by Joe Kort, MSW copyright
2004
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When you look across a crowded room and
spot that hot guy, you may think you’ve found the man of
your dreams. Usually, it is lust that you are feeling—a
purely sexual sensation, until you start to talk to him and
get to know him. And suddenly you fall into romantic love.
Our society focuses primarily on
romantic love and calls it real love. Movies, books, songs,
and television programs all make us feel that if we cannot
sustain this feeling, then we’ve “fallen out of love.” Many
believe that this rapturous emotion should never end and
that keeping the “high” of the connection should require
little to no work at all. That’s just not so. If you two are
lucky, this physiological state of infatuation lasts from
six to 18 months, tops.
For most people, romantic love is the
best part of their relationship. With the selection process
in the hunt for love seemingly over, it’s easy to just lie
back and enjoy the ecstatic feelings and the bonding
experience. But as an emotional experience, romantic love is
simply the doorway to any relationship. Its main purpose is
to bring two people together in an emotional “time out” when
both partners can feel their sameness, overlook their
differences and experience a feeling of euphoria.
Romantic love is nature’s anesthesia.
During this stage, people often say they feel drugged. If
depressed, they report being less so. If suffering from an
addiction, they will experience a diminished craving or feel
entirely “cured.” Love’s a stimulant too: Someone who needs
a lot of sleep finds he can suddenly operate on less; and a
sluggish sex drive will ratchet up to match a partner’s
higher libido.
The sense of elation, exhilaration and
euphoria that new lovers feel is largely due to their bodies
producing a natural amphetamine called phenylethylamine
(PEA). So if you feel drugged, it’s because you are! Most
people don’t know that as we fall in romantic love, nature
floods us with chemical cousins of amphetamines like PEA,
dopamine, norepinephrine—all natural stimulants and
painkillers. When PEA is first released, it is actually at
its most potent state, which is why people never forget
their first love. This also promotes addictions to sex and
love in people who are constantly seeking to access this
natural high. The problem, just as with most other
addictions, is that each time it’s released, it becomes less
and less powerful and lasts for a shorter period of time.
It’s not meant to last. Its only purpose is to connect two
people to begin the bonding process.
Gay men cherish this time even more than our heterosexual
counterparts do, since we’re so often warned that we’ll
never find love, and that the gay culture is based on
promiscuity and short-term hook-ups. So when romantic love
hits, it’s like a long-forgotten uncle remembered you in his
will.
Alas, it’s only a temporary state
that's supposed to end. But people who don’t know this, do
all they can to keep it from ending. Some people break it
off just to make up again and reactivate those early
feelings, plus the dose of PEA. Others use drugs and alcohol
to try and make the feeling permanent—or at least, replace
it. Still others decide that relationships “shouldn’t be so
much work,” so they dissolve it in disillusionment—or else
have sex with others to bring back that of PEA high. Too
many gay men see the inevitable twilight of romantic love as
a confirmation that we cannot enjoy sustained love, and that
the heterosexists and homophobes were right. But this is
another misconception: they are not right, and we CAN enjoy
sustained love.
Some cultures (India’s, for example,
where arranged marriages are still the norm) don’t aspire to
limerence, because they’re aware that it’s not based on
reality. If you find a guy that you think is the man of your
dreams, just understand that real love involves three
stages, and that your first two years together are not
necessarily a positive indicator that he’s the right one for
you. It’s good to enjoy the PEA high, as long as you
understand that it’s not what real love is all about. This
is important because if you base your feelings on the PEA
high, when the stage of romantic love ends, you could walk
away from the relationship of your dreams.
