A love hate relationship is a most commonly a romantic, personal, and often sexual relationship that incorporates aspects of both love and hate. These two conflicting emotions can be experienced either simultaneously, or alternating. A love hate relationship can exist from the start, such as when a person dates someone who they recognize as being “bad for them”, but are still attracted to. Otherwise a love hate relationship can also develop from a normal relationship, such as when a couple who have loved each other strongly start to dislike one another on a personal level, while still desiring each other physically.

While a love hate relationship is most often used to describe a romantic relationship, it can also describe the relationship between family members, friends, or any other situation in which the parties experience a dislike for the relationship, yet also desire the relationships to continue.

If you find yourself in a love hate relationship, there are several things you can do to make the situation more tenable:

1. Acccept that there is a problem. Hate shouldn’t play a part is any loving relationship. It is a negative emotion, and accepting it into your life a regular basic can only be damaging. Many people grow up in dysfunctional families where yelling “I hate you!” at each other is considered to be normal. This can lead to confusion regarding love hate relationships later in life. Only once you have accepted that there is a problem can you start working towards fixing it. 

2. Understand that it will take effort. Relationships are complicated, and none more so than a love hate relationship. Resolving the underlying issues that are causing the difficulties in the relationship is not going to be easy, and there is no such thing as a quick fix. If the relationship is important to you however, then no doubt you are willing to do whatever it takes.

2. Identify what aspect of the relationship is “hate”. If you can isolate the problem specifically, you are one step closer to rectifying it. If you can do that, it will

leave you with just the “love” part of the relationship (which should be the desired result). If you find yourself strongly attracted to someone, but they cheat on you time after time, then the cheating is the part you hate, and what needs to be resolved (cheating can be an indication of deeper issues too of course).

3. Work together to improve the relationship. In a love hate relationship, both people MUST be willing to work with each other, otherwise there is no change of chance. One person trying to change the relationship just won’t work; it needs to be both people. If your partner is completely unwilling to try and fix the “hate” part of the relationship, then it might be impossible to save the relationship.

4. Get professional help. If the relationship is important to each of you, but you can’t seem to make any progress yourselves, then seeing a relationship or marriage counsellor is a good idea. A counsellor can help you stay focused, and will also have had experience in love hate relationships before. Seeing a professional is oftentimes the best thing that you can do for each other.

 

Remember: Relationships should add joy to your life, not cause turmoil. If you have tried everything you can, but the relationship is still causing you distress, then breaking up and starting again with a different person might be your only solution. You both deserve to find happiness, even if it’s not with each other.