Can you "feel" loved by another?

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Ok, I'm aware this question can so easily be misunderstood, I'll clarify what I'm asking. Firstly, I'm not asking whether you can love others. Reams have already been written in relation to this and Aspergers. I'm asking, when somebody else loves you - a parent, partner, child, relative, friend, can you actually *feel* it from them. Also, I'm not referring to logically calculating that your partner, child or parent loves you. I want to know if you can actually *feel* how they feel towards you.

I ask because even when logically I have every reason to believe somebody may well love me, I cannot feel that love from them, although feel my love for them very strongly. And only recently, it struck me that maybe some people could actually feel love from another, without needed to rationally process the words from them. It explains why as a child, I don't recall feeling loved by my parents. I assess how people feel about me based only on their words, and when parents criticised me for my behaviour not coming up to scratch, I naturally assumed they didn't love me. How could they when they were so critical of my behaviour?

In relationships it's the same. I can only process the words of my partner. If I don't regularly hear clearly that she loves me, then I start to assume she has lost interest in me. And it makes initiating relationships even harder as I am in effect 'flying blind' all the time, with no idea what the other person feels about me. And as initiating and flirting is filled with hints and double meanings and (worst of all) subtle body language, it's no surprise that generally I have got it horribly wrong.

If other people (NT's?) *can* feel what another person feel towards them, it explains a lot of things that have mystified me. Such as the 'sparring and teasing' I've seen between people attracted to each other, where they verbally say negative things, but still end up together. If they can sense the others feelings, then this would explain it. The slightest negative comment towards me and I assume the other person dislikes me. Also with children who get in trouble with their parents, but don't feel rejected by them as they know they are still loved.

The alternative explanation is that nobody really has ever loved me, which is what I tended to believe until pondering this question. Or perhaps that I have had such long periods being unloved, that I no longer have the capability to feel it.

Does anybody else feel like this? It would be good if NT's could reply too, as perhaps this could be a difference between AS and NT.

I can only come to a logical conclusion. I can't "feel" it and like you I don't know if it's that way for everyone. I really relate to the parental disapproval thing. Especially because my parents had a tendency to give me the silent treatment after the "charges were read." I became very afraid of not measuring up because that meant abandonment to my young way of thinking and I knew I could never survive on my own.

I felt so completely unlovable that I became afraid my parents would give me away.

I can relate to what you're saying, especially the thing about your partner, and needing to hear that they love you because you don't know if they do otherwise. I'm not really sure what to say though, you've puzzled me and I'm curious to hear what other people have to say about this.

Only if feeling uncomfortable is the feeling of being loved.

i think i can feel it, but i'm not sure.

No, I really can't. I can feel affection but I never really know if someone loves me. If they don't show it I just assume that they don't. I broke up with my ex because I didn't think he loved me and I never really know if I was right or not.

for the most part, no.

this was actually the first thing my mother asked me upon my disclosure to her that i suspected myself of having AS... thinking about it was a big relief to me though, because i realized that did not mean she didn't love me, etc. instant (positive) change in my relationship with her because of this realization. and many apologies on my part for having misunderstood. she is actually very demonstrative, but as with anyone whose expression i cannot read or feel, it comes across to me as a patronizing act, like someone overemoting on stage. some people, though, are more "real" to me than others.



equally mystified. i have ended friendships over one fight, since negative things said (out of anger? i can only guess, in retrospect) i have taken literally.

so, very good question, one i have wondered about as well.

another mystifying thing: i feel rather whole, internally - a lot of emotions, probably the same desires as other people have, but the outward expression is a bit broken, and the ability to convey / share my inner self with others doesn't function properly. remember those old bank drive-up windows where you stick your deposit into a plastic capsule and this jetsons-like air chute sucks it up into some hidden network of tunnels and into the bank, where the teller (who is behind glass) receives it? there you go.

Wow. I broke up with my only SO in exactly this circumstance, with reasoning of me being an emotional cripple and unable to tell if what I was communicating was otherwise. That said, we're still good friends and still meet up occasionally for movies and... stuff.

Def. not very easily...
It took years before it sank in with my business partner...It took my leaving him partially because I felt so threatened by every other female...and saw anyone to be a potential replacement because he had left someone for me..now it has sunken in as he is emotionally dependant on me even though he is having a kid with another girl...and I am in a position where I can't easily leave at all..as we are entertwined as business partners....

I don't feel it with my ASish friend...I have been on the verge and back from breaking up with him countless times...because he makes me feel insecure....

I sincerely wish I could "know better"..but that is the most I can hope for....ARE people SUPPOSED to feel the love from other people...is that really normal??

It sounds like this is quite a common experience for Aspies. Years ago, long before I'd heard of AS , my ex-wife would sometimes say "but can't you *feel* that I love you", and I'd be confused as I'd assumed I was totally out of favour based on the whatever was happening on the surface. Eventually, this became too much for her. But it does suggest that she thought it normal to be able to feel this from another.


An informal survey of a handful of NT's suggests that they do believe they feel it to some extent - although it isn't 100%. We really need some NT's to join in ....

Also many years ago, during relationship counselling, the therapist definitely assumed that we could tune in to each others feelings. This assumption did not even get challenged it seemed a fundamental point of human functioning. He would ask "so what is your partner feeling now?" and of course I'd go "huh? How can I ever know that? Ask her, not me." and the therapist would get very annoyed as he thought I was being facetious. But I thought they were being dishonest and pretending to have these abilities to pick up on these feelings.

One other thing: It's not that I can't detect *any* feelings in others. I can quite easily sense whether people are happy, sad, bored, angry etc even of they try and hide it with words. It's just that love seems too subtle.

Love is a form of spiritual energy, the highest and purest form of energy that exists. I feel love when I give it and recieve it. I feel it when my cats snuggle upto me back home, I feel it radiating from me when I hold them close to me,when I cuddle and kiss the man I love, and oh hell yes I can feel it when I get it back.

Last year I had a kiss so powerful and wonderful I never wanted it to end.

All my relationships with people have felt one-sided to me. If anyone I'm with is infatuated with me I usually don't see it. I could be thinking of them 24/7 and I assume they're not doing the same.. I don't know if it's a can't see it thing due to lack of being "in tune" or more of a low self esteem thing. Ie I'm not sure if I deserve love so I assume it's not there and they have more important things to care about than me.

Very, very rarely. Mostly I have to use logic to work out that someone really loves me.

I feel love, when I give it to, and receive it, from the people that I love, but if I'm not receiving it, I don't feel it, and I haven't felt much love, from my family, this summer. I think I hear an autistic child, getting away, from his abusive mother. That's a whole different story, togther.

You have piqued my curiosity. I need to ponder on this as I get some sleep now. It makes perfect sense to me that I might not be able to feel the love from others. I'll try to reply back to this thread when I have gathered all my internal thoughts (and feelings?) together regarding this.

I can't determine how other people feel about me, I just try to analyse them by watching them and listening to what they tell me but I usually find a reason for their attachement that doesn't really sound like pure love. I know I can feel some kind of love toward them however, but I just guess they can't really tell (well, some people told me it was hard to determine whether I had feelings or not so...).

I think most people think they know how other people feel about them because they imagine they do. I know a girl who has built a world of illusions about a man she barely knows and she is pretty sure he loves her thought they've almost never talked to each other. Most of the time people just interpret non verbal language such as a smile or things like that, "they can see it", but people can lie. I can't see it so I assume people are lying or just interested in something (escaping loneliness ?).