Do you have the ability to fall in love?

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Yes. I am in a long-term relationship.

Problem with me is, I tend to treat my crushes as special interests that suddenly fade without warning. I guess that's normal.

I don't know. I don't think that I've ever fallen into romantic love, though I occasionally get hopeless crushes; I do have family members and pets that I love deeply. I am fond of my bf, and am waiting to see if something more happens.
Do kids/parental love count? I love my niece irrationally and deeply, to the degree that it makes me smile just to think about her, and it started pretty much as soon as she was born - close to love at first sight.

Yes, but it happens rarely.

Yes, although rarely. Due to my jealousy (something that I really hate) I often find it painfull

I did once. It was stupid and confusing and I hated it.

I swore I wouldn't let it happen again, and it hasn't.

I tried to make a rational choice in mates instead. That really hasn't worked out as well as I hoped it would. But it could have been worse.

For me anyway. For him I am not so sure. I think a guy's ego really needs a woman to be in love. I know he fell in love with me. I know loving me has been hard on him.

When I was younger, I thought for sure I would be able to fall in love, but now I'm questioning that idea. I find a lot of guys that I see physically attractive, but I haven't really felt any sort of emotional connection with anyone since I was 16. That was a long time ago, and I am much less shy around men now than I was back then. Part of my inability to fall in love comes from a fear response because I've had my heart broke too many times when I was younger due to idiotic, obsessive crushes. The vulnerability of falling in love makes me feel very uncomfortable.

Yes I can fall madly and passionately in love.

Not the way it's meant. I can lust (and do, strongly). I can like to be around someone. I can care for them (as in, to take care of them). I can prefer their company. I can also miss them, if in a way I suspect is blunted of the way others feel it.

But the love I have is more intellectual than emotional. I choose to behave lovingly toward them, but as far as full-on, unable-to-see-their-flaws romantic love....

* shrug *

No, I see their flaws, and I choose what I will do about it. The closest I get to that sort of thing is when I'm ridiculously horny for someone, but it wears off quickly enough with sex and then I can see them again.

I sometimes think I am a brain and genitalia, with little enough between them: brains-brains-brains-scorchingly horny-brains-brains-brains.

Interestingly enough, that intellectualization seems to have functioned to allow me to be better at the actual acts of caring for someone, in some ways, because I treat their expressed desires seriously. As long as they tell me what they want (and I will ask), chances are quite good they'll get it and other things in the same vein. I go to a lot of trouble to give them what they seem to want because I know this is a deficit on my part.

The most I have ever felt down the line of romance is shallow infatuation. I have no interest in engaging in a romantic relationship and I doubt that is going to change any time soon. I don't believe in soul mates - I think relationships take time and I don't think it is special. To the individual, yes, but in general, meh.

I'm bisexual and very interested in sex, but people just assume that I'm asexual because I think romance is icky. And I am capable of loving people (often quite profoundly) but just not romantically. This is sort of why I hate valentines day because it surrounds me with this nauseating farce of romance and the sugary sweetness makes me sick.

I think the conventional idea of love is, for me, a bit off.

"Butterflies in the stomach" is something that occurs with crushes. Non-serious emotions that are a little bit shy and sensitive.

Love isn't really something passionate for me. I've never experienced impulse emotions when it comes to others, never been unable to keep my hands off of someone, never been unable to stop thinking about someone, etc after obsessions at age 14. Love is more of a steady, close feeling of caring about and being in sync with someone as well as knowing and being known in a significant way.

I don't know anymore. I'm beginning to doubt it.
Honestly the thought of adjustments, & a lot of compromises makes me very uneasy.
I thought I was o.k. in the sex area, but I'm beginning to question that too. (& I'm not even sure why.)
Maybe I should just be reconciled to the idea that I was married for a long time, & it had it's ups & downs, but it was frequently Brilliant. Maybe I should not ask for more, but just let it go at that? It's more than many people get in a life time. We really loved each other in spite of our faults. Perhaps he was the only one who could appreciate that in my case the best control was none at all. I was always gonna be there. I didn't need to be checked up on. I was in 100%, & wasn't going anywhere. Why would you be with some one if that wasn't the case? If you are not happy, talk about it, fix it if possible, & if all else fails, state your case & leave without retribution or manipulation.

The last None-relationshi experience I had has made me very nervous about men, & I wasn't that confident to start with.

I wrote a lot of crap here. I've just removed it because.... It must have been difficult for him (Boo Hoo!), juggling a bunch of women @ one time. Keeping everyone separated, & on the Down Low to some extent. No wonder all that Control & negging! It must have been like herding cats!

I saw him on Wednesday afternoon, by accident. (@ least it was accidental on my part!) He was driving past in his New car! (or maybe he's just swapping out cars again?)
Good move getting rid of the giant boat car! That thing was far too large & unique! Now he can Hound Around town in a little grey import thingy, that will attract no attention. I mean I happened to see that big car in the parking lot of Ye Crappy Motel last Festival Saturday. It stuck out a meter(yard) from the other cars. That gave me pause for thought I can tell you.. 'Not my B.F., & no claim @ all on him, but a general "Yuck!" factor got filed away. (Was that where I was expected end up, the year before? Well that didn't work out for him.)

Just in case he or one of his 'friends" is reading this I'd like to say that since I was never important enough to actually communicate with, stop bugging me now with stupid obscene gestures etc. from your friends in passing cars. (There seems to be a few new trollish members here on W.P. lately.)
. I'm out of the picture, ya say? If anyone had bothered to ask me , I could have told him that a long time ago. If he hadn't felt the need to pull all this control, & cloak & dagger stuff, maybe things might have been different. At least we could have come out of this with a clear idea why it wasn't ever going to work. Nobody wants to look @ face that you like & have to think, "I wonder where that's been lately?"

I'm too f*kking old for him! Ie: I don't look @ relationships as a dirty lil' secret, or a bragging point, like some 12 year old boy w@nking @ night would.

I'm in love right now, it's only my second time but yes, it is possible for me.

I've been with my NT partner for 22 years...got 2 great kids together....each year it just gets better and better.

Our eyes met across a crowded room and we've been together ever since, love at first sight.

My story might sound corny, but the reality is awesome! (and the result of a lot of hard work and communication on both our parts).

Im only self-diagnosed and i am in love, but when it first happened I remember it was a conscious decision, and was with this relationship, but that doesn't make it any less meaningful now I have some life experience. My first love was typically very good looking, talented, the reasoned and calm alpha male of our friends, and I felt comfortable with him like no-one else before, but I never 'fancied' him. I'd never fancied anyone like others did. I admired aspects of people and I'd been drawn to people in a friendship way before, who seemed socially unsuitable to be a boyfriend in some way, so I'd tell my friends I liked the best looking boy in school because everyone had to pick one! I wanted the experience of having a boyfriend because I must be really ugly or boring if I couldn't get one- I'd be abnormal because everyone else at school had relationships. How naive I was! I now know I definitely had never met the right person and Ive accepted that I'm just choosy, and in different ways to other people- intelligence and a philosophical nature is key, with certain "classical"/anthropological physical features (Ive always analysed this when thinking about who I think is attractive lol). When I realised I had been making stupid decisions, and decided not to have relationships i thought would be 'fine', (I needed them as friends), that I would function better alone and enjoy being single, I suddenly got the chance to meet up with someone I'd had a strong friendship-type connection with before and "knew" I should spend more time with him.

After my first love told me he loved me, and showed it for long enough for me to believe it, I studied everything I liked about him until the whole picture was immaculate, so when his character changed I could not accept his strong hints (that he'd fallen out of love with me), because we never argued, I wasn't naggy like other girls, and he knew I would literally take a bullet for him. He was a nice person, and was capable of loving me- the REAL me. Surely he would never leave me? At the time I felt as if half my "self" had walked out the door. Between 18 and 23, I had a few boyfriends i loved as friends, and might have settled for if I didn't have this yearning for the "connection" I'd felt before. I got dumped because they'd lost interest. I didnt heal until I focused on my first boyfriend's bad points, and realised he was actually very flawed! It wasnt all my fault! Then I met up with my current partner, loved him instantly as a friend and just couldn't do without him, then cautiously "let myself" love him in a romantic sense. Once I do love, its always permanent or extremely painful, so I was scared at first, but 4 1/2 years later I still think I made the right decision The difference this time is I would never let him disrespect me and I always put in a lot of effort to see things from his perspective, I know the full him, faults and all, and love him for who he is, and not through rose-tinted glasses.