diff --git a/event.go b/event.go
index 1258038..ba48eba 100644
--- a/event.go
+++ b/event.go
@@ -37,15 +37,19 @@ func NewEventStreamReader(eventStream io.Reader, maxBufferSize int) *EventStream
 	initBufferSize := minPosInt(4096, maxBufferSize)
 	scanner.Buffer(make([]byte, initBufferSize), maxBufferSize)
 
+	// this ensures we don't keep checking data we've already scanned within one Split
+	newDataIndex := 0
 	split := func(data []byte, atEOF bool) (int, []byte, error) {
 		if atEOF && len(data) == 0 {
 			return 0, nil, nil
 		}
 
 		// We have a full event payload to parse.
-		if i, nlen := containsDoubleNewline(data); i >= 0 {
+		if i, nlen := containsDoubleNewline(data, newDataIndex); i >= 0 {
+			newDataIndex = 0 // reset for next token
 			return i + nlen, data[0:i], nil
 		}
+		newDataIndex = len(data) // we've already scanned the entire data up to this point
 		// If we're at EOF, we have all of the data.
 		if atEOF {
 			return len(data), data, nil
@@ -64,16 +68,38 @@ func NewEventStreamReader(eventStream io.Reader, maxBufferSize int) *EventStream
 // Returns a tuple containing the index of a double newline, and the number of bytes
 // represented by that sequence. If no double newline is present, the first value
 // will be negative.
-func containsDoubleNewline(data []byte) (int, int) {
+func containsDoubleNewline(data []byte, newDataIndex int) (int, int) {
+	// Look back of the length of the longest search string to start from the end of the data that
+	// we looked at already minus the smallest length that could contain the search string from
+	// backtracking. this prevents n^2 lookups if data repeatedly does not contain the search
+	// string and slowly grows, especially to a large size.
+	lookBackStart := max(0, newDataIndex-3) // len(cr lf cr lf) - 1
+	lookBack := data[lookBackStart:]
+
 	// Search for each potentially valid sequence of newline characters
-	crcr := bytes.Index(data, []byte("\r\r"))
-	lflf := bytes.Index(data, []byte("\n\n"))
-	crlflf := bytes.Index(data, []byte("\r\n\n"))
-	lfcrlf := bytes.Index(data, []byte("\n\r\n"))
-	crlfcrlf := bytes.Index(data, []byte("\r\n\r\n"))
+	crcr := bytes.Index(lookBack, []byte("\r\r"))
+	if crcr >= 0 {
+		crcr += lookBackStart
+	}
+	lflf := bytes.Index(lookBack, []byte("\n\n"))
+	if lflf >= 0 {
+		lflf += lookBackStart
+	}
+	crlflf := bytes.Index(lookBack, []byte("\r\n\n"))
+	if crlflf >= 0 {
+		crlflf += lookBackStart
+	}
+	lfcrlf := bytes.Index(lookBack, []byte("\n\r\n"))
+	if lfcrlf >= 0 {
+		lfcrlf += lookBackStart
+	}
+	crlfcrlf := bytes.Index(lookBack, []byte("\r\n\r\n"))
+	if crlfcrlf >= 0 {
+		crlfcrlf += lookBackStart
+	}
 	// Find the earliest position of a double newline combination
 	minPos := minPosInt(crcr, minPosInt(lflf, minPosInt(crlflf, minPosInt(lfcrlf, crlfcrlf))))
-	// Detemine the length of the sequence
+	// Determine the length of the sequence
 	nlen := 2
 	if minPos == crlfcrlf {
 		nlen = 4
@@ -98,6 +124,15 @@ func minPosInt(a, b int) int {
 	return a
 }
 
+// max returns the max integer between the two inputs
+// TODO remove when min supported go version is 1.21, as max is now a built in function
+func max(a, b int) int {
+	if a > b {
+		return a
+	}
+	return b
+}
+
 // ReadEvent scans the EventStream for events.
 func (e *EventStreamReader) ReadEvent() ([]byte, error) {
 	if e.scanner.Scan() {