Love is said to be earth’s most powerful emotion. There are infinite poems, myths, stories, and realities about love. A person loses himself for the sake of love, love makes us vulnerable, Love makes us the happiest, people die for love, and people live for love, don't they? I know, loving and being loved is a blessing.
In this century, where every 3rd person is depressed, they develop anxiety, suffer through things that we cannot even imagine because of love.
When you love someone and that person loves you in return you’re uniquely vulnerable. They have a power to hurt you that’s like nothing else.
-Elijah Michelson
What is this love? How come it is so powerful?
We all agree Love is an emotion we may not express in words but we can understand it chemically.
Love Hormones:
The hormones and neurotransmitter which we are going to read about has many functions but we are going to focus on only LOVE factors.
So here are some hormones which are likely to be produced when a person is said to be in love.
Chemicals which are released in the process of Love:
Testosterone and estrogen:
These both are known as sex hormones. In male testosterone and In female estrogen is high. Research says that falling in love reduces a male testosterone levels, and increases a female's testosterone levels. This results in the changes of the female body as the development of secondary characteristics.
Dopamine:
This hormone is responsible for the feelings you may get in theory: pleasure, satisfaction, and excitement. It plays a very important part with motivation. Dopamine in the process of love, experiences pleasure and pain.
Norepinephrine:
This neurotransmitter is responsible for flight and fight response. When a person is in love they must feel heart racing, or when a person gets a reply from their crush they start sweating, excited. So all these feelings come from releasing norepinephrine.
Serotonin:
This hormone is known as mood stabilizer. Serotonin is a feel good chemical…In easy words if you are feeling depressed then the serotonin in your body helps you to be happy. Serotonin is also responsible for keeping your memories safe.
Oxytocin:
Oxytocin is said to be THE LOVE DRUG. Well it is released during sexual activity. When two adults are having orgasm it is released by both sexes i.e. male and female. The bond gets deeper and trust becomes almost unbreakable with the release of oxytocin.
Vasopressin:
This is the secret behind long term relationships. Vasopressin is also a sex hormone in addition it is more responsible to maintain the bond between two people. Stimulates trust, empathy, bonding between a couple in long terms. [1]
Pheromones:
Pheromones are similar to hormones but work outside of the body. Animals used to sense their mates with the help of pheromones. Humans get help from this to find an appropriate mate. In simple words, if you come across someone you might feel a little attracted to them by their smell. They are nothing but pheromones which are odorless chemicals detected by your nose.
Understand this with an example,
You meet a person and he’s good looking, caring and is understanding, like there’s nothing wrong with him yet somehow you don’t feel attracted to him..it is because your body didn’t choose that person.
What exactly happens in your brain when you start to develop feelings for someone?
Love is associated with the endocrine system which deals with hormones and their functions. Love starts with attraction till it becomes obsession. Let us understand how this obsession takes place .
Hypothalamus releases dopamine (Excitement increases): Dopamine level increases due to which serotonin level decreases.
Since serotonin deals with moods, the lower level of serotonin may lead people with obsessive compulsive disorder, this is the reason why you get so much obsess with a person and develop feelings for the same.
Along with dopamine, the body produces nerve growth factors. (Responsible for intensity of romantic feelings)
Further Oxytocin and vasopressin are relead. With these two hormones the trust, companionship and bond gets deeper and stronger. (This is the step where the couple is already thinking about long term relationship)
These hormones affect the different parts of the brain which have many responses.
With these steps we can say that a person is finally in love.
(1) Activity increases in the romantic core of the brain
(2) The amygdala( a part of brain which controls the emotions of fear and aggression) deactivates
(3) This makes the person’s standard of judging others blurry
(4) The person feels secure, less feared and less stressed. The person is ready to give commitment and looking forward to sticking with one person.
What are the situations that the love makes us experience?
So this was all about falling Love. Sometimes love isn’t full of romance and dreamy life, it gives us pain too. We face so many obstacles for loving. So let us see how the brain reacts to different situations associated with love.
The situation where you are top of the world and you think you are the luckiest person to be with your partner.
"The best love is the kind that awakens the soul; that makes us reach for more; that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds."
-The Notebook
People who are so much happy and romanticize their love have following activities
The A-10 cells present in the base of the brain in the ventral tegmental area.
It produces dopamine and spray it to other regions of the brain. Mostly in the reptilian core of the brain. This core is associated with wanting, focus, motivation and cravings. This results in obsession over your partner and you may lose yourself by obsessing over them.
For example Often this happens, you look out for their likings, surprises them. It’s nice that you show so much affection towards your partner but with thinking about them constantly you somewhere stop thinking about yourself too.
You most of the time obsess about only one person. You crave for your partner’s presence all the time. This phase is beautiful and research has shown people are so much happy in romantic love.
This addiction may get horrible as well. You crave so much that if your partner isn’t around you may get anxious, sad, lonely.
The situation where you are so much in love with your partner and he/ she dumps you.
This is the most painful thing one could ever suffer from. A person who feels the same as mentioned in the above situation but then when he/she gets dumped by their partners...
The core of nucleus accumbent becomes active which deals with the rewards.
The person suffers from overthinking by calculating where they went wrong, what could have they done more?
They basically think about gains and huge losses.
But they should remember to..
Stop questioning your worth because if
“You can love the wrong person so much, imagine how much you can love the right one? “
It is the beginning of you wanting, choosing and working for yourself.
The situation where you try to impress your crush or we can say one sided love.
"We accept the love we think we deserve"
-The perks of being a wallflower.
Fear of Rejection either makes a person unstoppable by giving them enough motivation or makes them question their abilities.
This is the deepest and most painful form of love.
It is a mixture of romantic love which leads to deep attachment since it is one sided.
You keep thinking about your crush, you seek ways to impress them, you imagine scenarios with them which makes the desire ,attachments deeper that you try everything to win them.
So the brain experiences Romantic passionate love activities with intense motivation, intense energy, and a willingness to risk everything to win them.
The situation where you’re in long term relationships.
“ I’ll always love you when you’re no longer young, beautiful or alive”
- Will, Shakespeare in love
We often wonder if love lasts for many years. Yes, love does last for many years otherwise marriages wouldn’t work out.
The researchers study a person who’s newly fallen in love has the same activities like romantic love, they tested it after 25 years and the person still shows the same activities for their partners.
We all can say love is eternal
For the people who haven't fallen in love even once...Its okay , your chance to fall madly in love with someone will some soon..
Well, till then get to know that the brain reacts the same when you drink alcohol to as you are in love and That’s why they say love is a drug
Perks of Being in LOVE:
After falling for someone: The adrenaline forces oxytocin to create a blend of oxygen and nutrients this rush will make your face capillaries dilated which gives your skin a different glow
Love causes speech problems: No wonder you get your tongue slipping in front of your crush. The norepinephrine triggers your nervous system once it is released. So when your crush enters, you feel excited and anxious
Butterflies in stomach: Well when you are excited the cortisol steroid in the body gets released which causes sensation. These are nothing but butterflies
Love eases pain: When you get injured the brain area Which makes you feel safe and secure. When you are with your partner the brain doesn’t receive the pain sensation as usual.
Love Makes you live longer: When you are happy in love, your hormones get balanced resulting in a healthy life.
Love improves your mental well being: Having someone worth keeping our secrets, supporting us keeps our burden a little low. It’s always a good thing sharing a road towards your destination with someone. Also dopamine and serotonin plays here.
Love gives us reason to live for: As I’ve mentioned above, dopamine stimulates the motivation, that’s how we feel optimistic towards our work, career or anything that will keep your partner with you
Boost your confidence: When someone loves you, you start loving yourself more, pampering yourself more and that’s how you gain your confidence
Random Facts about love:
World's longest marriage lasted for 86 years!! [3]
Love at first sight really happens [3]
The butterflies will go away eventually and that’s okay [3]
We can sense and are attracted to a person with a different immune system by Claude Wedekind of the University of Switzerland. [3]
Romantic love and the love between a mother and child share a similar chemical connection. [3]
It only takes up to 4 minutes to decide whether you like someone or not [4]
When Two Lovers Look into Each Others’ Eyes, Their Heart Rates Synchronize [4]
Looking at a photograph of your loved ones, can relieves the pain [4]
Your pupil dilates if you see, think about your lover [4]
The word 'Love' is from the Sanskrit word lubhyati, meaning desire. [5]
Venus is the Roman goddess of love, and the equivalent of Aphrodite.
Red roses are the symbol of love [5]
Doves mate for life so they are used as the ideal in most of the weddings.[5]
People with LIBRA are said to be the most romantic people when in love.
Love is within us. No matter how many hormones your body produces, every person is worthy of being loved, and every person is capable of loving. Don’t ever doubt yourself when it comes to love.
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Beautiful content 👏. After reading this I got to know more about Love. This is really good study work. I hope many more people will go through this work and it will help them in some or the other way. Please keep writing such things. Looking forward to more of such amazing stuff!!!💐