How do you know your SO loves you, especially when you just started dating them?

17 comments

1. That’s the scary thing: I don’t. It took almost a *year* in my current (long distance) relationship to finally accept that she loves me back.

2. If you just started dating you don’t love someone that takes time

3. Through their actions. For example, making time to see me, getting to know my friends and family, letting me know they’re thinking of me by sending me a message or something once in a while. I don’t need someone to tell me they love me, I need them to show it.

4. He said he loved me, and then he traveled to another hemisphere to spend time with me, I think thats good enough evidence

5. Well, does he leave a little note to tell you
   you are on his mind?
   Send you yellow flowers when the sky is gray? He’ll find a new way to show you a little bit everyday. That’s how you know.

6. When someone tells me they love me very early on (within the first few dates) I don’t really believe it, simply because they don’t even really know me yet. Also first few dates and first few months are very different to me; someone saying they love me a few dates in would be very different to me than someone saying they love me a few months in.

7. I do not expect them to love me until they know me completely, which only happens over time

8. When I started dating my husband I lived a 30 minute drive and an hour+ bus ride from work. The first bus (of three) that I had to use to get home stopped right at the end of the block he lived on. It was pretty standard for me to pop in on my way home, or even stay a while (past buses running) and he’d take me home later.

   About two months or so into dating him I woke up one morning feeling icky. You know that kind of feeling where you feel off, but not actually sick. So I went to work. An hour or two into my shift it became apparent that going to work was a terrible mistake and I was incredibly ill. I left, headed for home. The bus only ran every 30 minutes and I just missed it so had to wait a while, and by the time I got on the bus I was completely exhausted so I checked in with my boyfriend and just got off by my boyfriend’s place. The plan was to just get a nap then take the bus home or have him drive me home later.

   I didn’t wake up at any reasonable time. I had the full on flu. I slept until the middle of the night. Then slept more. And more. I ended up staying almost a whole week, sleeping most of the time. He not only didn’t hint that I should go home, he said I should stay so he could take care of me. And he did. He brought me soup and gatorade and meds and popsicles. For the first four or five days I didn’t even have the energy to shower. He did. not. care.

   That’s love. Pure and simple love. I married that man as fast as I reasonably could. Well… faster than was reasonable even. Three weeks from online meeting to first date. Five months from first date to wedding date. But it was leap day, and we thought it was hilarious, knew we wanted to get married, and so were like fuck it, why wait? (also we were horny mormons lol)

9. Through their actions! Little things mean so much especially in the beginning.

10. I wouldn’t want anybody to be showing me love like that within a few months of dating. You should still be discovering what flavour crisps each other likes best and making each other laugh.

    I’d run for the hills. And then I’d run some more.

11. >How do you know your SO loves you, **especially when you just started dating them?**

    If we just started dating, I wouldn’t believe they loved me, and it would be a red flag for me if they said it that early. They don’t even really *know* me yet, how can it be love?

12. There’s a difference between intrigue/infatuation vs love.

13. We said the actual words after a year of dating. I don’t believe in love at first sight. For us it was the actions that conveyed our love and affection for each other. Just being there for each other without really saying anything and actually making an effort for each other. We both are in the health professions which is hectic enough but we still make time to spend with each other even if it’s only for an hour or a day.

14. I feel like love in the beginning is actually just potential love & there’s no way of knowing if it’ll continue being love.. if that makes any sense.

    You don’t fully know each other yet, but you know you want to… you know you want to spend all the time you possibly can with them, you want to put in the work to create a relationship & nurture the bond, you want to learn all there is to know about them, etc. but it’s not fully love just yet.

    The way I love my fiancé now feels a lot more concrete & undeniable than it did when we first said it early on. Now we’re having a baby together and we’ve started building an entire life together; I’ve held him while he had mental breakdowns, met his whole family and learned why he is the way he is, took care of him when he was sick & throwing up, forgave him and kept on loving him. So much more.

    In the beginning of love, you don’t know if it will stick. When you’re in love, you won’t have to ask anyone if they love you because you’ll feel it. You’ll already know.

15. If someone says they love you after just a few dates, that’s a red flag, not a good thing.

16. I don’t think it’s love in the early dating, but a right connection. To me it’s that they constantly want to make me feel comfortable, want to spend time with me and when going out for coffee, we end up heading back home 5 hours later just because we had so much to talk about. It feels natural, you can be yourself, there’s right kind of butterflies. There’s no anxiety, stress or jealousy.

    My partner and I have been together for years and living together, and neither of us still haven’t said “I love you”, but I knew I love him since a few months knowing each others.

17. Early ‘I love you’s will be very rarely genuine. My husband said that when we were dating very early on and told him at the time that it wouldnt last long because I am a very stubborn and annoying person. I never felt an ‘in love’ feeling and was raised in a household where I never saw anything like that except on TV.

    My mom and stepfather love one another but not in the head over heels way. And my biological dad is with neither mother, me or my half siblings. You can say the words but actions are what speak more.

    I can truly say I am in love with my husband but we have been married three years as of March 2nd and we have grown together and grown up a great deal.

    When we were dating it was all lovey dovey and fun and games but that doesn’t make it real. When reality hits, love will deepen. Infatuation will run away.