Are you truly in love or just desperate to pair up?

It is easy to get carried away by the excitement that characterises the early stages of new romance and become desperate to make it work.

According to Ken Munyua, a counselling psychologist based in Nairobi, this is more likely to happen if you have been single for a lengthy period and have been looking for a romantic partner.

 “If you have been single and craving for romance for a while, and you happen to meet someone who expresses romantic interest in you, you’re likely to start thinking that they are your soul mate,” he says.

However, nothing kills the flickering flame of new romance faster than desperation in one of the partners.

“A desperate new lover is like a leech. He or she sticks like glue and sucks the life out of their partner. If any man or woman continues being with a desperate lover, it is simply because he or she is taking advantage of them,” writes Ruth Purple, the author of The Male Magnet Formula.

Nevertheless, realising that you are crossing the line between showing interest and being desperate, doesn’t come automatically for those who are in love. How can you tell if you are just drunk with infatuation and desperation or whether you are truly in love? Here are some tips to help you figure it out:

Anybody goes: According to Munyua, the first sign that you’re desperate is the readiness to give in to any man who expresses romantic interest in you.

 “You have no checklist of wants and needs to be met by your prospective partner. There are no particular characteristics that you’re looking for in a man. And if there are a few, then they superficial traits that can’t hold a long-term relationship together,” he says.

Going overboard: If you’re putting significantly much more effort than your new boyfriend or are trying to rush through a relationship in its early stages to make it reach the level that usually takes months or years to arrive at, then you might be desperate. A relationship is a two-way street and both parties must pull their weight for it to work.

If one partner is trying to make things move faster, the other partner might feel overwhelmed or rushed and may pull away.

A desperate person will often have thoughts or use phrases such as, “You are my life” or “I am nothing without you” or “I can’t live without you.” A desperate person will also send a barrage of messages to their new partner to talk about every single innocuous thing.

A desperate person discusses the future (kids, marriage and life together in five or ten years) in the very early stages of the relationship.

If you seem way ahead of your partner in your deeds and thoughts on the relationship, you might just be desperate.

Premature commitment: If you have only dated for less than month and you are already demanding commitment from your potential partner, you need to slow down.

According to Purple, moving at the speed of a bullet in a new relationship is a clear indication that you’re desperate. She says: “After two weeks of dating, you hear wedding bells and after the third week, you want to meet his parents, a month into dating, you want to move in with him. You are literally scaring him away!”

Losing your identity: You are desperate if you quickly lose your identity and your voice, and start behaving like your new catch. Whatever he wants becomes what you want you want. You never say no to anything he proposes. 

 “If their take becomes your take, if their thoughts suddenly become your thoughts you’ve started off on the wrong foot. Your partner may initially like this and believe it to be a sign of compatibility, but they’ll soon lose interest and despise you as thoughtless, unprincipled and dependent,” says Purple, adding that no one wants a partner with no opinion, no interests and no identity.

Regular abuse: You’re also desperate if your partner abuses you emotionally, verbally or even physically, but you don’t want to admit that he is abusing you. You are afraid that if you acknowledge it and confront him, you might get dumped and be relegated back to singlehood.

 “You make excuses for his abusive tendencies and mischievous activities to avoid being thrown back to your single status. However, subconsciously believing that you won’t find a better partner or no one will ever love you is a fallacy,” says Munyua.

Prevent it: According to Psychology Today, a magazine on mental health and relationships, before you say yes to a new romance, say to yourself that you don’t have to make your new relationship work at all costs.

“The tendency to go overboard with your romantic gestures or to try and make the new relationship work at all costs is both taxing and corrosive. The engine that has evolved among women is to be very cautious about (getting into new relationships), then to get very emotionally involved once in the relationship.

This means that you may have excessive feelings of neediness only after a relationship has emerged. Be cautious,” reads an excerpt from the journal.