Love Is Pain: Why You Have To Be A Little Bit Of A Masochist To Date

“I’d bleed for you” is the ideal way to describe the bargaining process of a new relationship. You’re trading your health, your sanity and your blood for a chance at true love.

Most, however, lose their sanity before they ever get close. The odds are in favor of the dealer, yet most play until they’re bleeding out on the curb.

Like gamblers, there’s a certain breed of people who play the dating game. They are those with traits of “self-defeating personality disorder,” or “masochistic personality disorder.”

It makes sense -- you have to be somewhat self-destructive to enter into such a high-risk game.

According to Nancy Mcwilliams in Psychiatric Times, a core symptom of the disorder includes suffering within a relationship rather than being alone -- to choose pain over solitude.

To willingly walk through fire.

They are those who risk their happiness on someone else. Those who enter relationships knowing full well they will most likely leave it crying and hurt.

They do it for the pain and the suffering.

They do it to feel something -- particularly, pain. They will leave relationships that are good for them and chase the ones that will kill them.

If you believe you're not a masochist for entering the dating game, then you're ignoring the symptoms.

According to Psych Net, symptoms of self-defeating personality disorder include a list of familiar patterns every tenacious new single guy or gal exemplifies upon finding a relationship.

You choose people and situations that lead to disappointment, failure or mistreatment

This is when you go after the bad boy while the nice guy, who has made it clear he’s willing to love and care for you, is standing right next to him.

This is when you go for your ex in the relationship that should have ended years ago. This is when you give up your healthy relationship for a one-time fling that gives you herpes.

You reject or render ineffective the attempts of others to help you

This is the classic case of misplaced adoration. It's when you reject the only person who is taking care of you. When you fall for the sweet talkers and the conniving instead of the wholesome and honest.

It's when you can't see a good thing that's in front of you because you're too busy looking at some idealistic dream scenario that will leave you as thirsty and disoriented as any mirage.

You follow positive personal events by responding with depression, guilt or a behavior that produces pain

You don't know when you've gotten what you've always wanted. You have a hard time accepting when you're actually happy and have found the perfect person for you.

Instead, you refuse to see it and usually take it for granted, unconsciously pushing that perfect person away.

You incite angry or rejecting responses from others and then feel hurt, defeated or humiliated

You knowingly hurt those around you, and then expect them to forgive you. You poke and prod and push away the date you tried so hard to get, and then you scorn yourself for sabotaging yet another chance at a real relationship.

You are hateful toward the ones you love and botch every opportunity at another chance. You run out the people who love you, and then look for them in every other relationship you chase to avoid being alone.

You reject opportunities for pleasure

All those positive opportunities, the ones you should be taking with the people who actually love you, are rejected and scorned. You hate those who love you too much because you can't stand the idea of being praised.

You want to feel rejected and battered and worthless. You go for those who make you chase them, instead of the ones who have been chasing you.

You fail to accomplish tasks crucial to your personal objectives despite a demonstrated ability to do so

This is when you only try and have relationships with those who have baggage. You purposefully choose people with problems and, in turn, avoid your own.

You become obsessed with fixing them, making it work and making excuses for them. You choose the crazy ones and the impossible ones, the ones who will never work out because they're as damaged as you are.

You engage in excessive self-sacrifice that is unsolicited by the intended recipients of the sacrifice

You do things they didn't ask you to do. You become obsessive, self-sacrificial or unnecessarily devoted.

You hurt yourself for them, yet they aren't ready to even notice you. You cry over them, obsess over them and make your life revolve around them before they're even ready to admit you’re part of theirs.

You like to hurt yourself for people who aren't worth the pain and drive yourself mad over people who will never be mad about you.