The Love-Laws To Follow During Lockdown

Maybe you met before lockdown and have isolated together or had to isolate apart. Or maybe you met during lockdown and have spent lots of time chatting together and feel incredibly close. 

Whatever the situation, there are always crucial things to take on board to maintain that good feeling from the early days.

Here are a few ‘love-laws’ for you:

Never compare: There’s no “one size fits all” definition of love. Which is why I always recommend not looking at friends’ relationships and thinking: “that’s what I want, too”. Because no two relationships are the same. 

It’s great to bounce thoughts about your developing relationship off your friends or family that you’re close to, but remember not to compare yours. It can set up unrealistic expectations. And you never know what’s truly going on with another relationship to focus on yours - and what you two need.

Set boundaries: With all the worries that go with the early stages of dating to the falling-in-love stage, sometimes you let your expectations slip and accept less-than-good behaviour. If you want a future with this new person and suddenly they, for example, don’t do as they said they would, pull them up. This can go both ways with men and women! 

Set your boundaries and reboot your relationship if they have qualities that you value. Love ‘slippage’ is okay because we all slip up - but only a slip, that behaviour shouldn’t become permanent. 

Avoid the blame game: Sometimes when things are going wrong it’s easy for you - or them - to hide behind a wall of finger-pointing. It becomes a game of it’s all their fault, or they say it’s all your fault. This isn’t good for your new love. By avoiding this blame game, it brings you both into taking responsibility for your share of how well your new love is going.

Get listening: Don’t just pay lip-service to what they say when you’ve stopped hanging onto their every word. Let’s be honest, the first couple months you only have ears for them but as we become more secure a fatal mistake is to stop listening. Put down your mobile or laptop, face them and listen. They’ll repay the favour.

Change your default ‘fall-back’ mode: If you’re honest with yourself, you probably have a habitual way of behaving when stressed or angry - your default ‘fall-back’ mode. Run through in your memory how you respond to difficulties in relationships - maybe your fall-back mode is to over-dramatise. Maybe it’s to shut down, maybe it’s some other behaviour that potentially sabotages your relationship. If you want things to work with them break this bad habit, this fall-back mode, and learn new ways to deal with stress in your relationship. 

See the good in them: As time goes on it’s far too easy to forget what you first saw in them. Make it a daily habit to remind yourself why you fell for them - qualities you were attracted to. With these qualities in mind, during stressful times (and they come to every couple!) you’ll look at them with more loving eyes. 

Happy dating!

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Follow Dr Pam Spurr on Twitter @drpamspurr  and on Instagram @drpamspurr

For more advice, visit her website at www.drpam.co.uk

Check out Dr Pam’s ​podcast: https://bit.ly/2JFPjBU 

Photo credit: @criene via Twenty20

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Photo by Artem Beliaikin on Unsplash

Photo by Ernest Brillo on Unsplash