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In the context of Lars von Trier’s Nymphomaniac, the question of whether Joe regains her ability to love is complex and ultimately met with a bleak, cynical conclusion. While she experiences a breakthrough in her ability to feel, the film suggests that she is fundamentally incompatible with the traditional concept of love.
Here are the specific details regarding her journey:
Throughout Volume II, Joe’s primary struggle is her "numbness"—both physical and emotional. She loses the ability to reach orgasm and, by extension, feels a profound disconnection from humanity. She views herself as a "bad human being" because she cannot feel the love she is "supposed" to feel for her child or a partner.
Jerôme is the only man Joe ever claims to have loved. However, her love for him is synonymous with her pain. In the middle of the story, she loses her ability to feel sensation specifically when she is with him.
Near the end of her story, Joe tracks Jerôme down. In a pivotal scene, she finally experiences a physical and emotional "reawakening." When she sees him again, she realizes he is the source of her "soul’s" desire. However, this is immediately soured: she discovers that Jerôme has moved on and is in a relationship with P (the young girl Joe had taken under her wing). Joe’s "ability to love" is rekindled only at the moment it is irrevocably lost to her through betrayal and jealousy.
Joe tells Seligman about a specific, lonely tree she found on a hillside—a tree that grew differently from the others because it was exposed to the elements. She identifies with this tree. This realization is her "regaining" a sense of self-love or self-acceptance. She stops trying to fit into the societal mold of a "loving mother" or a "normal woman" and accepts her nature as a "nymphomaniac" and a solitary creature. In von Trier's worldview, this self-actualization is Joe's version of love, even if it looks like coldness to others.
The framework of the movie is Joe seeking a connection with Seligman through the telling of her story. For much of the film, it seems she has found a platonic, intellectual love—a bond based on understanding rather than sex. This is the closest Joe comes to a "pure" form of love in the entire narrative. She trusts him, and through his empathy and his "digressions" (comparing her life to fishing or mathematics), she feels validated for the first time.
The ending of Volume II provides the definitive answer to whether she can exist in a world of love. After Joe finishes her story and falls asleep, feeling at peace and "cured" of her self-loathing, Seligman—the man who claimed to be asexual and who provided her with the only safe space she ever knew—enters her room and attempts to rape her.
Joe wakes up and shoots him. This ending suggests that:
Summary: Joe regains the ability to feel sensation and a sense of self-acceptance, but she does not regain the ability to love in a way that allows her to function in society. The film concludes that for someone like Joe, the "ability to love" is a trap that leads to further trauma.
The summary omits the crucial plot point that Joe tries to shoot Jerôme but fails because she forgets to rack the gun. This directly parallels the ending where she successfully racks the gun and shoots Seligman, symbolizing her change/hardening.
The summary fails to mention that Joe's physical sensation actually returns during her abusive sessions with K, which is critical to understanding that her 'feeling' is linked to pain, not the romantic 'reawakening' with Jerôme implied by the text.
In Nymphomaniac, Joe does not regain the ability to love in a traditional or functional sense. While she regains physical sensation (the ability to climax) through sadomasochistic pain with K, her attempt to reconnect with Jerôme ends in betrayal and violence. She ultimately finds a form of self-acceptance (symbolized by the gnarled Soul Tree) as a solitary being. The film ends bleakly: after she trusts Seligman as a platonic friend, he attempts to rape her, and she shoots him, confirming her worldview that she cannot exist safely in the world of men or love.