Would you still love me if I was a worm?

An investigation

Heidi Klum, dressed as a worm for a 2022 Halloween party

I hadn’t paid attention to the whole “Would you still love me if I was a worm?” discussion until my wife showed me the video below.¹ It’s about a woman who asks her husband (they’re both in their late 20s, married for six months) if he would still love her if she were a plant. He says yes, adding that he would water her every day. She feels he’s not taking her seriously and says she wants a divorce.

The worm meme started in 2019 with this viral tweet.

Variants of the meme gained popularity on TikTok, featuring videos in which a woman asks her boyfriend if he would love her if she were a tank and a man asks his girlfriend if she would love him if he were a cockroach. These videos garnered millions of views and likes.

I know this will come up, so before going on, yes, I’m well aware that this is a joke—a comically needy question that puts the relationship partner in an awkward position.

And yet. Sparked by the plant story, it occurs to me that

1. Some people take it seriously and genuinely wonder if their partner would love them if they were a worm, a plant, a tank, or a cockroach.

2. For many, it’s a silly, dramatic, and annoying question, but still a coherent one—something a very insecure person might ask.

If so, then it reveals two interesting facts about how people think. The first is about personal identity; the second is about what we want from those we love.