really there.

PERRYI think it has already happened to me. The first time I heard of Love and Limerence, it was from awoman who I was attracted to and was trying to start a relationship with. I think she thought I was

limerent for her.

DR. SELLARS

Yes, false attribution of limerence is a real danger, a danger, ironically, that comes not from ignorance,

but from knowledge.

ISADORA

(Changing the subject.) When limerence fades and I am through with a former LO, I realize that myimage of him had been distorted to fit the scenario of my fantasy. Sometimes my former object of

adoration shrinks back to reality. I have neither love nor sympathy, nor even tolerance It isnt real and

when its over, its over. I no longer see that man who once occupied my every waking thought through

the rose-colored visions of limerence. His very presence reminds me of what Id just as soon forget,

myself wrapped up in thought of him instead of the really important things in my life.

PERRY

Thats really sad.

ISADORA

I admit it. My own letter would fit in. I am one of that group.

NANCY

A largely invisible group. Many of the letters described secret passions, ones LO never knew of.

DR. SELLARS

Limerence makes people want to mate and marry. The letters were certainly biased toward protracted

limerence. Nonlimerents or happy limerents are not motivated to write to the author of a book on a

subject that is irrelevant to them. I read one letter from a woman who claimed to have been actively and

painfully limerent for a man for twenty years, a man who gave her no real encouragement.

ISADORA

I am currently in my sixth year.

DR. SELLARS

Whats the next question? Oh yes, Would I support research to discover methods of determining

limerence objectively? Here, maybe I depart from the rest of you. I would definitely not support a


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limerence witch-hunt. No random testing or testing by government or employers. But because I have

come to see limerence as some-thing of a scourge . . .

ISADORA

(Interrupting) As well as the greatest happiness, and an experience that changes age into youth and gives

meaning and excitement to the dullest existence.

DR. SELLARS

Yes, youre right, but it is also disrupting, and maybe for many reasons we need to learn more and

therefore research should be encouraged. I would favor knowing how to keep it from interfering withother human goals, such as the goal of family and marital stability. Maybe, Isadora, we could find the

long-sought love potion as well as the antidote. But it must be kept in the hands of responsible

researchers.

RUTH

If possible. As a researcher myself, I have known about abuses committed by researchers from

plagiarism to outright fraud. Im not comfortable about putting knowledge of a persons limerence in

researchers hands.

DR. SELLARS

Then whats left? We cant shut down science because it contains rotten eggs. Not only does limerenceinterfere with individual functioning, but it has resulted in quite a few historical events that had large

consequences.

NELSON

Helen of Troy

NANCY

Edward the VIII!

RUTH

Henry the VIII!

ISADORA

Cleopatra!

NELSONWith its uses for espionage, I would think the CIA might go in for undercover research.

RUTH

In other words, were dealing with a hot potato.

NELSON

Very hot.


27/33


PERRY

I am reminded of the scientists whose tape recorders are capturing our every word. We are not the only

ones to ponder these questions. Maybe they wanted to see if we would react the way they do themselves.

NELSON

I think we are.

DR. SELLARS

But theres still Ruths question about whether it is possible for people in general to understand

limerence.

NANCY

They wont have our concentrated experience and, left to their own devices, they will not read Love and

Limerence. I didnt. Nonlimerents find it tough going. Boring. Saying nothing new.

DR. SELLARS

Yes, theres a lot of resistance, but there was also resistance to heliocentric views of the solar system.

RUTH

Some still think the earth is flat, and practically everyone thinks that even without air resistance, heavy

things fall faster.

NELSON

But for the most part well-established scientific facts get through despite resistance. Nonlimerents can

understand that limerence exists even though they dont experience it as I do now.

DR. SELLARSWhich brings us back to your question of how people in general could ever know what we know about

limerence.

NELSON

One thing that has come through loud and clear is that if I ever be-came limerent, no one would knowabout it. No one. Not LO, certainly, since that would immediately doom my hopes. Not my employers,

friends, voters if I were a political candidate, not anyone! And I will protest to the Supreme Court if

anyone starts snooping around my urine.

ISADORABut a lesson from the letters is that limerence demands expression in some form. Expression may be

artistic and art may require personal disclosure.

RUTH

Oh my god!!!

ISADORA

What is it, Ruth?


28/33


RUTH

Dont you see? Why didnt I see it before? Its so obvious! Oh my god!

PERRY

Why is she looking at us that way?

NANCY

Get her some water.

RUTH

No, please, its all right. Its just that weve been idiots. Ive been an idiot. Why didnt I see it before?

DR. SELLARS

See what, my dear? Would you like to tell us about it?

RUTH

Oh, Dr. Sellars, dont you see where this has all led us? Dont you see the inevitable? Even why,

although were here, we cant be here?

NELSON

Thats nonsense.

NANCY

Are you saying were not real? Are we ghosts?

RUTH

Yes, thats what Im feeling.

NELSON

Ruth, youve been the most levelheaded of all of us. Youd better explain.

RUTH

Of course. Im sorry. Its just that it came over me so suddenly. I was struck by it. [Begins to laugh.] Its

really funny. Please bear with me. Ill be okay in a minute. Its just that it takes some getting used to.

NANCY

Whats going on?

RUTH

Okay, Im sorry. Let me try to explain. Maybe Im wrong. Maybe it isnt the way it looks. Lets go over

the logic of it.


29/33


DR. SELLARS

Yes, please.

RUTH

Okay. A scientist studied a topic that no one else had researched. When she presented her findings at a

national convention a man in the audience objected that it was immoral to study the sacred subject of

love. A graduate student said she was not permitted to study love, that the subject is taboo in academia.A few years, and much additional research later her presentation is pointedly not included in theconventions published Proceedings, although and maybe because reporters who happened to attend

that particular session give it star billing. The Report gets written and published, but it is touch and go at

all points. She doesnt even try to publish a journal article because she knows it wouldnt pass musterunder existing guidelines. Her book gets a sarcastic put-down in Time magazine. Talk show hosts avoid

the subject. On the other hand, some psychotherapists give the Report to patients and some instructors

assign it to college classes. Womens magazines cant deal with such a downbeat subject, but twothousand people write to say it described them exactly. They thanked her for telling them they were not

alone or crazy.

NANCYThe word creeps into the language here and there. The author tries to publish a follow-up report, but

gives up because no publisher expresses interest. The letters from readers, which we few have been

privileged to sample, keep coming. But a United States Senator takes the trouble to declare the topic off

bounds . . .

NELSON

I dont see where this is going.

RUTH

Think about it. Whats the pattern?

NANCY

Theres no pattern, just ups and downs.

RUTH

Do you know why?

DR. SELLARS

Isnt it always like that with a new idea?

RUTH

Is this a new idea?

ISADORA

In a way yes, and in a way no. The poets have been talking about limerence (under other names, ofcourse) for millennia. But not like this.


30/33


RUTH

And whats the difference?

NELSON

They werent precise. They didnt really define what they were talking about.

PERRYThe way I did, I mean the way I didnt do before this weekend and the letters.

NANCY

We had the Report before the letters, but confirmation came in the personal testimonies.

NELSON

Without the letters, I saw the whole thing as a neurotic fantasy. I didnt believe it. After all, the Report

was written by one person.

DR. SELLARS

Are you saying, Ruth, that the unevenness of response toLove and Limerence is inevitable?

RUTH

Yes.

DR. SELLARS

But weve already noted that. Our concern, the question we have not yet dealt with fully, is what

research would we recommend.

RUTH

And what did we decide?

NANCY

Im beginning to see what youre getting at. We didnt exclude the idea of research necessarily, but were

all against physiological research and have had no other suggestions as to how it should proceed. I tend

to be research minded, but you pointed out that researchers are not to be trusted.

PERRY

And, Dr. Sellars, you said that therapists were also not to be trusted.

NELSON

Yes. In addition, no one who is limerent can ever admit to it. That leaves zero.

RUTH

Thats it.


31/33


DR. SELLARS

Wait a minute. We here know what we know. Weve seen the letters.

RUTH

Have we?

PERRYNot really. Because we are not real.

ISADORA

Thats right. We are figments of a writers imagination. We are not real because we couldnt be real.

RUTH

The confirming data could be publicly revealed without doing violence to the trust of the letter-writers.

DR. SELLARS

Just as the author had to disguise the identities of those she interviewed.

NELSON

Okay, we cannot exist.

DR. SELLARS

The implication is that the topic of limerence cannot be brought to public attention through research.

RUTH

Thats right.

NANCY

But why? What about evolution and human nature and weekend love potions?

RUTH

All flights of fancy, Im afraid.

ISADORA

Wait a minute. Theres one thing thats real. Thats the letters from readers. Those are real, arent they?

Limerence is real.

RUTH

Yes, thats the irony. They are indeed real, the only thing thats real, but it does no good because no one

will ever see them. To repeat, if the author quotes them exactly, privacy is violated; if she summarizes,

confidence in what she says is undermined.


32/33


DR. SELLARS

Most people think of being in love as a temporary, mutual attraction that leads straight to the altar. But

intense limerence only endures in adversity. In the happiest of marital situations it dies a slow death

between the kitchen sink and the electric bill.

PERRY

It becomes family love, a form of true love, friendship.

DR. SELLARS

Until one or both develop limerence for someone else.

NANCY

Which in the proverbial jungle would lead to the starting of a new family. Yes I can see possible

adaptive value from a strictly reproduction point of view.

RUTH

Maybe thats why limerence is so tenacious and long-lasting. A human infant needs a few years ofparental care in order to survive.

PERRY

I hate being nonexistent.

DR. SELLARS

I think we have no choice.

RUTH

Maybe in another century, another society, things might be different.

ISADORA

The letters, the real ones, must be destroyed, mustnt they?

RUTH

Yes, they must. Even if the writers themselves did not object, it would be unethical to publish them.

PERRY

Written in invisible ink and read by ghosts.

NELSON

But limerence is real even if we are not. The evidence is overwhelming!

NANCY

Goodbye all.


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NELSON

Thats funny.

NANCY

I know.

RUTHAre you disappointed, Isadora?

ISADORA

If I existed, I would want the love potion.

DR. SELLARS

I would want answers.

(End)

Copyright 2003

dtcw 28 lim retreat

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