Many Lovefraud readers have experienced the phenomenon of knowing that a romantic partner is unreliable and even bad for them, but they keep taking the person back. A psychiatrist explains why this happens. Blame your brain.
I heart unpredictable love, on NYTimes.com.
Link supplied by a Lovefraud reader.
kmillercats
The article explains in more depth what I already knew about dopamine. Addiction. I hadn’t had “feel good” for a long time. That is why after 4 years of enormous hurt I still want him back in a way. He was about the only feel good I had. Now…how do I get over it. It’s been 6 months and it is still very painful.
Ox Drover
Kmillercats,
My big addiction was nicotine….and I have not had a cigarette in 4 years or so but every once in a while when I think about it, I crave one.
Most of the time though I don’t even think about it. I do know that it takes TIME to get through the worst of the cravings for addictive stuff, be it dopamine or nicotine or alcohol or crack cocaine. Whatever is what you crave has a hook on you.
But we are stronger than our cravings. We are stronger than our addictions.
Read up on the Stockholm Syndrome, this will give you some idea about it. Also Patrick carnes’ book “The Betrayal Bond” explains this push/pull bonding.
Just keep on reading and learning, it will get better. (((hugs))))
Louise
kmillercats:
I pretty much felt the same way you describe. For whatever reason, when I was with him, it was euphoric. I had never felt that before. And it was extremely addicting. You ask how to get over it. Some advice given to me has been to find someone else, but I don’t want that. It does make sense that finding someone else would fill that void, but in my opinion, it would also just introduce all kinds of drama or “stuff” again. At that point, it doesn’t become a mode for healing. It just becomes more hurt. No one needs that.
skylar
Here’s a story about how emotional health predicts success.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/06/opinion/brooks-the-heart-grows-smarter.html?src=me&ref=general
Ox Drover
Very interesting article, Sky, I would like to know more about that 30 or so men who could not make intimate relationships. Psychopaths?
The data from that study might be of interest to those studying Ps.
of course, how is “success” measured? By income? What other status?
I’m glad for the old man whose only medication at 86 was viagra and who died at 96. LOL
Back_from_the_edge
Yes: like an addiction.
And as they ‘step up’ their abuse,
the addiction only gets deeper and deeper.
That is how abuse perpetuates itself, on that
euphoric addiction of being accepted and mirrored.
It is soon to be 7 months NC from me. For the
sixth time around. Sixth time must be the trick!
With an intrusion no less than a couple weeks ago .
I don’t understand the OBSESSION, I guess. I suppose I
never will. It is very HIDEOUS to me, especially after all
the death threats and attempts on my life already. I find
NOTHING ‘romantic’ or ‘flattering’ about the stalking.
One thing about this whole experience is that it has
forced me to push myself to my limits. NOW I KNOW
how strong I REALLY am. NOW I KNOW. If I can make
it back from the very edge of HELL ITSELF, I can stand
tall and KNOW I am stronger than it.
I will scoop my guts back inside myself and continue on.
My life is more important to me than the addicting abuse
cycle. Even after they are long gone, the abuse lingers.
Another relationship won’t make that go away….
the only person that CAN make it go away is ourselves…
I have chosen to LOCK that door, technically and
philosophically. It’s like opening a can of worms
that was marked ‘beef stew’.
Dealing with and getting solid with OURSELVES MUST
come first now. Let them fall into the past as we rebuild
ourselves and become the people we have a right to be
proud of.
I figure we all deserve that.
We survived.
Dupey
Frandee
But just how Strong can we be, sometimes I feel so Hard because of my “strength” other times I feel like the biggest sissy!!!!
skylar
Oxy,
It seems they were measuring success by self-reported measure of contentment with where they were in life. The guy who became the president of his nursing home, was in the nursing home, so I don’t know if we can consider that “successful”. Yet, in a sense, just surviving is considered a success because they said that only 4 of the non-emotional guys were still alive.
I guess it’s a book now:
http://www.amazon.com/Triumphs-Experience-Harvard-Grant-Study/dp/0674059824
Watching my father age, I can see exactly this change. He is still very self-absorbed but he has changed and is no longer the angry man he used to be. Life has dealt him some blows and he has accepted them with humility, just as he has accepted his successes (with a little less humility though).
Ox Drover
Yea, and I would like to read it, but even “prime” with free shipping it is nearly 19 bucks so I don’t think I want it that bad. LOL
I’ll wait til it goes on sale for $5 or 6 bucks and free shipping. LOL I’m a cheapie.
Just being in a nursing home I don’t think is a failure at all. There are nursing homes that are not rat traps or just for people in wheel chairs or unable to feed or toilet themselves. Florida is filled with nice assisted living places and nursing homes that are great. Plus you get to live where the storms come. LOL
skylar
Yes, I can’t afford that book either.
The study is also interesting because the researchers THEMSELVES changed what they were looking for. It stated that initially, relationships were not even on their radar. So society is changing as to what we value.
It also goes to show that a researcher’s bias does determine the results of his research.
Edit:
it appears George wrote another book in 1977 about the first part of the study and that book is even MORE expensive. So maybe the price isn’t going to come down.
http://www.amazon.com/Adaptation-Life-George-Vaillant/dp/0674004140