It’s Tough To Love Someone Who’s Never Been Hurt

It's prudent to avoid dating someone who's never had their heart broken: Because they simply can't understand real love.

By Caithlin Pena

Updated 10 years ago, February 13, 2015

As children, we learned not to touch the sharp knife in the kitchen because if we did, we’d hurt ourselves. But in order for this lesson to really hit home, we would’ve had to ignore the advice, touched it anyway and cut ourselves. That’s the only way you really learn: from experience. The same goes with heartbreak. One can never experience the true highs of love without first experiencing the agony of a shattered heart. You know the kind of agony we’re talking about: can’t-get-out-of-bed-life’s-not-worth-living agony. And that’s why it’s prudent to avoid dating someone who’s never had their heart broken: Because they simply can’t understand real love. Here’s what we mean:

1. She’ll expect your relationship to be just like a Nicholas Sparks movie.

She dreams about her own Noah (from The Notebook, duh) a perfect man who would do anything for the love of his life. But without a previous heartbreak, she doesn’t realize Noah only exists in the movies. “Perfect” is subjective and ever-changing and after heartbreak, imperfect becomes the new definition of perfect.

2. She’ll put you on a pedestal.

She believes in an idealist type of love, something we, the heartbroken, smartly know only happens in romance novels and movies starring Josh Duhamel.

3. She’s quicker to leave when your flaws are revealed.

You’ve broken the version of romance she envisioned in her undamaged heart. If she doesn’t leave you, she’ll try to change you into someone that meet her lofty expectations.

4. She might wonder why you don’t put her on a pedestal.

You learned long ago that believing your significant other is a perfect human being ends up in disappointment. Nobody is perfect, no matter how much you want to believe it. So if she puts you on a pedestal, she’ll wonder why you don’t do the same to her. (After all, you’re both perfect for each other, right? Why else would you be dating?) The truth is, you can’t put her on a pedestal because you realize she’s not perfect, but you accept her for it. She may not.

5. She’s careless.

Heartbreaks causes us to be more cautious the next time we start dating another person. You remember the mistakes you made and the hurt you felt (or caused) and try to avoid doing those things again. But because she’s carefree (ah, youth), she might wonder why you’re not opening up to her as much as she is to you or why you don’t respond when she casually tells you she loves you.

6. She’ll neglect you.

One of the reasons that relationships fail is that one person begins to neglect the other. But as someone who’s never had her heart broken, she has neverfeltthat neglect so she might not realize she’s doing it to you. While she’s off having a grand time with her girlfriends, she forgets to call or make time to see you. A few days? No biggie. A few weeks? You may want to talk to her about it or she’ll never figure it out.

7. She might think you’re neglecting her.

One of the misconceptions of dating is that you must spend every free minute with each other. You don’t have to. Time apart is quite healthy. But she may think you’re supposed to spend every second together. So when you hang out with the guys watching the football game instead of going on a date night with her, she might think you don’t want to be with her anymore, when you really just want a night out with guys.

8. She won’t know that being in a relationship doesn’t always mean being in love.

She may be. She may not be. She could be stuck in this euphoria of being in a relationship and being “in love.” Infatuation can easily be mistaken for love. First-timers in a relationship might think that being in lust with a person automatically means that they’re in love with a person. So when you tell her that you don’t love her – at least not yet – you end up looking like the bad guy. Someone who hasn’t had her heart broken won’t realize that it takes more than physical attraction to be in love with someone.

Keep in mind: Not every girl is the same. Some first-timers to dating may not be huge fans of Nicholas Sparks. Some may actually be cautious, because they’re unsure of what to do in a relationship. And some will probably date you just to know what dating feels like.

You learn everything about dating from previous experiences, so you know what would make the other person stay and what would scare them away. Dating someone who’s never felt that way? They might end up scaring you away or you’ll shatter their vision of a perfect love. So, tread carefully.