![]() They were the same! Breakup pain is real, physical and measurable at least as much as body injuries.įor some of us, like Erika, the heartache may become a long experience, with months of anguish and an increased sense of depression and low self-esteem. A study compared the fMRI of people who scored eight on a one-ten pain scale to others talking about their breakup. For instance, Columbia University cognitive neuroscientist Edward Smith completed a series of studies and tests in 2011 that proved the pain we feel during heartbreak is similar to the physical pain we might feel due to a severe burn or broken arm. If this was not enough, more than one neuroscientific study has provided evidence that a breakup hurts no less than a broken bone. The images revealed the activation of several areas of the brain, such as the ventral tegmental, the ventral striatum, and the nucleus accumbens involved in the reward/motivation system, which uses dopamine as a neurotransmitter. Researchers showed some brave volunteers, who had experienced unwanted breakups, their former partners’ photos while inside an fMRI scan. Rather neuroscientific research shows a substantial similarity between the experienced rejection from someone we love and the experience of withdrawal from addictive substances. Have you heard the saying “love is an addiction”? And this one, too, is not a metaphor as we may have thought. What does breakup do to your body?Ī breakup, in particular, when unexpected, affects the brain, nervous system, cognitive capacity and, not metaphorically, the heart. Therefore, she was ill since humans cannot separate the heart from the mind and the mind from the body. They are a matter of the heart and brain. When Erika shared with me the list of symptoms she was suffering, I explained that breakups are not just a matter of emotions or cognitive processes and feelings. She thought that emotions are just that: emotions, things that are just in your mind. Erika could not make complete sense of her emotions. “I thought to be stronger, and this is not the first breakup as you can imagine, but I am sick my health is deteriorating, and I have brain fog too”. “Gabe, how can this breakup make me so sick?” she questioned in one of our sessions. Rosy and Erika met seven years ago on Campus at their university Queer Room, and from there, their relationship moved fast to a partnership. In addition, she was always stressed and depressed. ![]() Rosy had ghosted her for months she said she needed her space.Įrika, my client, told me that she felt sick, had chest pain, and often, at night, she was breathing faster. That “why” was tormenting Erika, who could not think anything but spend long hours looking at photos and checking Rosy’s FB page and Twitter. After six years of cohabitation, Rosy (not her real name), her partner, left her without a “why”. Erika (not her real name) could not stop crying.
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