Ever been in a situation where someone gives you so much love, affection and attention, and it’s just… too much and too fast? You only knew each other for a few weeks and they called you their true love! You feel like it’s a lot and you get confused because you ‘should’ be thankful, but at the same time, it’s overwhelming and too good to be true.
When you try to establish boundaries or maybe didn’t do what they want or expect, they get very upset and would even gaslight you, or worse.
“You’re so selfish!”
“You’re not trying as much as me!”
“I would give up the world for you in a heartbeat, but you wouldn’t do the same for me.”
“Why are you ruining what we have? You have someone who loves you, but you don’t appreciate us, or me!”
This is what we call Love Bombing.
It’s a toxic behaviour where abusers shower another person with love, affection and promises as a way to control their victims. It’s tactic manipulation. They make you feel like everything is perfect and you should be thankful, but if you don’t do what they want, they withdraw their kindness and start to be mean; belittling you, and their outbursts or anger becomes unreasonable. They will punish their victims with whatever they feel is appropriate – ie, shouting, physical abuse, give silent treatment etc. Sounds familiar?
If you’re the love bomber, then you will feel that the other person doesn’t appreciate you even after all that you’ve done for them. You find it very disrespectful and an insult to your love and kindness, and boundaries are a sign of rejection and insult. How dare them! Whenever they ‘misbehave’, you constantly go back to thinking about all the things you’ve done for them. But is that really love or is it conditional love? – Where your love comes with a condition that they do what you want them to do. If so, it ain’t love babe, it’s toxicity.
So, which one are you?
Jasexplains 