If Love is A Drug, Heartbreak Is Cold Turkey
Savvy|April 2018

Coping with heartbreak is as tough as dealing with drug addiction, but you can make it a tad easier for yourself, says Salome Mitter.

If Love is A Drug, Heartbreak Is Cold Turkey

No matter your age, a broken heart can make you fall to pieces. What’s worse is even as you’re hurting like crazy, you’re trying to fulfil your other obligations and responsibilities, and struggling to keep your life from falling apart…

PAIN ALERT

No matter how much the cynics might poo-pooh the idea, science proves that heartbreak can be an overwhelmingly painful psychological gash. Brain scans show that heartbreak triggers the same mechanisms in the brain that get activated when intense physical pain is experienced. And while intense physical pain generally lasts minutes before it subsides to a throb, severe emotional pain caused by heartbreak can continue for days, weeks and even months.

There is no easy checking out of heartbreak hotel. The one who broke our heart consumes our waking thoughts and our troubled dreams. Desperate to regain the love we lost, we go through a vicious cycle of trying to understand why the break-up happened. Memories threaten to overwhelm us. We cannot stop thinking what could have been, we keep dissecting what went wrong and how it could have been avoided.

Naturally, this creates serious imbalances in our daily life - from disturbing our eating and sleeping patterns, to robbing us of our ability to concentrate, think creatively and function normally. According to studies, 40 percent of heartbroken people experience symptoms of clinical depression. The intensity of grief is similar to that on the death of a close relative.

ADDICTIVE LOVE

This story is from the April 2018 edition of Savvy.

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This story is from the April 2018 edition of Savvy.

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