Hypersensitive and hyperamorous: emotions power 10

Go from incredible giggles to deep sadness in the space of a day.

This is the emotional whirlwind that inhabits hypersensitive people on a daily basis.

In friendship as in love, this particular character trait prompts one to take everything to heart.

A smile, a party canceled at the last minute, a raised eyebrow.

And these roller coasters are all the more difficult to manage when looking for the chosen one or when you share your life with.

How can we love serenely when all our feelings are heightened?

In his book

(1), the psychiatrist Stéphane Clerget gives hope to all the ultra-emotional.

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Madame Figaro.fr

.- Why did you choose to devote a book to

Stéphane Clerget.-

I receive a lot of patients who appear to me to be hypersensitive.

They feel emotions with greater intensity than average.

For some, this is often associated with hypersensitivity to smells, tastes or music.

They can get carried away by a melody or really get irritated by a noise.

To this is sometimes added an intellectual hypersensitivity, in other words the ability to be invaded by thoughts, to ruminate a lot.

And all these specificities have an impact on their life, especially in their emotional relationships.

Do hypersensitive people necessarily perceive love with a capital A?

Their emotions are heightened to the power of 10. So when there is desire for the other, the physical and sexual attraction is experienced with this very strong intensity.

But this does not necessarily translate into hyper romanticism.

It all depends on the personality of the hypersensitive originally.

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You say that they are people very attached to the observation of others, to sensory stimuli. Are they more demanding in their search for the loved one?

This is what they claim, but the reality is quite different. Thanks to their empathy, they quickly evaluate the other and perceive the faults more. If the other does not meet their expectations, they will quickly back down. It is not a requirement but a reluctance, a fear of suffering. Some people experience the first snags at the start of a relationship with such intensity, such pain, that they let go early and come to be wary of love, even sometimes to give it up altogether.

Love can be complicated for everyone because two different psychologies clash. How to explain that hypersensitivity can add a layer?

In a relationship, the main problem is to know if you are in love or not, to distinguish between all the plural and intense feelings that you have for the other. The hypersensitive swim even more in this vagueness. They also do not have a shell and are therefore more vulnerable, dependent on the gaze of the other.

During a meeting, should you tell your new partner that you are hypersensitive?

At first, it is better to approach the subject in a general way by describing the portrait of a hypersensitive.

On hearing it, the partner will associate it with a person around him.

It remains to be seen whether the latter left him with a positive or negative feeling.

If the relationship becomes more serious later, we can tell the partner that we have this trait, assure them that we remain a completely normal person but simply with a stronger receptivity to emotions.

The empathy of a hypersensitive makes him an ideal target for the psychic vampire 

What are the reasons hypersensitive people may encounter more romantic failures?

Jealousy is one of the main factors in romantic failure, as in many couples. In the hypersensitive, it is linked to his lack of self-confidence and his emotional dependence on others. He fears being left. This fear could have arisen in childhood with the feeling of being abandoned by absent parents, the departure of an older sister or a separation from the nanny. Where others have experienced it as temporary suffering, some children may experience it as a real trauma. In adulthood, this sensitivity occupies so much of the ground that it is difficult to reason in our relationships with others. We are more sensitive to criticism from our partner, we misinterpret, we overreact to the point of breaking.

You say that they can also be the target of predators.

It is said that love is blind but it is doubly so in the hypersensitive.

A manipulative person, who takes pleasure in making others suffer, can trap them by playing on their emotional dependence, by pressing on their guilt to thus maintain a bond of control.

The empathy of a hypersensitive also makes them an ideal target for the psychic vampire who takes without ever giving back.

When he feels the suffering, the lack, he is ready to do anything to help them, all this to continue to be loved.

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Few tourists dare to face the frost of Russian winter and that's good.

The Hermitage rooms are almost empty.

After a salute to the Psyche sculpture

(of which the Louvre has the original), we walk through the former State General, the extension of the Hermitage inaugurated at the end of 2014.

Photo Bérénice Debras

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

We escape the city to taste the life of the Palace of Tsarskoye Selo (Pushkin).

Here again, the places seem magical.

Photo Bérénice Debras

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Without a tourist around, or so few, one feels like distinguished guests in the row of luxurious rooms - including the reconstructed amber room.

Photo Bérénice Debras

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

How one would like to take a seat at one of Catherine II's tables!

For fear of making a mistake in the label, we will opt for slides on the ice rink in the garden.

Photo Bérénice Debras

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

The Repa

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Golitsyn Loft

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

Saint Petersburg, the winter destination for lovers

See the slideshow

27 photos

Is the violence of the rupture also double in the hypersensitive?

More than that, it is triple or even quadruple. This can be expressed by crying but also outbursts of anger, verbal violence. He invests so much in the other that when the latter leaves, it looks like an amputation, as if a part of him is cut. And unlike the others, this suffering never completely disappears. It's a wound that bleeds all the time. I have patients who talk about their breakup twenty years later with tears in their eyes as if it was yesterday. Many remain stuck in the early stages of relationship mourning: denial, sadness or, more rarely, anger. Of course, time and other love affairs come to put an additional plaster, but the wound is still there. To come to the end of this heartache,it is necessary to work on oneself and to be accompanied.

When the other leaves it's a wound that bleeds all the time

How to behave well with a hypersensitive lover?

The big secret is communication. You have to be attentive to the other and leave no room for misunderstanding. People with hypersensitivity are often emotional overwhelming and have a hard time saying things clearly. In this type of configuration, each partner must verbalize as much as possible, say what we feel and question the other about his feelings. It's like a sexual relationship: we always make sure of the other's consent, we explain where we are going. And to avoid hurting the other, when we make a joke for example, we specify: "I'm kidding, it was a joke". We can also invite the hypersensitive to take a step back and write once he is more comfortable with the partner via SMS or e-mail his feelings. In the end, it comes down to always respecting the other, as if it was the first week that we saw each other.

This exacerbation of emotions can also positively impact the relationship.

What do we have to learn from hypersensitive people?

It is not a superhuman effort to live with a hypersensitive.

When he is happy, he is 10 times more enthusiastic and above all he is more receptive to what life offers him.

Today an incalculable number of people do not manage to feel pleasure because they restrain their emotions too much.

We have to take the risk of experiencing things with more emotion, this is what makes us feel alive and transforms our daily life into a great adventure.

(1) Stéphane Clerget is the author of

, Éd.

La Musardine, 16 euros.

* Originally published in February 2021, this article has been updated.

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