5 Things I Learned From Being Love-Bombed

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He told me I was “exactly what he was looking for” before we even met. By date two, he started talking about our future wedding. He told me I was his soulmate and put me on the highest pedestal.

When we first met, the autumn leaves were falling (just like my heart was), and the world felt completely magical. It felt like I had finally met ‘the one.’ But what I didn’t realize at the time was that he wasn’t falling in love with me. He was love bombing me.

Love bombing, a tactic used by narcissists and manipulators to gain control over you, can be absolutely crushing. But once you move past it, there can be some positive takeaways.

Here are 5 things I learned from being love-bombed:

1. If It Feels Too Good to Be True, It Probably Is.

When I first met my narcissist ex, everything felt perfect — almost too perfect. He was attractive, he checked off all the boxes, and… he was completely obsessed with me?

Nothing had ever felt more perfectly aligned, and deep down, something just didn’t add up. At the back of my mind, my intuition was constantly whispering, “This feels almost too good to be true.”

I figured I was just being paranoid. Previous lovers had burned me, and I thought my intuition was actually a self-defense mechanism.

When I figured out that I had been love-bombed, I realized that my intuition was right. If something feels too good to be true, it probably is.

2. Real Love Takes Time to Grow.

One of my biggest red flags should have been how intense everything felt early on. If we weren’t together, he wanted to talk all the time and often about the future. Where we would live, getting married, having children — all before I even knew his favorite color.

It felt like this magical chemistry that I had never experienced before. And while I had never experienced anything like it before him, it was anything but magical. It would later become chaotic, dark, and heavy.

Intensity isn’t the same thing as love. Love is all about emotional connection… and emotional connection takes time to build. Love is like a flower that needs to be watered and takes time to grow and flourish.

3. Real Love Doesn’t Harm Your Nervous System.

It was intoxicating how much my narcissistic ex wanted to talk early on. He would text me in the morning, throughout the day, and before bed. His texts and phone calls would be the highlight of my day. It felt like I had finally found someone who was ‘all in’.

But over time, the texts became less and less. Once he knew he had me, his need to constantly text me all the time disappeared. And when I said or did things he didn’t like, he would punish me by not responding or acting suddenly cold towards me.

This would spend me spiraling, desperately wanting to go back to the beginning back when things were good. I would go out of my way to try to fix things, and sometimes, it would smooth over… until I said or did the next wrong thing. When things were bad, it would literally make me feel sick. And when I didn’t hear from him, I couldn’t eat or sleep. It was like he was my drug, and I was going through withdrawal.

Real love doesn’t throw your entire nervous system out of haywire. Real love isn’t toxic. It’s consistent and steady. It never leaves you wondering if you’ll ever hear from the other person again.

4. The Lows Aren’t Worth the Highs.

Do you know that song “Dance” by Garth Brooks? He talks about how he could have missed the pain, but then he would have had to miss “the dance”, otherwise known as the entire love story.

If I could go back in time, I never would have danced with the guy who love-bombed me. I went from being on the highest pedestal to an absolute nobody to him. He ghosted me like I was nothing, easily moving onto the others he was busy love bombing.

Nothing hurt more than realizing I meant nothing to this guy who had once said I was his soulmate. The highs were not worth the lows. None of it was worth the pain.

5. I Deserve a Non-Chaotic Love.

I used to crave butterflies… and drama. I wanted the type of life that swept me off my feet, even if it meant wondering why he was taking so long to text me back. Chaos lit me up.

Now I crave peace. Safety. I’m ready for a boring love: one that shows up every day, respects me and my boundaries, and doesn’t come with extreme highs and extreme lows. I want a mutual love filled with trust and respect, instead of chaos, unpredictability, and instability.

The Bottom Line

Sometimes, the hardest lessons come cloaked in what you think is true love. But once you’re no longer being love-bombed, taking a look at the situation will make you realize a lot about what you’ll accept in the future.

I came out of that relationship changed for the better. It took a lot of tears and a whole lot of self-reflection to get there, but I’m wiser and stronger than I’ve ever been. I haven’t found “the love of my life” yet, but I’m convinced that it will come with peace and trust, not intensity and chaos.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.