Unattainable Love.

Being in unattainable love with someone only completely unavoidable, it is also potentially self-destructive. Generally, everyone has had a crush that was some way out of their reach. So, we’re already accustomed to this concept in grade school, as young boys and girls. However, every situation is different and “unattainable” is a matter of opinion, not fact.

Unattainable love is an obsessive addictive disorder in which a lover becomes overly involved with the details of an imaginary person, a celebrity, a character from a movie, an individual married or committed to someone else, or a colleague, boss or acquaintance. They start following their personal and professional lives and weaving stories about togetherness with them. Psychologists have indicated that though many people obsess over film, television, sport and pop stars, the only common factor between them is that they are all figures in the public eye.

Below are some general classifications of unattainable love, based on severity and complexity of the lover’s feelings and behaviour:

• Simple Obsessional
• Intense-Personal
• Love Obsessional
• Erotomanic
• Entertainment-Social
• Borderline-Pathological

Simple Obsessional

This form of stalking is generally associated with individuals who have shared previous personal relationships with their victims. However, this is not necessarily the case between a common member of the public exhibiting unattainable love and the famous person with whom they are obsessed. Simple obsessional stalking constitutes a majority of all stalking cases, anywhere from 70%-80%, and is dominated by males. Low self-esteem plays a large role in the obsession that these individuals develop with their victim, in most cases, a famous person. If the individual is unable to have any sort of connection to the object of unattainable love with which they are obsessed, their own sense of self-worth may decline. Individuals that meet the criteria of being labeled as a “simple obsessional stalker” tend to share a set of characteristics including social awkwardness, a sense of insecurity, an inability to have successful personal relationships in their own lives, feelings of powerlessness and very low self-esteem.

Intense-Personal

This is an intermediate level of obsession in which the lover starts believing that the object of their unattainable love, no matter who, is their soul mate. This stage is associated with neuroticism as well as behaviors linked to psychoticism. There is an intense-personal attitude toward someone who probably doesn’t even know about the existence of the lover.

Love Obsessional

Love obsessional stalking accounts for roughly 20%-25% of all stalking cases. As the name suggests, individuals who demonstrate this sort of stalking behavior develop a love obsession with somebody who they have no personal relation to. For example, a woman who had been stalking David Letterman for a total of five years claimed to be his wife when she had no personal connection to him. Individuals that are love obsessional stalkers often convince themselves that they are in fact in a relationship with the subject of their obsession. The people that demonstrate this form of stalking behavior are likely to suffer from a mental disorder, commonly either schizophrenia or paranoia.

Erotomanic

Erotomanic, originating from the word Erotomania, which is a type of delusional disorder where the affected person believes that another person is in love with him or her. This belief is usually applied to someone with higher status or a famous person, but can also be applied to a complete stranger. The term refers to stalkers who genuinely believe that their victims are in love with them. Comprising less than 10% of all stalking cases, Erotomanic stalkers are the least common. There is not much research done on this condition yet, however, the victims in this case are almost always well known within their community or within the media, meaning that they can range from being small town celebrities to famous personalities from Hollywood.

Entertainment-Social

Entertainment-social is mostly a type of celebrity worship. It is used to describe a relatively low level of obsession. This level of admiration is linked to a celebrity capturing the attention of their fans, so much that the fan, or the lover, in this case likes to perpetually discuss the object of their love.

Borderline-Pathological

This is a serious form of unattainable love, when the lover almost worships a celebrity or whoever they are in love with. It can be expressed by statements that would not sound normal to a sane person. Something like – if I had a way to do it, I would spend the rest of my life washing clothes worn by my favorite celebrity.

Watch out for these signs. Be careful about falling in unattainable love and do keep checking back for more information on the subject!