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What Happens When You Fall In Love With Someone: How The Body Reacts

What Happens When You Fall In Love With Someone: How The Body Reacts

People experience different emotions at different times everyday.. Their faces light up when they are happy and feel a gripping pain in their hearts with sadness or heartbreak. In terms of love, it can be a mixture of multiple emotions all at the same time. So what happens when you fall in love with someone deeply? Does the body respond differently when we are in love or being loved?

What Happens When You Fall In Love With Someone?

It might sound cliché-ish that falling in love makes your heart race faster, eyes dilate at the sight of your significant other, or be very excited and restless. All these things can happen when someone is in love. Seeing the person you like releases different kinds of chemicals, called neurotransmitters, in the body, which are responsible for the different physical and emotional reactions a person has. 

Neurotransmitters and how it affects our bodies and emotions

Dopamine is known to be related to the feeling of pleasure and motivation. It makes the person excited and feel happier when the person he or she likes is around.

Adrenaline and norepinephrine are also responsible for making your heart beat faster and making you feel energized. You feel that you can do more things even without rest.

Oxytocin is another that is responsible for making your eyes dilate. It also makes you feel secure and more attached to your loved one.

Vasopressin, on the other hand, also plays a role when you are in love. It helps you feel an emotional bond with your partner and makes you want to maintain that relationship.

Less pain

Studies show that love also makes you feel less pain. A portion of the brain makes you feel less pain, while viewing pictures of your partner. This was established during the test in the particular study. Love was treated as a distraction that enables people to feel less pain compared to other stimuli.

Lowered risk of cardiovascular diseases

Being in love also lowers the risk of cardiovascular diseases. Couples have lower blood pressure results compared to people who are single and unattached. The overall feeling of happiness might contribute to the sense of health and well-being.

Is There A Negative Side To Being In Love?

Understanding what happens when you fall in love with someone can make you curious about the flip side of things. Anything is bad when done in excess, which makes love “dangerous” at some point. Our bodies’ physical reaction may be influenced by our emotions and vice-versa.

The effect of love is similar to alcohol drinking. It lessens the effects of anxiety and fear of the person. It might sound positive, but the negative effects of too much alcohol might be the same. People in love may become aggressive and become highly sensitive to others. It can also make a person trust other people less, which can create complications with relationships with others. This may result in jealousy and harm against others.

Love can also be highly addicting. Being in love can make you feel a certain high due to the positive emotions. Love also makes a person’s serotonin levels lower, which is present in people with obsessive-compulsive disorder. 

Key Takeaway

Love is a complex emotion that anybody can feel. It affects the person’s physical, emotional, and mental state. Knowing what happens when you fall in love with someone makes you prepared for the things that happen to your body.

It is good to understand the difference between love, attraction, and attachment as these may have similar effects. For as long as it is mutual and nobody’s getting hurt, love is an experience to cherish and share with others.

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Disclaimer

Hello Health Group does not provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment.

The Science of Love and Attachment, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-mindful-self-express/201603/the-science-love-and-attachment, Accessed July 24, 2021

What falling in love does to your heart and brain, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/02/140206155244.htm, Accessed July 24, 2021

Romantic love: An fMRI study of a neural mechanism for mate choice, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cne.20772, Accessed July 24, 2021

Hormonal changes when falling in love, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15177709/, Accessed July 24, 2021

Viewing pictures of a romantic partner reduces experimental pain: involvement of neural reward systems, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20967200/, Accessed July 24, 2021

Addicted to love: What is love addiction and when should it be treated?, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5378292/, Accessed July 24, 2021

The dark side of the ‘love hormone:’ Similarities with the effects of alcohol, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150519210251.htm, Accessed July 24, 2021

Women’s pupillary responses to sexually significant others during the hormonal cycle, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0018506X07001699, Accessed July 24, 2021

Love takes up where pain leaves off, brain study shows, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/10/101013173843.htm, Accessed July 24, 2021

Current Version

01/21/2023

Written by Elaine Felicitas

Medically reviewed by Mae Charisse Antalan, MD

Updated by: Mae Antalan, MD


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Written by Elaine Felicitas · Updated Jan 21, 2023

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