hen you’re falling in love with someone, there’s likely one question at the top of your mind: Do they feel the same way? When you give someone your heart, it’s a vulnerable time, so naturally you want to feel like that emotion’s reciprocated. As a result, looking for every clue including the sex behaviors that mean they’re in love can be one way of reassuring yourself that the feelings are indeed mutual. But is it actually possible to know if someone is in love with you based on how they behave in bed? According to sex and intimacy coach Irene Fehr, there are a few key things you can be on the lookout for in bed that indicate someone’s falling in love with you. “When we’re falling in love, we fall under the spell of what’s called ‘limerence.’ During this phase of newness and excitement, we’re flooded by a chemical cocktail of hormones that produces a euphoric state and creates an intense, all-consuming draw to each other,” Fehr tells Elite Daily. “During this period, people do behave differently in bed — because we’re wired to seduce and impress our partners to want to mate with us (whether or not you actually want to mate).” Here’s what the experts say that looks like in practice.
They’re fully present and sexually open in bed.
If your bedmate is connected, present, and confident under the sheets, that can be a sign they’re in love, says Fehr. “You might feel their openness in how they look at or touch you,” she explains. “They might be more courageous in taking emotional risks to show themselves to you in asking for what they want, or telling you about their desires, too.”
They want to go the extra mile to please you.
A partner who’s in love is likely to value your pleasure over their own, explains Fehr. If they’re going above and beyond to make sure it’s a mutually satisfying experience, it could very well be a sign that they truly care about you. “They might forgo their own needs and want to please their partners,” says Fehr.
They prioritize affection.
Another behavior to note in bed, psychosexual therapist Cate Mackenzie tells Elite Daily, is how much they prioritize affection, as it can be very telling when it comes to the state of their heart. “If your partner is prepared to make an effort to spend time being there with you, perhaps touching and kissing more, then you know that this is about the connection, not just their pleasure,” she explains.
They try too hard to impress you.
While being or falling in love with someone can often be a boon to your confidence, Fehr does warn that sometimes the opposite can be true. Caring about someone to that degree makes you feel vulnerable, and that, in some cases, can lead people to hide parts of themselves in the bedroom to impress the person they’re with. “It might look like they’re trying extra hard to impress for fear of being seen as less good of a lover. For men, it’s about their performance. and that might translate into working really hard to make their partner orgasm or have pleasure. For women, it’s about being pleasing and sexual, making sure he gets off and is happy with your love-making, even if it’s less than what she needs or wants to feel pleasure,” she explains. “They’re creating a facade that’s meant to impress, but that hides the genuine vulnerable human part of themselves.” Fehr says that people do this out of a fear of losing the one they love, but the behavior might inadvertently jeopardize your connection over the long term. “It’s important to be mindful of these impulses and to verbalize your needs and also fears,” she advises. “The more you know yourself and what you need going in, the more you can honor these and not fall into the traps.”
Everyone wants to be loved, so it’s natural to seek out signs of it in the person you care about most. If reciprocated feelings are something that’s important to you, the experts agree you may very well find them when you’re the closest — you just need to know what to look out for. And if you do want to show them a little extra love to see if they return it in kind, remember that it’s not necessarily all about being over-the-top under the covers.
