Are you addicted to falling in love? This can negatively affect your life.
Brain chemistry is strongly related to our emotions, and addiction to emotions is also common in most people; among the hormones released by our brains when we fall in love, adrenaline, which is responsible for the butterflies in our stomachs and excitement, can trigger this need. always having someone to minimally obsess over. If you don’t know someone like that, maybe you are that person.
But did you know that? there are several disadvantages such behavior. We spoke with a clinical psychologist, neuropsychologist and relationship specialist trained in cognitive therapy. Ana Paula Torresto destroy the minds of those addicted to falling in love.
How is the emotional life of a person in love?
According to the expert, a person living in these circumstances usually puts the other as the protagonist in his life, because it is through the second man that he gives himself the pleasure he seeks. “The focus of this person’s life is not on him, and it can even turn him into an obsession,” he explains. “The individual part of that person as an individual appears neglected, always in the background,” he adds.
Why is solitude not an option?
Spending some time in complete solitude is necessary for self-knowledge. Even in relationships, it’s important to cherish individuality and personal experiences. However, someone who doesn’t know how to be alone is often associated with an addiction to passion, which can be explained neurologically by involving brain chemistry.
“The need to fall in love is driven by adrenaline, and that feeling creates these reactions. This makes that person feel more alive, willing and excited.“, account.
However, this feeling is short-lived. Therefore, when the passion ends, the person who is addicted to this feeling tends to take actions that will make him feel the feeling again. “Even if he ends the relationship, he will need to feel in love again, so he will look for a new relationship that can make him feel the ecstasy of the original state of the relationship,” explains Ana Paula.
addiction is repetition
First of all, the neuropsychologist states that this is not the final state of the patient, but a consequence of certain circumstances experienced by the given person, which were reflected in his relationships. That is, like all addictions, this behavior can come from childhood, upbringing, or replaying your past relationships.
Understanding the love that this individual has created in his ecosystem of connections can determine how he may be treated in early adulthood. “It can be said that this attitude is the result of the environment of its creation and the dynamics of relations formed in that place,” he says.
According to the specialist, their first relationship can in turn establish a cycle of repetitions, because there is a constant search for what is familiar to that person, or there is a need to fill gaps or heal injuries.
“This behavior can be unconsciously perpetuated even as a method of dealing with certain issues,” Torres defends.
The moment it becomes harmful
According to the neuropsychologist, the tendency is that dissatisfaction is established in this relationship dynamic when the hormones of passion dissipate. So it’s normal that you keep jumping from one relationship to another.
“As long as the individual does not identify these circumstances, which they experience as a potential problem and as limiting their emotional life, they will continue to perpetuate the cycle,” she says.
In this case, the person may always be looking for the kind of love that they did not receive in childhood or have an extreme fear of rejection and abandonment, which ends in self-sabotage.
Because it’s not a healthy practice, Ana Paula agrees that it’s a behavior that can be changed. “The first step is to realize that the way you relate to this person is harmful to your life, and after this realization comes the stage of self-awareness, such as the personal resources and skills to be acquired in the therapeutic process. supervision by a specialist”.
It is important to know how to be single
Because humans are social beings, it is important that we nurture healthy relationships. However, it is also important that we enjoy our own company. According to Ana Paula, this plays an essential role in our mental health.
“It is in these individual moments that we will develop our creativity, mainly focused on solving problems. Apart from studying our feelings and our own interests,” he emphasizes.
Taking time for yourself is also important for qualifications, exploring new areas of knowledge, looking for hobbies and enjoyable activities. This time forces us to create our identity and more importantly. a pillar to stand on. Thus, the coveted self-sufficiency is born. “This individual time allows us to develop our own base and not remain ungrounded when other people and situations leave our lives,” emphasizes the psychologist.
Ana Paula also argues that being alone after a relationship ends is important for a person to process their grief and reconstruct their plans with another person so that they become internal experiences.
Dealing with moments of loneliness
Being single is not always an easy task. Enjoying our own company exists at certain times, but we also need to understand that there is a fine line between solitude and loneliness, and it is important that we learn to deal with both situations.
“The sorrow of a lonely person is that often people on social networks show that dealing with them is extremely comfortable and only positive,” emphasizes the specialist. Dealing with the loneliness that emerges in moments of solitude is hard work, but it paves the way for us to be our own foundation.
