She loves me ... she loves me not
by Tara Bordeaux, reporter

    Recognizing true love is extremely difficult, a counselor told NE Campus students last week.

    Anita Peters instructed student on how to discover the signs of real love.

    The initial feelings one has when a relationship begins—a racing heart, sweaty palms and nervousness—are not always love, Peters said.

    “At first, love seems like a magic land where all is right,” she said.

    Such fantasy causes many people to overlook the signs of an unhealthy relationship.

    Peters, who has been married for 31 years, is also a relationship counselor.

    Using a model she designed herself, Peters showed the audience how relationship abuse occurs in a repetitious cycle.

    When a relationship begins, it can become so exciting at first that it almost seems “too good to be true,” she said.

    Many people give off a false image of themselves, causing their partners to overlook many of the bad qualities they possess, which can lead to an abusive relationship, whether emotional or physical.
As an example, Peters used several gift-wrapped packages to demonstrate how easy it is to misinterpret love.

    Peters chose a male and female from the audience and asked them to look over each package carefully and choose one they would like to open.

    Both students chose different packages, which yielded different results.

    The male student chose the largest, most appealing gift on the table, and the female chose the smallest gift that was wrapped in newspaper comic.

    The large box was completely empty inside, in contrast to the small box, which contained a silver ring.

    Once the gifts were opened, Peters discussed the meaning behind each of the gifts.

    “Never, ever mistake wrapping and bows for what’s really inside,” she said.

    Just as with the packages, a person can seem “charming and larger than life” in the beginning, but that does not mean that one will find real love inside, Peters said.

    “Love is more than just a heart decision, it’s a head decision as well,” she said.

    In order to help members of the audience understand how to find out if a relationship is real love or not, Peters went over a two-page questionnaire that asked students to answer yes or no to several relationship questions.

    After answering students’ questions, Peters gave everyone handouts to take with them with definitions of love by a few famous people.

    As the session concluded, Peters informed the students that she was in the process of writing a book about some of the subject matter she discussed in her presentation.

    To find out about upcoming workshops, contact the NE Campus counseling center.