How do you know when a FSUW is in Love with you?

[Diplomacy]

OK

I got the "you can tell she is into you" down.  How about honest to goodness she loves you, and not just rolling the dice and hoping she will love you at one point?  Never really see that coming up on the forums.

[Vaughn]

First off, we might want to throw out a few examples of what is meant by "into you" - which
undoubtedly differs from "in love with you"...

 I recall the look (and obvious feeling) of pride on my wife-to-be's face as we strolled around
her city all dressed up and taking in the sights.

 Also very vivid was a phone call during which she was telling her Mama about me, and how
we would travel by car to Novgorod to meet her at the dacha. She underestimated my ability
to comprehend rapidly spoken Russian. At this point I was getting excellent grades.

 One evening I awoke to the sound of sloshing water. I arose from the sofa and peeked down
a hallway to see her on her knees, bent over the bathtub, washing my laundry by hand. In my
long memory I cannot recall a more humbling nor guilt-ridden moment. She thought I wouldn't
notice since I had been napping. 

 There are too many "into you" events to list here.... 

The "in love with you" moment lasted many hours on the Moscow-bound train as she
accompanied me to make my departure. We felt the time quickly dwindle, there were
so many things we wanted to discuss, so many new questions...."Are we simply infatuated?"
...."Where did all the time go?"...."How soon can you return to me?"....  It was difficult
for both of us to let go at the airport when they announced my flight. Personally, she
made me feel like the leading man in an epic whirlwind romance film. Without hesitation
I can say I still feel the same way seven years later - I cannot wait to arrive home from work.

 We were in love all right. But the M word never once came up. We would save that joy for
the second visit many months later. 

[GoodOlBoy]

OK

I got the "you can tell she is into you" down.  How about honest to goodness she loves you, and not just rolling the dice and hoping she will love you at one point?  Never really see that coming up on the forums.

When it comes to love, for me, it is the "little" things my wife does for me.

She will write little notes and put them in my pocket.

If I pack and go on a business trip, she puts a "personal" item of hers in my suitcase, so I don't forget her.

I will also find some kind of "food" item that she cooked for me packed in my suitcase.

Some Russian women believe that when you feed the man with your cooking, you feed his soul.

It may be true. 

Diplomacy I could write page after page....but IMHO the love of a Russian Woman is something really special that I cherish every day.


GOB

 

[ECOCKS]

There are so many ways, as the two posts above begin to show.

As for me, this was the highest priority on my list.  I dated her for several months and just enjoyed the progression towards total commitment.  Granted, that was easier in my situation because I decided to live here full-time.  Everyone has their own criteria and methods though.  Some are more superficial than others yet still seem so astonished when they learn the truth and come crashing down.

The customs are different, the viewpoints are different, yet in the end, they are still women and we are still men.  You can screen out the scammers, look for the evidence of integrity and so on, but for me, the biggest test was (and still is) very simple, conducted twice a day.

Just before I go to sleep at night, while struggling to keep my eyes open, I ask myself if I am truly happy or wish I was anywhere else with anyone else at that moment.  The answer for a couple of years now has been, "No."  I do the same when I wake up in the morning.  Acting on the results of that "test" I have taken appropriate action.

Your question was how do you know she is in love with you but your heart has to tell you that answer.  I rely on mine.  For better or worse.

Good luck to you.

[kievstar]

Look into their eyes and you will know. RW no different than AW. 

[Diplomacy]

Personally I find them to be actions speak louder than words.  There are AW that do this also.  Reading what everyone has written so far, I agree with everyone.  It is all the things that have been said.

You can easily fool someone by saying the right things, having sex with them, and doting over them.  For some that may even be all they are looking for on both sides.

There are things that make it different in love on both sides.  Vaughn and GOB bring up some great indicators of that.  Vaughn even did good at describing the progression for him.

Ed that is the true litmus test. 

[BC]

Ed that is the true litmus test. 

Yep.. this is one of those 'if you have to ask' questions...

[Misha]

I got the "you can tell she is into you" down.  How about honest to goodness she loves you, and not just rolling the dice and hoping she will love you at one point?  Never really see that coming up on the forums.

Your first fight. All couples fight at some point and I would say how couples fight and how they resolve issues will say the most about whether and how much a couple loves and respects each other.

[KenC]

OK

I got the "you can tell she is into you" down.  How about honest to goodness she loves you, and not just rolling the dice and hoping she will love you at one point?  Never really see that coming up on the forums.

.My answer is that you really won't know for sure until some time passes.  It is easy to do all the special things for your partner in the beginning of a relationship, but only the test of time will prove that it is love and not just infatuation. 

That is why the "speed engagements" are so dangerous.  Many guys cannot understand that the treatment they receive might just be "standard" RW behavior, and they misconstrue it as something more than it really is.  I also believe that many RW "hope" to fall into "true love" down the road but are not necessarily in it when they arrive here.  Not that they have larceny in their heart, they just have not fully developed a relationhip of strong love yet.  (How can it be real "love" in such a short period of time like some of the relationships here?)  I think the men meet a certain criteria for the women (he is good looking enough, he treats me well enough, the future is bright enough) and they decide to take a chance on developing love later.

Of course the "deception" works both ways too. The men going over to woo RW are also on their best behavior and may not be acting too terribly "normal" either.  The true test of being a "prince charming" will come much later after a tough day at work and the baby crying.
This is probably more than you wanted to know.
KenC

[Diplomacy]

I agree with mistaking cultural norms and actually having a woman who truly loves you

Ahh, the fights.  Yes, I admit I was not a good boy with that one.  I made a mountain out of a mole hill.  Had to know before I made the commitment.  Very happy with both sides, and a lot of learned.  To the point now, we can work through a lot via compromise. 

I prefer to not get into a fight to begin with, but not let things that are minor build up to a volcano eruption.  Which IMO is something to watch out for in FSU culture.  They internalize a lot, and then Bam!  I have had to work hard at that one myself, so maybe it is not just culture but the FSU people I associate with.

True also about the test of time, some people are just in love with being in love more than the person they are in love with.

This also gets into learning to compromise too.  Not loving someone how you define love as, but as they define being loved as.  One thing that I really like about FSU culture is that gifts can be openly discussed.

I myself would send flowers a lot.  She prefers Dark Chocolate.  So I tell her to treat herself to the good stuff, but get flowers on occasion.  She is not a morning person, and I am.  We were trying to work around each others schedules the hard way. 

I even struggle with the fact that there is some very different normals with love between a man and woman in FSU cultures.  There is a lot of time and patience needed in this area too.

[Tamara]

Every relationship is different as are the signs of love. Cooking and doing laundry are not necessarily the signs and not all FSUW do them. Try to look at your relationship as if you are not involved in it.  Is the woman ready to sacrifice for you? Did she ever go out of her way for you? Does she do anything she does not necessarily like that much, but knows that you enjoy it? I think going through hard times together really shows true love. While dating, it's all romance. But routine life and obstacles really prove if love is real.

[M_Diva]

If a man needs to ask his friends or a message board, the woman is NOT into him.

Or, he just does not know her well enough to even have any answer relevant.

We are not so mysterious, when in love, a woman has many voluntary and involuntary ways of communicating it to a partner. He is not ready for a real relationship if he is not able to communicate on such a level. After 6 months of daily contact, if you do not know, than she isn't into you much, or she is any you will never understand her. If meeting only occasionally, whatever your communications level, you two do not know each other well enough to guess with any reasonable level of accuracy. Wait until you know, it is not a race, you do not get a prize if you rush it ahead of nature.
Besides, the happiest you will ever be is in that highly romantic fantasy world located in time somewhere between meeting and marriage, well before the nasty part comes into play:reality and responsibility, and you have come back down from floating 6cm above the pavement.

Marina
St Petersburg

[ECOCKS]

"....

Besides, the happiest you will ever be is in that highly romantic fantasy world located in time somewhere between meeting and marriage, well before the nasty part comes into play:reality and responsibility, and you have come back down from floating 6cm above the pavement."

Maybe it's the word, besides but I serously hope that I misunderstand this passage.

"..the happiest you will ever be.."

How depressing.

Hopefully I am missing your context, if not I have to say this is a personal philosophy which perhaps not all share.

[Diplomacy]

Ed:

Her answer is actually a reason I asked the question.

The survey that said 75% of the FSUW did not love their Husband when they came to the country.

Clearly the majority of the men are marrying women not in love with them.  Not being loved back is the real danger.  Yet, the men would believe they do love them.

Then that made me think further.

Is love a different normal?  Is that culture influenced? character influenced?  Experience Influenced?  Communication influenced? Action Influenced? All personal or some some universal?

The heart is easily fooled sometimes, and there are a multitude of reasons one would look to marry a WM.

This post was topic of conversation, not my needing an answer to.  I am though concerned as to how we have such disparity of the men being in love and the women being in love.

The last thing I want to do is criticizing anyone being honest about their beliefs and reason for them.  I do though know one can pretend to be in love with you and love can be blind.

[Misha]

The survey that said 75% of the FSUW did not love their Husband when they came to the country.

Which survey is this?

Is love a different normal?  Is that culture influenced? character influenced?  Experience Influenced?  Communication influenced? Action Influenced? All personal or some some universal?

Well, when it comes to RW, my observation is that Russian ideals of love are not that different from Europeans and North Americans.

[ECOCKS]

The part I don't understand (I hope) is the comment that the happiest anyone will be is "..between meeting and marriage, well before the nasty part...reality and responsibility.." 

Call me a lovestruck fool but I would be in severe depression if I believed that all hopes of increasing my happiness absolutely ended with marriage.

I just cannot even think how to go on discussing/considering that as a fact, hypothetical or otherwise.

[Sculpto]

I could be wrong.. but what I think Marina means is it is the illusions that often accompany the process of falling in love are what often make us most happy.. the love in the eyes fool that can see nothing negative in their partner.. once day to day life sets in and the period of anticipation and dreaming stops things are different.  Contentment is another story... deep overall happines is different than the burning fire that can motivate someone to forgive almost any transgression, cross oceans and mountains to reach someone, and so on. 

[ECOCKS]

That is what I worried was meant.  She is certainly entitled to her own belief but I just find that to be extremely depressing.

[Sculpto]

That is what I worried was meant.  She is certainly entitled to her own belief but I just find that to be extremely depressing.

I dont see why that should be depressing EC.. I don't live for the excitement of the new relationship.. I live for the confort of the stable relationship...

[ECOCKS]

Happiness is happiness.

Her statement is that point is "the happiest you will ever be..."

I find that to be a depressing state of affairs if the happiest time of my life is behind me now.

I look forward to a few decades of increasing happiness with my wife, exciting places to see, grandchildren who are not yet conceived, my children's weddings, the pleasure of my wife's company every night before drifting off to sleep and so many more things I have not dreamed of yet.

[Misha]

Happiness is happiness.

Her statement is that point is "the happiest you will ever be..."

I find that to be a depressing state of affairs if the happiest time of my life is behind me now.

True, the chemical euphoria that is "falling in love" with fade, but I agree that there are other intense forms of happiness that equal or surpass this happiness: birth of a child for example.

[Blues Fairy]

between meeting and marriage, well before the nasty part comes into play: reality and responsibility

How is that the "nasty part"? If one's not averse to reality and responsibility, one can well draw enjoyment from there; otherwise such a person should not enter into a marriage at all.

[M_Diva]

Yes, early romantic love is a chemical process as much as an affair of the heart. During an early infatuation and even endorphine laced euphoria person of "being in love" has many of the external trademarks of drug addition or insanity, it is a time of delirious joy and focusing on all except reality. For the sake of the relationship and later children, luckily that phase is short lived. As couple drift from that early high to the day to day process of carving out a life a diffrent sort of love evolves(at least with the ones who allow it to mature, the ones who are addicted to the early phase usually split up thinking they are missing the high). Observer couples who are happy and content after 10 years, they are not "in love" as in the context of the original super or hyper attraction of first "falling in love", the relationship matures and broadens into love, respect, companionship and less passion. The other person can walk out of the room without the  other having terrible pangs of dispair as in the first stages of love-drug induced single-minded obsession with their new partner. That first phase is a life peak experience, it is not duplicated later. But the late stages of love are reported by those who study relationships to be the most satisfying and relaxed. It is easy to see, there is a dramatic change in the nature of love in successful pairings. There are some cultural influences but most studies find that the primary influences on the brain chemistry are genetic.  A successful long term relationship naturally goes through these stages.

This is why I am suspicious of partners who at first are too practical minded and not given to the passions of chemically altered states in the brain that occurs when someone is really into each other...at first. If I did not get heady with excitement over a guy just walking into my sight when we have developed a relationship, during the time that those passions and euphoria are naturally symptom, I would worry about the nature of that later stage of calm gentle love that an successful relationship matures into.

This one reason I am not particularly convinced that cross cultural relationships are such a good idea for many people, too many practical aspect arise too early. As you see, they almost drop off into the background noise statistically when both partners are of similar economic position and are most common when there is a great perceived mismatch. Some one is thinking much too seriously about gain through economic position, the woman for the prospect of gaining it and the man for using it as an attractant where otherwise his sparkling personality and wit were not enough if they were equals.
Here in St Petersburg, where the net worth of many young single women are equal or superior to the western men who seek them, there is much less interest in marriage agencies or specifically seeking a foreign man. The whole marriage industry has shifted away from Russia towards poorer less optimistic regions such as Ukraine and Belarus in direct proportion to the economic differnce. As someone said in a political campaign "Its the economy stupid". It really is, and I am not convinced that that is a good way to start a relationhip that has expectations for long term success.
Why not go yo France where the girls are just as slim and stylish as Ukrainian girls, and with as good an education? The man has not economic imbalance to exploit so he has to compete on even ground in France or even St Petersburg or Moscow. I dare say that as a whole young people of my age in larger cities in Russia have an economic advantage over similar age western people. We mostly own our homes free and clear, have no debt to speak of, have high educations and as much or more discretionary spending money. In the west, they are saddled with tremendous school debt for decades, and might not own a home clear for 30-40 years, and spend much more on monthly basic expenses. If a relationship starts with a couple with positions of balance, the relationship itself might be more rare but by all possible logic and reason, it would have odds in its favor for existing for the right reasons.

Does this make sense in the context of my original post that you were questioning?

Marina
Its 2:46 a.m., i should be out in a club of asleep right now...sleep it is...bye-bye

[Sculpto]

The "New Russian" speaks. 

She sounds a lot like my GF.

The only problem with her theory is... the heart wants what the heart wants.. and sometimes.. economics are not even a small part of what brings people together. 

[Misha]

This one reason I am not particularly convinced that cross cultural relationships are such a good idea for many people, too many practical aspect arise too early. As you see, they almost drop off into the background noise statistically when both partners are of similar economic position and are most common when there is a great perceived mismatch. Some one is thinking much too seriously about gain through economic position, the woman for the prospect of gaining it and the man for using it as an attractant where otherwise his sparkling personality and wit were not enough if they were equals.

Don't quite understand your point here. Are you saying that cross-cultural romantic love is impossible? That a RW cannot fall in love with a man who is not Russia?