"It starts in my toes and I crinkle my nose..." is such a sweet and dare I say accurate description of the feeling of falling in love. Psychologists and scientists will argue that this reaction is triggered by a set of chemicals released into your brain. Among them is Biological Anthropologist and renowned authority on "romantic love rejuvenation," Dr. Helen Fisher, who describes this feeling in her book Why We Love as the simple release of increased levels of norepinephrine and dopamine while simultaneously the levels of serotonin are decreased in your brain. According to Fisher, the presence of these chemicals is the reason we fall in love and the reason we make certain choices while in love; choices that we would most likely not make otherwise. However, what is the trigger that causes the release of these chemicals, I wonder?
Dr. Fisher fails to address a precise trigger, she vaguely references thoughts of the loved one or visual stimuli, however, I personally am inclined to postulate that the feelings themselves trigger the chemical release. Thus, we find ourselves in the proverbial chicken or egg conundrum. However, I strongly advocate that we feel in love before norepinephrine and dopamine in our brain increase and serotonin decreases. I believe it is the feeling of falling in love that increases these levels in your brain but not vice versa. While it is true and scientifically confirmed that the very first stages of love involve the release of norepinephrine, dopamine select areas of the brain, I disagree that these chemicals cause one to fall in love. For Fisher however, “romantic love is a universal human feeling, produced by specific chemicals and networks in the brain.” (Why We Love) Fisher goes on to say that elevated levels of dopamine in the brain are the reason we love so deeply because they are “associated with learning about novel stimuli” and produce “extremely focused attention and unwavering motivation and goal directed behaviors,” which she considers to be the basic characteristics of romantic love. I might be mistaken, however, by this logic Dr. Fisher has reduced the process of falling and being in love to beloved Finding Nemo character, Dori’s, “something shiny” distractions wherein the new shiny object becomes the extremely focused learning for the duration of its novelty. If this were true, wouldn’t we fall in and out of love rather effortlessly? Wouldn’t our beloved cease to be the center of our attention as the new shiny and novel object of our devotion comes along?
According to Dr. Fisher the other chemical crucial to feelings of romantic love is norepinephrine that causes what she refers to as “lover’s high.” Lover’s High, as Dr. Fisher describes it, is the effect on varied areas of the brain which generally cause exhilaration, excessive energy, sleeplessness, and loss of appetite- all of which Dr. Fisher considers to be further characteristics of romantic love. However, by her own reasoning what comes after these “symptoms” is no longer romantic love. I refuse to believe only the preliminary stages of falling in love constitute romantic love. In my humble opinion, falling in love and being in love are two different processes. Furthermore, the more complex and in depth later phases of romantic love; where the relationship begins to form into a more solid entity, involve conscious effort, choices, and actions beyond any involuntary chemical releases and network patterns in the brain.
In this respect I agree fully with Bell Hooks as she depicts romantic love in her book, Bell Hooks On Love, as taking a flight of stairs upon which you reach a flat platform connecting you to the next set of stairs and consciously decide to keep climbing rather than turning back. But that’s a topic for a different day. For now, I would venture to say that I agree that the “Bubbly” feeling of falling in love, the feeling that “starts in (our) toes” as Ms. Caillat sings, is most likely the elevated release of norepinephrine and dopamine in select areas of our brain as a response to our falling in love. However, in my experience, the romantic love I have experienced and felt in its entirety (falling and being) is far more complex and wonderfully imperfect…
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