Love or Lust? Signs It’s Just a Hormone-Driven Fling

In honor of Valentine’s Day, we thought it may be a good time to help out those who are perhaps a little confused about their, err, “situation-ship.” It seems like, nowadays, that’s a lot of people since the way the younger generation does dating is a bit unconventional. A friend with benefits, boyfriend, booty call, boyfriend-just-when-he’s-in-town—these are terms we mostly understand. But what about a “Lover”? Traditionally speaking, a lover falls in a gray area between booty call and boyfriend. There certainly is all the excitement, chemistry, and sex that you have with the booty call, but you also feel that cosmic connection you feel around new love. And yet, things don’t really move at the same pace as a developing relationship. It’s more frantic. It’s rushed, but also very slow. You spend a lot of time together—you crave each other—but you rarely go out and meet each other’s friends. A lover’s fling is, to put it simply, a hormone-driven thing that doesn’t usually last long but sure is fun while it lasts. Here are signs you’re in a hormone-driven, Lover’s fling.

You don’t want him in your real world

You’d never want him to do something like stop by your work or possibly even your apartment. You want your interactions with him to exist in some realm that feels like it has nothing to do with your real-life—it’s almost like your secret life. You just want to keep your trysts with him in his loft apartment, beach house, or whatever another secluded love nest he has.

Nor does he want you in his real world

You’ve caught him trying to separate you and real-life, too. He doesn’t want you meeting his neighbors or seeing boring bills on the table. He doesn’t want to discuss traffic or taxes. He just wants to sweep you back off into lover’s land when real life things come up.

When you’re together, you completely lose the sense of time. You always run very late for whatever you need to do after. In fact, if you know you’re spending the afternoon with your lover, and a friend invites you to dinner that night, you almost resent the invite—you didn’t want appointments or alarms ruining the magic.

You turn into some character from a Jane Austen or Nora Roberts novel when you’re together, speaking in a romantic and inflated way you never speak to your friends or anyone else. You know that if your friends could hear the two of you speak, they’d roast you—hard.

Things can be a little too romantic

You have some moments that are a little too much, like when he sings songs he wrote about you, wants to paint your nude portrait, or rubs a feather all over your body for 15 minutes.

You talk about your dreams and secrets

You tell each other about your deepest secrets and dreams. It’s almost like you’re teenagers, whispering in the night. You’ve told him about dreams like, wanting to live on a tiny tropical island and just make money selling poems. Nobody else knows about this—that’s because your alter ego comes out around your lover.

But you don’t talk about yourselves—really

Other than your elaborate dreams, you don’t talk about yourselves—not really. You don’t tell him about your dad’s hip replacement surgery or your coworker who keeps jamming the printer and blaming you.

Your brain shuts off

You feel a little less intelligent when you’re with this guy—like your brain is in a fog. But, you kind of enjoy it. It’s like you intentionally turn your brain off when you’re with him, so you can block things out.

You allow for things you normally wouldn’t

He has, perhaps, no job. Or, very different political views than yours. He could be terrible with money or wear a lot of tie-dyes. You’d never actually date someone with any of these qualities, and yet, here you are.

You’re sexually exploring

Your time in bed is more sexually explorative than any time you’ve ever spent with a man. You’re up to do all sorts of things you typically wouldn’t do with someone—like a serious boyfriend.

But wouldn’t do those things again

You’re doing things in bed with this guy that you know you’ll only try once. In reality, you know this is just a fling so, it’s safe to try these things—it’s not like he’ll be around long enough to want to repeat them.

You don’t tell friends much about it

When you’re actually dating someone new, your friends can’t get you to shut up about him. You’re always telling them how funny and smart he is and all the dates he’s taking you on. But, when they ask about this guy, you just sort of blush, say something vague like, “It’s amazing” and change the subject.

Other than the amazing sex

Well, there is one thing you can’t stop telling your friends about, and that’s the sex. You’ve become their live erotic novel—they’re drooling over your every word of these raunchy tales.

You just left something too serious

You recently left something serious and complicated and told yourself you wanted nothing like that again for a very long time.

He’s your escape from reality

You feel like this guy is your escape from reality. You turn your phone off with him. You don’t look at clocks. You just want to drift away into lover’s land. You don’t like the thought of bringing him as a plus-one to your office party or a wedding—you don’t even really want to know what he’s like in those settings.