Is Relationship Hopping Unhealthy? A Deeper Look At Serial Monogamy

Multiracial couple watching television together at home on the couch involved in serial monogamy

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If you’re prone to serial monogamy, then you’ve probably heard these pieces of wisdom before: “You have to love yourself before you can love someone else” and “You have to be happy alone before you can be happy in a relationship.” And, they weren’t entirely speculation. If you believe that a relationship makes a person happy, you could be missing critical information.

Research published in the American Psychological Association looked deeper at the happiness levels of married individuals. They found that people who are happiest in their marriages also tended to be happy before ever getting married. These same individuals even managed to return to pre-marriage happiness levels after becoming widows or widowers. Translation: relationships don’t make miserable people happy, but they can make already happy individuals happier.

This is important information for serial monogamists who’ve spent their lives running from the single life, for fear that it’s wrought with misery. The reality is, if you never learned how to be happy outside of a relationship, then there’s a good chance you carry that misery with you even into relationships. Still, relationship hopping is common.

People leave a relationship and walk directly into another one every day. Is it always a bad thing? Not necessarily. Sometimes, a person truly does meet the love of their life…when they happen to be dating somebody else. But then there are others who think everyone and anyone could be the love of their life – it’s a lens that prevents them from being single. If you are a serial monogamist, here are some things to consider to help you decide if your love of love is healthy.

How Do You Handle Being Alone?

African american woman sitting on the sofa at home hugging pillow depressed and worry for distress, crying angry and afraid. sad expression.

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How do you feel about spending time alone, in general? This question isn’t about your relationship status. It’s about how you feel about spending a day by yourself, taking a weekend trip alone, or even just going to the movies alone. The idea of alone time shouldn’t be frightening. In fact, alone time is great for you. Research reported on in Forbes shows that people who take regular alone time have better mental strength and more empathy. However, if the idea of spending a few hours alone strikes panic throughout your body, then the idea of being single is probably also frightening. And that could mean that fear of being single – rather than actual compatibility with someone – drives you to relationship hop.

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Do You Feel Valuable?

Young african american woman sitting on bed with serious expression at bedroom

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Answering this question can be difficult. It can require extensive meditation and self-reflection. However, most people, if they’re honest with themselves, have a sense for which direction they lean in. You probably know, right now, if you predominantly feel you offer a lot of value to the world, or if you predominantly feel that you do not.

PsychCentral and TherapyReviews report that serial monogamists tend to struggle with low self-esteem and/or haven’t mastered self-love. When those conditions are true, sometimes the only way a person can feel of value is by being of service to or connected to someone else – like in a relationship. And that can lead to relationship hopping.

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Do You Feel Responsible For Your Emotions?

Husband cuddling tired wife on living room sofa

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Do you have tools and a non-romantic support group to help you through difficult times? When you hit rough patches in life, do you feel confidently, “I will get myself through this?” Or, do you feel safest when you have a romantic partner to lean on in these times? Relationships should be supportive and can help us through tough times, but they shouldn’t be crutches. If you feel confident you could get through difficult times as a single person, that’s healthy. If the idea of a rough patch while single is horrifying, you could be seeing relationships as emotional crutches. And that can lead to serial monogamy.

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Do You Disappear Into Your Relationships?

In love, carefree and young black couple hugging while enjoying the view of a beach at sunset. Lovers holding and being affectionate while bonding and spending time together on a seaside getaway

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PsychCentral also reports that serial monogamy and codependency habits tend to go hand in hand. So while regularly being in committed relationships doesn’t have to be a sign of a problem, it might be if those relationships are codependent. If your friends and family remark that you tend to “disappear” in your relationships – meaning you become unavailable to others – codependency might be at play. And if you do struggle with codependency, it’s possible the fear of being alone rather than compatibility drive your decision to be in a relationship.

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