Name: Is Love Really A Drug? | What Does Love & Heartbreak Do To My Body | National Geographic
Uploaded: 2025-05-27T07:51:14.000Z
Duration: 8 min 49 s
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Have you ever felt so head over heels in love that you ignored all the red flags?

Or so distraught from a breakup that you didn't want to leave your bed for a whole week?

Well, there's probably a reason for that.

Why do love and heartbreak feel like we're literally riding a roller coaster?

Scientifically speaking, she was actually onto something with that one.

I'm Alzo Slade here with Nat Geo to break down how everything you experience and consume can affect your body in ways you may not expect.

Today, we're flirting with what does love and heartbreak do to my body?

Falling in love makes our bodies go berserk.

The basis for love's physical effects are chemicals flowing through our bodies.

The process of experiencing affection, attraction, and attachment makes our brains release a whole cascade of hormones, neurochemicals, and natural opioids.

Think of them like emoji messages from your brain to your body.

We have noradrenaline that makes our heart race and our palms sweat.

Vasopressin, it excites us and generates possessiveness.

Testosterone and estrogen, well, now, they make us lusty.

After physical intimacy, dopamine is released.

It's a feel good, a reward, like a love high that's even been shown to resonate in the brain as strongly as cocaine euphoria.

Who would have thought that love could be as potent as cocaine?

Just snuggle up with your lover and get that hot.

Serotonin is another mood boosting hormone, but it might also create those obsessive scroll through their entire Instagram grid impulses.

Lastly, there's oxytocin, a bonding drug that deepens attraction and increases trust released from meaningful interactions like deep conversations and touch.

That's a lot of chemistry going on in our bodies.

This stampede of neurochemicals can even deactivate the neural pathways responsible for negative emotions, meaning we might be unable to feel some bad things when we're thinking about our crush.

And that's why so many of us ignore red flags up front.

Once the chaos and butterflies have settled down, if we're lucky, we've fallen all the way, and we're in love.

In this state, hormone levels balance out and create lasting effects.

Its possessiveness becomes devotion, protection.

Serotonin normalizes, and we chill all the way out with the obsession.

The steady supply of oxytocin leads to better sleep, immunity, decreased anxiety and depression, and in some cases, faster wound healing.

Being loved has even been shown to give us longer lives.

So when Linda at the office sticks up another photo of her new boyfriend in the cubicle, you might want to cut her some slack.

Unfortunately, what goes up usually comes down.

Be it a breakup, divorce, or even death, heartbreak is an unfortunate reality for all humankind.

When we lose love, that stream of healthy, feel-good chemicals suddenly stops, and that causes problems.

Journalist Daryl Austin researched this topic for National Geographic and could tell us a little bit more about how this works.

Losing a loved one is literally shocking to your system.

It's like being addicted to a drug that suddenly dries up, similar to an addict going through withdrawals.

The areas of the brain that are associated with cravings and emotional regulation are involved with both drugs and love.

Oxytocin is protecting our heart tissue, and when we lose that stream of oxytocin, that heart tissue becomes vulnerable, and it can lead to a stress response like spikes in blood pressure, difficulty breathing, and an increased risk of heart attack.

There was a really interesting study from the 1960s, and they found men were 40% more likely to experience a heart attack after the death of their wife than other married people their age.

Well, dang, Daryl, that's rough when we lose our feel-goods and the security we've grown so attached to.

Low serotonin levels can be connected to depression, anxiety, and digestive issues, while low dopamine can cause lethargy, memory loss, sleep problems, and mood swings.

When we're so desperately craving our prior happiness, we might turn to the quick hits to try and surge our dopamine.

When we know what the quick hits are, yeah, that make-out session with that rando on the dance floor.

Heartbreak has our hormones going haywire all over again, including a new foe that's entered the chat.

Those rascals come with a whole host of issues.

Quick side note, the stress hormone cortisol follows circadian rhythm, meaning its effects might be stronger in the morning and may be to blame for all those days you just can't get out of bed.

To sum this all the way up, very simply, heartbreak makes us feel like trash.

So how the heck are we supposed to get over something so devastating when we feel so sick?

Our brains may cognitively understand that things are different now, but our bodies need time to catch up to that reality and reset the chemistry.

If we lean on the relationships we do have, like family and friends, those rewarding social interactions can start regenerating the oxytocin we were missing.

A good bear hug from mama can release the dopamine we were jonesing for and ward off the stress hormones plaguing us.

Even snuggling a pet can release those good goods.

It doesn't have to be romance that gets the love hormones flowing again.

Since some of our neural response to social pain is the same as how we'd respond to physical pain, we can treat the pain in the same way.

A study found that simple acetaminophen or Tylenol can be effective at diminishing social pain.

Who knew that headache and heartbreak had the same medicine?

I know your energy levels are all out of whack and you're craving junk food and have no motivation to exercise, but I promise breaking those cycles will help.

Just a daily walk, even if it's silly and little, can ease depression and sorrow.

Sticking to a strict bedtime and following a wind-down routine can create the structure you need to get regularity back.

When we reinstate regular sleep, it helps our bodies to regulate our hormones and impulse control, which might stop us from the make-out sess with the bad breath creep on that dance floor next time.

On the more emotional side of recovering, never underestimate the power of journaling, therapy, or grief groups to sort through thoughts and feelings.

You're not alone, and plenty of folks are available to listen.

As we have seen and heard and experienced, love is kind of exhausting.

Love and heartbreak are undeniably a biological rollercoaster, but the bodily benefits of love, both platonic and romantic, are irrefutable too.

Do you think love's high is worth heartbreak's pain?

Let us know, and we'll see you next episode.