Relationship With Caregivers

Whatever your relationship with your primary caregiver; when you were an infant, someone answered your call and met your needs.  That person was an extension of you, as far as you were concerned, and when she or he was answering your needs and desires, it was as if the two of you were one. 

When we fall in love with someone who falls in love with us, we see each other in a way that feels familiar.  Falling in love is the closest we come to “mother love,” that love that answers all our needs.  Even if the timing isn’t completely right; the need is answered by this person, this mother or father, who completes us. 

Yearning for Love

I imagine the first time we feel the yearning to love and be loved happens the first time we realize our primary caregiver is, in fact, not an extension of us.  The distance between that person and us must be wide and terribly tangible.  Even if she is within arms reach, the sudden realization of the difference between us, of the boundaries that define each of us, must feel like a chasm.

Jump ahead twenty, thirty, forty, fifty years and the lover who reminds us of how it feels to be completed by another shows up without boundaries, longing to get as close to us as we will allow.  Physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual closeness are aches easily filled by our new lover.  Nobody wants that honeymoon period to end. 

The Honeymoon Period Has to End

The honeymoon period ends.  For some, the ache of what feels like separation might actually stir up grief.  For others, getting some boundaries back in place, letting friends and family back in to their own and the new life they have created with their new lover is a breath of fresh air! 

In whatever way you deal with the yearning to love and be loved, use it to the best advantage of your lover and yourself.  When you feel the ache of it rising in your gut, let the ache grow.  Let it come up into your chest, around your heart and throat, and breathe through it, in and out. 

Appreciate the gift of having someone in your life with whom you can satisfy that desire for connection.  Let it drive you to acts of love that delight, not smother…acts of love that might even give a person some space. 

Use it to value your ability to love and be loved in return.  Use it to value his or her freedom to love and be loved in return.  Use it to remind you that you two are vulnerable to each other in a way no one else is and celebrate that reality in your own heart, with lovemaking, and with respect.  The quality of your loving will blossom into something even more beautiful than it already is!  

To learn more about Sarah Elizabeth Malinak, visit www.IdealRelationships.com.

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