You're Not Bored, You're Just Regulated

"I sat in my therapist's office and said the words out loud for the first time: "That lightning isn't there." I was talking about Vanessa. About how when she touched me there was this comfort and calm I hadn't felt before. It lingered. It confused the hell out of me. Every relationship before her? Lightning. That activated, can't-eat-can't-sleep, my-stomach-is-in-knots feeling. The kind of intensity that made me feel alive. The kind I thought was proof we were meant to be."

"Here's what nobody tells you: Your nervous system may have been trained to confuse danger with desire. And when you finally meet someone healthy? Someone who doesn't trigger your abandonment wounds or make you anxious? Your body doesn't know what to do with that. It reads "calm" as "boring." Safety as "no chemistry." Regulation as "something must be wrong." But you're not bored. You're just not activated."

Someone described feeling calm and safe with a partner instead of the intense activation they previously equated with love. Past relationships produced 'lightning'—an activated, anxious intensity mistaken for chemistry. A therapist suggested that that lightning could actually be dysfunction rooted in trauma. The nervous system can be trained to confuse danger with desire, causing safety to register as boredom. Meeting a non-triggering, regulated partner can feel unfamiliar because the body expects activation. Therefore calm, presence, and safety can indicate a healthy attachment rather than absence of chemistry.

Read at Psychology Today