How to stop limerence: Why “Just Letting Go” Doesn't Work (And What Does Help)

In this article, you'll read why stopping limerence is not the same as “just using your common sense” or “simply not thinking about that person anymore.”.
You'll discover what's happening in your brain, nervous system, and attachment patterns that makes limerence stronger the harder you try to push it away, and why relapses under stress or fatigue are a normal part of recovery.
We'll look at what people usually try to stop limerence, why it often only works partially, and what initial small steps *do* help to make the loop less powerful over your life.

In The limerence loop: why your brain can't stop hoping I'm explaining how hope, uncertainty, checking, and small rewards together form a kind of emotional slot machine.
This blog follows on from that, but with a different focus: less on what goes wrong, and more on what recovery looks like in practice – including relapses, doubts, and learning to choose yourself while your system still pulls you toward your LO.

My experience with overcoming limerence (and relapsing)

In my own limerence periods, I've noticed that relapse can happen in two very different ways.
If there was still contact with my LO and everything felt “good” for a while, I could function reasonably normally. Until something small went wrong: a conversation that didn't go well, something I thought I had said wrong, or a period where I suddenly heard nothing for a long time. Then I noticed how quickly I started to worry again, reread, interpret, and have inner conversations, while before that I thought it wasn't that bad.

In situations where I consciously distanced myself, it happened differently. I experienced multiple times that after breaking contact, I lived in phases for a whole year: periods when I thought about that person less, for example, because I had a lot of distractions – moving, big projects, practical stress – and periods when, as soon as my life became a little calmer, there was immediately more room to think about that person again. Then I realized how strongly recovery is linked to what my brain is busy with. The more my attention was truly invested elsewhere, the less room there was for limerence.

Therefore, I have gradually become convinced that “stopping limerence” is not just about distance or willpower, but also about building something bigger than this one person: a project, a side hustle, your own business, a new hobby, something that engages your brain and makes you feel like the main character again. This is not a magic trick, but it does help to slowly shift the center of gravity: away from the loop around your LO, and more towards a life that isn't solely organized around it.A step by step approach and different exercises, with some setbacks on the way, is the most common way to gradually overcoming limerence.

It is precisely through my own relapses, both with contact and after distance, that I have increasingly delved into the psychological and neurochemical aspects of limerence. In my training as a trauma-informed coach, I am learning how the nervous system, stress, and old patterns influence each other, and how recovery almost always proceeds erratically and non-linearly. This combination of theory and experience is why I am writing this blog and my workbook: to give you language and direction at moments when you think you “should just be able to do better,” while your brain and your history are doing something else.

If you notice that shame is making your recovery more difficult, you can Limerence and shame help you be kinder to yourself as you work through limerence. For many people with ADHD, stopping limerence feels even more complicated: thoughts race faster, stimuli hit harder, and relapses seem more likely. In Limerence in ADHD I describe how to work in smaller steps with a busy brain, so that recovery remains achievable.

Why “just quit” rarely works

Many people try to stop limerence by trying hard:

• Have one more really good, honest conversation
• rationally tell yourself it “makes no sense anyway”
• to reprimand oneself that it really must be finished now
• Or find a new crush as soon as possible, so the old one feels less important

The tricky part is that all those strategies mostly stay on top of the same loop. Your brain has already linked your LO to reward, relief, and confirmation, and reacts to that with addiction-like dynamics: the combination of uncertainty, small signals, and great significance makes your system keep scanning and hoping, even when your mind says it's better to stop.

Furthermore, limerence is often intertwined with attachment and old pain: a feeling of not being chosen, fear of abandonment, or seeking safety in relationships that are never fully available. If you try to overcome this with willpower alone, it not only feels heavy but also like you're abandoning yourself.

“Just stop” often does two things:

• it puts even more pressure on yourself (“if I don't succeed, I'm weak”);
• it leaves the underlying layer – nervous system, triggers, old patterns – largely untouched.

Stopping limerence usually requires something else: gradually reducing triggers, learning to recognize when you're in the loop, reinvesting your attention elsewhere, and carefully working with the underlying attachment layer. Therefore, it makes sense that it doesn't go in a straight line and that relapses are part of the process.

In What is Limerence read more about the basics of limerence. And in Limerence is similar to addiction Do you see why this process is so similar to an addiction cycle, without it being a “lack of backbone”?.

Relapses: Why They're Normal and What They Mean

Relapses are a much more common part of limerence recovery than people think. Often, things get better for a while: you think about your LO less, you feel calmer, you have periods where you're almost surprised at how “normal” you can function again.
And then, just when you're tired, under pressure, or encounter an old trigger – a place, a photo, an unexpected encounter, a dream – it can just flare up again. That's not proof that you haven't learned anything or that you're “back to square one.”.

Sometimes you notice that you're not so much seeking contact, but rather continuing to talk to your ex internally. Why you keep having conversations in your head with your ex goes deeper into those inner dialogues and what they are trying to do for you.

Our brain, and especially a brain that has built an addiction-like loop, reacts extra strongly to stress and fatigue: old coping mechanisms return more quickly because they once helped regulate tension. In the context of limerence, this means that fantasy, checking, and hoping reappear for a while.
You can see that as retracing an old path, not as a failed attempt. Every time you notice, “Hey, I'm falling back,” and still make a slightly different choice, not texting, checking less, bringing your attention back to yourself – you're making that path less deep, step by step.

In No contact with limerence I am writing about the role of distance in recovery.
And Limerence and unrequited love Can you read how the fact that someone is unreachable or unanswered can actually strengthen the loop. Both blogs are a good basis for better understanding relapses, so you can see them less as a personal failure.

Four layers of recovery (broadly speaking)

You can broadly view limerence recovery as working on four layers. They often overlap, but it helps to name them separately.

1. Reduce stimuli.
   Fewer new “rushes” help your system to relax in the first place. This can involve no contact or less contact, but also digital boundaries: checking less, turning off notifications, no late-night scrolling sessions in the hope of a signal.
2. Recognize the loop
   As in The limerence loop Described: Learning to see when you are in hope → checking → interpretation → unease → once again hope. Just recognizing that prevents you from fully merging with the experience, but creates a little distance.
3. Looking at underlying attachment and old pain
   Limerence doesn't come out of nowhere. In Limerence and attachment styles en Why him or her? Do you see how old patterns and mixed signals play a role. “Stopping” only really gains depth when you also include this layer, even if only in small pieces.
4. Attachment energy transfer
   Your love, attention, and creativity don't have to disappear; they can be directed elsewhere. In Life After Limerence It's more about that. Building things where you are the main character – a hobby, project, business, creative pursuit – helps your system experience that there's more than just this one person.

You don't have to work on all layers at once perfectly. Often you start by reducing triggers and recognizing the loop, and then space slowly grows for attachment and shifting your energy.

First small steps if you want to know how to stop limerence

You don't have to be “completely done” with limerence all at once. Small, concrete steps are often much more powerful than big intentions. A few examples:

1. Name what happens by name
   Tell yourself: “This is limerence, not neutral infatuation.” That sounds simple, but it shifts your perspective: you're looking at a pattern, not just a romantic story.
2. Create a mini no-contact experiment
   Instead of “forever,” you can start with, for example, 7 or 30 days in which you don't initiate contact or check in. Not as punishment, but as an experiment: how does my nervous system feel when there are no new stimuli for a while?
3. Introduce more friction into your checking behavior.
   Things like muting, turning off notifications, removing apps from your home screen, or setting specific “no-check hours” make the automatic loop less automatic.
4. Write triggers and fallbacks
   Briefly track when you notice you're back in the loop: what happened just before, how did you feel, what were you thinking? That makes the patterns more visible and less mysterious.
5. Invest consciously in something larger than your first love.
   A project, hobby, training, creative plan, building something – you yourself mentioned how a move or something big in your life temporarily preoccupies your brain differently. You can consciously apply this principle: create something where you play the main role.
6. Practice small moments of nervous system care
   Calm breathing, a short walk, stretching, feeling your body, a brief body scan: these are not “spiritual tricks,” but ways to release adrenaline and tension so that the urge to check and fantasize becomes less intense. To avoid just relying on insights, you can start with the micro-steps from Two exercises that gently interrupt limerence.

How my workbook can help you

A blog can do a lot for understanding and recognition, but stopping limerence usually requires repeated practice. Precisely because the loop has had years to become ingrained, it's helpful to have a place where you can work step-by-step on:

• recognizing your personal loop
• the expansion of no-contact experiments and boundaries
• Handling relapses without beating yourself up
• exploring attachment, old pain, and your own needs
• moving your energy to something that nourishes you

That experience is also why I wrote my theory and workbook “Out of the Limerence Loop”. Not to “fix” anyone, but to offer language and exercises to people who recognise themselves in this pattern: falling again and again for unattainable or unrequited love, repeatedly ending up in a lovesick‑like state of limerence, and not understanding why it feels so huge. In the workbook, you can gently explore which old pain is involved, which triggers your nervous system picks up, and how you can, step by step, create more space for real, mutual connection.

If you want to tackle this step by step, my workbook will help you calmly and structurally go through these processes. This blog is primarily intended as a safe first step, offering recognition and language for what is happening.

To think about yourself

Perhaps it helps to gently ask yourself one or two of these questions:

• What does “stopping limerence” mean for me in practice; how would my day look different then?
• In which situations do I notice that I am most vulnerable to relapse (tired, lonely, stressed, a lot of free time, still in contact)?
• Which layer of recovery do I need most right now: reducing stimuli, recognizing patterns, addressing attachment, or shifting energy?
• What could be a small project where I feel like the main character again?

You don't need to have perfect answers to these questions. Just seeing that these questions exist is an important step in itself in shifting your perspective from “only them” to “also a bit me.”.

You are not weak or a failure because limerence doesn't stop all at once. Recovery is almost never a straight line. Limerence is intense, but it's also something you can learn to understand and influence layer by layer. Small steps, a lot of gentleness, and slowly rebuilding your life around yourself, that's something you can be proud of.

Frequently Asked Questions about; how to stop limerence?

About the author

I am Sidney, writer, researcher, and the driving force behind Sid's Saferoom. In addition to my years of personal experience with breaking free from limerence, I am certified Trauma-Informed Coach (IPHM-accredited via Kirsty Watson, The Complete Approach).

Knowing firsthand how lonely and exhausting obsessive infatuation can be, I dedicate my work to helping others heal. I write about it and developed the theory and workbook Out of the Limerence Loop. My mission is to provide you with the psychological insights and practical tools needed to interrupt the obsessive loop and restore peace to your nervous system.

• Want to know more? Read my full story on the About me-page.
• Weekly support? Subscribe to my English-language essays at substack.com.

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