I am quite happy to be the first to reply to this post !
I think you have an OVERWHELMINGLY pessimistic representation of relationships.
I mean, there's nothing pessimistic about it, it's just statistics. The average person will date 5-6 people in their lifetime. Some people just date one, some date 20. Some have lifelong relationships, some never settle with anybody, but on average, -most- of the people you are likely to date are not going to be your one and only. You don't have to take my word for it, do a spot poll on pretty much any group of people you meet.
How many people in this group are currently dating the first person they ever went for?
I bet it's a small number.
They're not only doom and gloom, they're also wholesome and make you more than you are.
According to people having been in such consensual relationships (or that they FELT to be so), the feelings are just nothing like your usual relationship.
Yeah, that's kinda what I said? The highs are higher, the lows are lower. Everything's elevated. I've been there, believe me.
It's something out of this world. So, you don't "break up" in this situation, if sex becomes a normal part of your normal "sibling" or "parental" love, there is no turning back. I don't see how you can stop to love your mother or father just because you now have sex with them. You knew and loved them before, or you wouldn't bang them anyway.
(rubs face) Oh my sweet summer child. Do you honestly think that if you are in love with someone, you'll never break up? Because people do. People do all the time. I've had literal dozens of friends go through breakups with their "one and only". Some got dumped, some did the dumping, sometimes it was just a mutual souring of the relationship. People grow and change. But even when the breakup is fairly amicable (and they frequently aren't), it's still really hard to be around the person.
You can't really have a "crush" on someone you know for years, it has to be much deeper.
You're -adorable-
And last point: not acting or coming to term with one's feeling and attraction, causes a lot of emotional damage too: if you have a strong, unexpressed desire for YEARS for your kid or the opposite, it's likely to ferment and turn to hatred or resentment.
Yeah, no. I don't buy this for a moment. You have to -process- those feelings in a healthy way, but it is absolutely possible to be attracted to someone, to recognize that it's a bad idea, and to let those feelings go and maintain a healthy relationship. I've never been there with family, but friends do this all the time.
True love is not something easy to sweep under the carpet without consequences... And familial love is more likely than not, to be very intense and genuine.
Sexual attraction is a hormone response, kid. Love is about caring about someone's well-being and wanting them to be happy. Romantic love is about wanting that person to be closest to you, to pair bond. You don't need sex to have romance, you don't need romance to have love, you don't need love to have sex.
"True Love" means very different things to different people. I'm guessing you think of true love and you think of your heart pounding, your palms sweating, cheeks flushed. The all-encompassing need to be with someone, to hold them, to kiss them, to desire their undivided attention.
When you get older and wiser, you realize that's just being horny, and that real true love is the feeling of understanding someone and being comfortable in your relationship with them. That's something that comes with time and effort for most people.
Being horny for someone makes you want to pair-bond with them, It's instinctive social behavior. That's "Love at first sight". It pulls you in, makes you want the other thing, and it doesn't work out more often than it does. I promise you, again, statistics. I'm not making this shit up. And I also promise you, you can get over it. You can be absolutely entirely smitten with someone, and it doesn't work out, and you get over it. Everybody that's ever had to get over an unrequited love can tell you. The earlier you let it go, the easier it is. Whiiiiich is why it's best to discourage people from taking sexual interest in family, because it's easier to let it go if you don't spend forever mooning over the person before it reaches critical mass and blows up your life.
Some people get lucky, and fall straight from being smitten to real love in one go, but that's just because they got horny for someone they turned out to be compatible with. It's like rolling a pair of dice and getting two sixes. Sure, it's gonna happen now and then, but if you think it always happens just because you saw it once, you're setting yourself up for disappointment.
And for two people to be family, -and- romantically compatible, -and- both interested in each other sexually? (and an extra dice roll if they're the same gender) That is a lot of dice rolls to risk ruining your life on. That's part of why it makes for compelling fiction. But it's a bad bet, ultimately.
