"All's fair in love and war" or so the old saying goes, meaning sometimes things aren't very fair at all. And sometimes, they aren't equal either.

I've often thought that in relationships, one tends to love more than the other, tends to work harder at keeping the relationship alive and growing (or just functioning!), or as John Banville describes in his beautifully written "The Sea":

"I had that sense of anxious euphoria, of happy, helpless toppling, which the one who knows he will have to do the loving always feels, at the precipitous outset. For even at such a tender age, I knew that there is always a lover and a loved, and I knew which one, in this case, I would be."

But what does that mean, I've had to ask myself. Is it that one gives more, does more? If so, does the person do it because he/she genuinely wants to, or is it out of neediness — or some other dysfunction — or a desire to get something back?

There have been a few relationships in which I have viewed myself as the lover — happily. I wanted to do everything, be everything, create the happiness. It made me happy, too. So I was devastated when — after "all that I did" — I was betrayed. When I look back at it now, I realize, well, that was not a healthy love. Another time, my naive romantic love bubble burst, and I fell out of love. That wasn't too healthy, either.

And, who knows — perhaps the men whom I considered the "loved" considered themselves the lovers! After all, we view our relationships through our own filters.

Perhaps the roles of lover and loved change over time in a relationship, and some sort of equilibrium eventually occurs. Or maybe it's better not to even think in those terms at all — just love as purely and completely as you can and be able to express to your partner how you want to be loved in return.

Is there always a lover and loved?
Which do you most identify with?