5 Weird Things That Happen When You Fall In Love
Ah, falling in love. It’s the stuff that dreams are made of. Well, and also movies and TV and songs and pop culture in general. Almost everything is about falling in love, because we’re all a little obsessed with it. What’s the secret? How does it happen? Why does it make us so loopy? Blame science. Researchers have proven that falling in love literally changes our brains and our chemistry. No wonder we can’t stop talking, writing or singing about it.
“Falling in love causes our body to release a flood of feel-good chemicals that trigger specific physical reactions,” Pat Mumby, a professor in the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Neurosciences at Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine told Science Daily. “This internal elixir of love is responsible for making our cheeks flush, our palms sweat and our hearts race.” And that’s not all it does.
1. More Weird Stuff – Physiologically. See, the thing is, your BODY does crazy stuff when you fall in love. Your hormones basically light up your body like a Christmas tree (or you know, someone’s sweet backyard patio) and you both go, well, a little nuts. According to Deborah Khoshaba at Psychology Today, “You are under the influence of your hormones that are making you feel, all at once, euphoric, endangered, and exhausted. Let’s call these the Three E’s of falling in love.”
There’s an episode of Sabrina the Teenage Witch (stay with me) where Sabrina’s boyfriend Harvey has been turned into a frog and there’s a “true love clause” so if she takes a test and it’s true love he’ll turn back into a person. So she does it and of course passes and her aunt Zelda says she knew she’d pass because “at 16 it’s always true love.”
And I think that’s sort of what all this euphoria kind of explains. That feeling of falling in love, even if you’re really young IS true. And basically, unavoidable. But it can obviously go away.
Great, glad I turned talking about the “real stuff that happens” into a Sabrina the Teenage Witch discussion. Moving on…
2. You Think Everything They Do Is the Best/Coolest/Most Interesting Thing
There’s an episode at the beginning of season three of Friends where Ross is talking about work and we can hear everyone’s thoughts during his chat. And everyone is kind of bored or not listening, except Rachel. They’ve been dating for a while and she is in love and she just finds him to be so smart and so serious and so special.
Obviously no one is perfect but when you fall in love you FEEL like this other person just MIGHT BE perfect. You’re not positive but you think no one’s been cuter or funnier or smarter and you can’t believe everyone doesn’t see it but also you don’t care because you KNOW it’s true.
3. You Don’t Care About Anything Except Each Other
This happens a lot – and I think we’ve all seen it – where a couple just holes up in bed together for days on end when it’s new love. Presumably just basking in each other’s glow, not worrying about anything except their perfect partner.
But it can also go the How I Met Your Mother way where Robin and Barney – when they dated the first time – just because gross slobby versions of themselves. They no longer cared about their appearance or moving or doing anything and that could be right for some people (maybe) but was not right for them.
4. Your Thoughts Are All A Dance-y Musical Number
I’ve never seen Step Up 3D but this street-side dance number scene has been shown to me and it’s so charming and I could watch it forever and it is what falling in love feels like:
5. You Want to know Everything About Each Other
In When Harry Met Sally… Harry tells Jess that after he slept with Sally they didn’t have anything to talk about because he already knew all her stories. What he didn’t realize at the time was that wanting to know all of someone’s stories is a definite sign of love. Not always romantic love, sure, but love nonetheless.
When you start a relationship it’s like you almost want to climb inside the other person as if they’re a tauntaun and you’re going to freeze to death on Hoth.
Just me? Sorry.
But you get what I’m saying. You want to know everything that’s ever happened to them and have inside jokes and be with them when new stories develop and you can’t imagine life without them.
(main image via ShutterStock)
