Still don't know WHY I obsess about people

This is extremely accurate for me as well. Obsessions (not only with people, anything) most often serve as seeming escape routes for me to distract myself from what truly needs to be dealt with and done in the moment.

It is not even unconscious anymore -- why it can be so disturbing due to the cognitive dissonance created.

I had hopes when I first entered therapy that it would help with this issue but so far it has not or only in very subtle, transient ways.

I don't mean to go off on a tangent off topic from the thread but I'd be interested to know what you mean by cognitive dissonance Xynesthesia and it not being unconscious anymore.

My mother loved/loves me, yet in my twenties I got very attached to several older women about her age - because they were more maternal than she was. I outgrew it, but you can know someone loved you and still want more.

The preemie thing...it's something like babies not being touched or physically loved in their first weeks hinders their attachment abilities? It could be that, mixed in with other factors unique to you.

I wonder the same thing. I was pretty attached to my T (thought I worked very hard not to let it get out of control) but my whole life, even as a little girl, I always got attached to older women, usually teachers. I saw them as mother figures.
My mom was always there, and she does love me, but she is not super emotional/touchy-feely/expressive. Neither am I, though. I don't know why I so longed for the motherly love of teachers I've had.

Maybe it is because you had your "fantasies" so long and never really build satisfying relationships in real life? Because nobody will ever fullfill your fantasy critizeria. And unconsciously... you fed this over the years.

I think I get what you mean Rainbow. I have a very loving and caring mother yet I still feel strong maternal transference towards my T. I am beginning to understand that while my mother loves me I often feel (and have done for a long time) that she doesn't really understand me and consequently is unable to meet a lot of my emotional needs. I often feel judged by my mother and often feel as though I need to hide how I feel to protect her. I don't feel either of those things with my T and that makes me wish T was my mum.

Despite understanding this, I still don't think it is a "good enough" reason for my issues. Maybe that is what is happening for you? As in logically you can kind of see what's happening but it doesn't feel justified maybe? I don't know, just a thought.

Have you been diagnosed with OCD or was it suggested to you that you might have traits of it.

Obsessing over people might be due to that.

I really have hard time with linking it to being a premature baby. So many people are born premature so I just don't see how they all obsess about other people their whole life. Is there any valid research on that?

There is ROCD- relationship OCD. I have had a few obsessions over unrequited love interests and have spent a lot of time trying to figure it out and understand why. The interesting conclusion I came to is if they had returned my affection, I probably would have stopped feeling such pure infatuation and started to see their flaws and decide they weren't right for me and lost interest! It might have to do with the black/white thinking of BPD (which i have traits). I think of them, I obsess about them, but I attribute qualities to them that I imagine they have when I have no idea what they are really like and I understand this.

You haven't mentioned your father.

I have classic unavailable daddy issues. I have a loving, but non touching, emotionally abusive mother who is narcissistic.

I also feel that I fixated on these fantasy objects because my needs were not getting met IRL. I am not able to truly connect with my h because he is not able to connect with me. We are having an intimacy issue. I even told him about the fantasies. I don't know how much of all this is me and how much is him, but I feel that if we could be happy, i wouldn't resort to imaginary friends.

If you google "psychological effects of trauma in infancy" there is lots of research on how trauma can cause all sorts of post-traumatic effects and problems with attachment.

Weren't you in an incubator for months as a newborn, rainbow? At a time when doctors knew nothing of the importance of bonding and attachment? I suspect that plays a big role.

Rainbow8, I can relate to this a lot. Almost as far back as I can remember I have obsessed about people in a position of authority who were always unavailable to me as the parent figures I wanted them to be. Ts are just the latest in a long line. I have so many interpretations as to why I do this when I always had a mother that loved me, I guess the truth is I'll perhaps never really know. However, some things that other posters have said jump out at me personally: lack of object constancy, fantasizing about ideal relationships (my escape from reality) and a mother's love not being about the child. I also wonder if for me there could be a theme of obsessing over unavailable people. Maybe my mother was emotionally unavailable. Maybe however painful this obsessing and fantasizing is, it is not as frightening as actually meeting my emotional needs in real life. Who knows?

I can completely understand feeling that the obsessing isn't justified when you had a mother that loved you though. I feel the same but for me it's because I feel terribly guilty and ashamed for these obsessive attachments. It seems as if I'm ungrateful and greedy. Most of all, I hate living with this day to day. There is always this need to obsess over someone and it never goes away. When one person exits, I find another.

I really hope you can get to the bottom of this with your T and find some peace of mind.

I could be the poster child for girl with daddy issues. I don't really like that term though. Anyway I was thinking about it and it seems that fantasies are a whole lot safer than when they become a reality. In a fantasy you are the one in control. When it becomes a reality there are other people in the mix and **** gets unpredictable. I also obsess A LOT. I know how annoying it feels. Maybe there is an Ocd component to it. Or maybe it's just the way you're wired. In any case, it might not even matter who and why. Maybe the issue that could be focused on is coping with it and trying to alleviate yourself from the obsessive pattern

I was going to say the same as JunkDNA. Sometimes we just can't know exactly why something is as it is. Sometimes we just don't have the memories or the information to know. We are so very complicated and it could originate in a number of experiences.
What is important is learning to accept these feelings and rather than trying to change them, to manage it in a healthy way. Working to find ways to soothe these very young feelings with self compassion and patience.

This is just my opinion, but I often think that the power of our parents / relationship with parents gets a little over-hyped in psychotherapy, as though they are the only source of our behavioral patterns. I don't mean to devalue the importance of whtever happened (or did not happen) with our parents in critical periods of development, and it's supported by ample scientific evidence also. What I mean is that we are also influenced by a myriad of other factors, people and relationships in our lives, both as children and as adults. Like Echos mentioned, it is very complicated.

I also have strong obsessive tendencies and I often think that wanting to know the answer to everything, figuring out how everything works is one of the most prominent of these obsessions. I sometimes pride myself on thinking of this so called "seeker mentality" as a positive feature, but all the searches can equally be just other manifestations of the obsessional tendencies. So I am trying to consciously stop myself and needless to say, it is rarely comfortable. Asking all the "why" questions and getting answers is often a good thing but just like everything, it can also turn negative when done in excess.

I have a tendency for obsessive interactions with people who piqued my interest and it did start in childhood/adolescence but I don't think primarily in relation to my parents, more other kids and people. In the first 10 years of my life I was frequently bullied by other kids and so felt like being an outcast in my social environment most of the time, except with some adults (e.g. my father and some of his friends, some teachers etc) mostly, but even with the adults it was very selective. As a result, I developed a strong tendency to look for individuals that I feel are similar to me, and then get obsessive. For me the "similarity" factor also often meant similarity in relational style, including this interpersonal intensity but just as much a very strong desire for independence and often withdrawing. Needless to say how this combo has created a dual drive of polar opposite forces, which often got reinforced throughout my life due to encounters with similar people, or even just perceived (imagined) similarities. In other words, a strong transference pattern, which in my case I think was reinforced by relationships with other people who had their own push/pull ambivalent style. The desires rarely remained unrequited, much more characterized by intense fluctuations on each side. Of course all this comes back boldly in my therapy relationships, even with current T who is trying really hard to remain even and consistent, but is undeniably affected by it (we discussed it in the last couple sessions).

So what is the solution to all this? I honestly don't know but I believe more and more what others also pointed out on this thread, that it is just something I carry and it will be much more constructive for me to really learn to accept it instead of the intense waves of confusion and shame I often experience due to the ambivalence.

Your pattern might be to seek what is familiar to you. At least that's the theory. Others have said similar things-your mother might have not been emotionally available. So you are seeking out the experience again by your obsession with unavailable people. And your fantasies sound like a need for control.

People who are not emotionally available can still love someone or appear to be a good parent.

I strongly agree that being a premature baby in the hospital likely led to some of your issues. Maybe it is a combination of things.

Rainbow, much of what you write resonates with me. I am very much looking for the 'why' as well, but I don't hold out much hope that I'll find out. There must be another way, for both of us.

Just another thought and one that I've considered as a possible reason for my obsessing:

Could it be that obsessing over people this way is some kind of distraction from some other issue your subconscious is trying to protect you from facing in therapy?

For example, in my own search to find answers for why I obsess over Ts I've read that it can be a distraction from the real issues that brought you into therapy. While I disagree with this as a comprehensive explanation for the obsessing (there are many more reasons besides) I do see this as being partially true for me because however painful it is, obsessing over T (or whoever) is the lesser of two evils. It is much more painful to start to unpick why I'm obsessing and explore the unmet needs and the void that I'm trying to fill with an unhealthy attachment.

Secondly, could it be a coping mechanism? Do you find that the more anxious/depressed/stressed etc you feel the more you obsess after people? Sometimes in the height of my despair, I find obsessing over someone to be of some comfort but more often, it's perhaps the pain it causes me torturing myself this way over unavailable people that I find more comforting....or should I say familiar? What I mean is, it's a familiar feeling to me to torture myself by obsessing over people so perhaps I find comfort in the familiarity of that feeling.

Anyway, does any of that resonate with you?

This is extremely accurate for me as well. Obsessions (not only with people, anything) most often serve as seeming escape routes for me to distract myself from what truly needs to be dealt with and done in the moment. It is not even unconscious anymore -- why it can be so disturbing due to the cognitive dissonance created.

I had hopes when I first entered therapy that it would help with this issue but so far it has not or only in very subtle, transient ways.

You don't need to understand why you are
Doing a behavior to change your behavior
For me obsessing over why is generally a way of avoiding actual change..

The is rarely one why.

That's true for me actually. I obsess over other stuff too (a song, a story, a film, an event, a certain "style") and always have but these obsessions (unlike my obsessing over people) are extremely short lived and can be for a matter of hours days or weeks and then I move on. For me it serves as a distraction and escape from reality, like Xynesthesia says.

Do you find you obsess over anything else rainbow8?

I don't mean to go off on a tangent off topic from the thread but I'd be interested to know what you mean by cognitive dissonance Xynesthesia and it not being unconscious anymore.

I haven't found therapy has helped me with obsessing either. If anything, it has only worsened it now I've been terminated. The only time I felt like it was actually lessening was when I felt a more secure attachment to T which had the benefit of making me feel less insecure about my life outside of therapy. That would seem to suggest the obsessing is a sign of insecurity. Perhaps that's another possible reason for obsessing? A feeling of insecurity within yourself and attachments with others??? Just thinking out loud here lol.

I mean that when I was younger, I would just engage in the obsessions and distractions without thinking about them as such. Acting out without knowing that I was avoiding something else. It caused me a lot of problems (some very characteristic repetitive behaviors, e.g. avoiding dealing with practical things, avoiding real, healthy commitments) and took a while to recognize this was happening actually. The anxiety associated with these distractions/obsessions was not on the surface much either when I was young so I would mostly just engage in my obsessions, enjoy the superficial gratification they had provided, and when all this caused issues, I would rather move on than deal with them.

The difference now is that after all these years, I have recognized the patterns and where they come from (yes, insecurities) but the pull is so strong and the habit is so ingrained, I still have the same desires and often act out despite the now clear and predictable consequences and how they disrupt other areas of my life, or knowing well that the distractions do not allow me to experience healthier ways of living. Hence the cognitive dissonance, citing a definition from Wikipedia:
"cognitive dissonance is the mental stress or discomfort experienced by an individual who holds two or more contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values at the same time; performs an action that is contradictory to one or more beliefs, ideas, or values".

I think this state can be very confusing and disruptive when one of the drives is mostly unconscious -- then we become aware of the consequences, patterns etc. What I mean for me now is that I know most of the time in a very clear way that I am distracting myself and what I should be really dealing with (and that would be satisfying). But because of this habit, I often do not resist the obsessions and distractions, engage -- while I am aware of the whole mechanism and what better ways to cope would be. This can generate the most unsettling state, painful and very vulnerable because the defenses (denial etc) are no longer protecting me the way they used to but I have not found stable, consistent other ways of dealing either. It's a limbo state and while I find therapy helpful in a few ways, in this sense it can actually make it worse by increasing awareness further and then leaving me alone to figure out what to do with all of it.

For me actually the area of relationships is far from being the most problematic in this sense but that suffers as well. To be exact, for me it's not even the obsessiveness that is the biggest culprit (unless it manifests in very destructive ways like substance addiction), but the avoidance. Well, the combination of the two.

Sometimes when I find myself focused hard on something, or someone, it's because I feel personally lacking or not good enough. I catch myself thinking - if only I could own awesome thing XXX or be associated with perfect person XXX I'd be awesome and perfect too. It never works out that way though.

Most people, I feel, use this as a default. On the extreme side, think of people who shop a lot, are focused on surgeries or self improvements, spend excessive time grooming or cleaning and so on. I don't use Facebook but my children do, and most of the hoop-la people post on their pages seems along these lines.

Unfortunately anxiety tends to exacerbate this a lot - I don't know if there is always an event or reason.

I mean that when I was younger, I would just engage in the obsessions and distractions without thinking about them as such. Acting out without knowing that I was avoiding something else. It caused me a lot of problems (some very characteristic repetitive behaviors, e.g. avoiding dealing with practical things, avoiding real, healthy commitments) and took a while to recognize this was happening actually. The anxiety associated with these distractions/obsessions was not on the surface much either when I was young so I would mostly just engage in my obsessions, enjoy the superficial gratification they had provided, and when all this caused issues, I would rather move on than deal with them.

The difference now is that after all these years, I have recognized the patterns and where they come from (yes, insecurities) but the pull is so strong and the habit is so ingrained, I still have the same desires and often act out despite the now clear and predictable consequences and how they disrupt other areas of my life, or knowing well that the distractions do not allow me to experience healthier ways of living. Hence the cognitive dissonance, citing a definition from Wikipedia:
"cognitive dissonance is the mental stress or discomfort experienced by an individual who holds two or more contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values at the same time; performs an action that is contradictory to one or more beliefs, ideas, or values".

I think this state can be very confusing and disruptive when one of the drives is mostly unconscious -- then we become aware of the consequences, patterns etc. What I mean for me now is that I know most of the time in a very clear way that I am distracting myself and what I should be really dealing with (and that would be satisfying). But because of this habit, I often do not resist the obsessions and distractions, engage -- while I am aware of the whole mechanism and what better ways to cope would be. This can generate the most unsettling state, painful and very vulnerable because the defenses (denial etc) are no longer protecting me the way they used to but I have not found stable, consistent other ways of dealing either. It's a limbo state and while I find therapy helpful in a few ways, in this sense it can actually make it worse by increasing awareness further and then leaving me alone to figure out what to do with all of it.

For me actually the area of relationships is far from being the most problematic in this sense but that suffers as well. To be exact, for me it's not even the obsessiveness that is the biggest culprit (unless it manifests in very destructive ways like substance addiction), but the avoidance. Well, the combination of the two.