Why do I feel repulsed when someone likes me back?
Being loved arouses anxiety because it threatens long-standing psychological defenses formed early in life in relation to emotional pain and rejection, therefore leaving a person feeling more vulnerable.
Disgust often comes up in response to poisonous or toxic people, where deep trust and love has been betrayed. We naturally feel disgusted in response to someone who has abused us. Validating disgust can decrease anxiety and shame from trauma.
Fear of intimacy may be rooted in fear of being rejected, so you never take those first steps toward building a relationship. You may fear rejection because it happened to you before or you've seen it happen to others and you don't want to experience that kind of hurt.
- Start Exactly Where You Are. ...
- Allow Rather Than Accept. ...
- Be Curious. ...
- Ask Questions of Your Internal Experience. ...
- Find Balance Between Challenge and Support. ...
- Respond with Flexibility. ...
- Remember That You Are Only Human. ...
- Recognize That Help Is Needed.
Fear of intimacy
Pushing people away is one way of avoiding intimacy. In fact, this avoidance can act as a defense mechanism for people afraid of getting hurt in relationships. This could be because a past relationship ended badly, perhaps with rejection or even bereavement.
"That much attention can be perceived as desperation or a lack of independence [on the part of the person showing interest]," says Kelley Johnson, PhD, a clinical sexologist based in North Carolina. "It could mean that they're a little more codependent than you'd like them to be." Dr.
Fear of intimacy can stem from several causes, including certain childhood experiences such as a history of abuse or neglect. 1 Overcoming this fear and anxiety can take time, both to explore and understand the contributing issues and to practice allowing greater vulnerability.
You have experienced trauma in the past.
Some people feel disgusted by physical touch because they have experienced trauma, whether it's sexual trauma or another type. In this case, your husband should try to understand you and give you the support you need to seek help.
Recent research has identified the important role of disgust in the symptomatology of obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD). Exaggerated and inappropriate disgust reactions may drive some of the symptoms of OCD, and in some cases, may even eclipse feelings of anxiety.
It all depends on you. A person cannot live without sex for 1 week, so there are many people who live without sex for years. It all depends on your preferences, how much priority you give to sex.
Do I have philophobia?
Signs and symptoms of philophobia include: Excessive or persistent fear regarding the thoughts of love. Afraid of becoming emotionally close to another person or considering long-term relationship commitments. Avoidance toward people—a person with philophobia may learn to fear all people and not just potential lovers.
The ick is when you find yourself dating someone and, all of a sudden, everything about their being or existence makes you cringe. It's a feeling you can't shake off and it intensifies with time. Sometimes, it's set off by something they said or did.

- Take your time. ...
- Express it. ...
- Take a break. ...
- Seek inspiration. ...
- Find an outlet. ...
- Meditate. ...
- Practice self-care. ...
- Speak to someone.
The brain on disgust— a short-circuit for empathy
Not only did the areas that indicate fear (amygdala) and disgust (insula) activate, but the medial prefrontal cortex, the area that is engaged when we think about other people and social situations (not objects), was less active.
Disgust proneness is increasingly linked with symptoms of anxiety and OCD. However, further examination of the mechanisms that account for the roles of distinct disgust-relevant vulnerabilities is needed, and studies that directly examine disgust during the course of treatment are limited.
As we get closer in a relationship, we actually feel more threatened, and therefore, angrier at being loved. We may “turn it down a notch” by starting to substitute dynamics of passion and love with habitual ways of relating.
Reciprocity of liking (also called reciprocity of attraction or reciprocal liking) is a particular type of reciprocity that refers to the tendency for people to like others who express lik- ing for them.
Anhedonia and loss of interest are thought to be caused by low serotonin levels. If you find that you're just not able to enjoy life anymore, you are not alone. In this guide to anhedonia, you'll learn coping skills for those times when you find you're losing interest in everything. Let's get into it.