Walking Out of Unrequited Love.

Schizophrenics have been noted to have lower amygdala stimulation due to reduction in its size, also affecting memory. While it has various other functions, the prime role of the amygdala is to stimulate negative emotions. Most psychological disorders are associated with the activation of amygdala. On the contrary, individuals suffering with hypertension, insecurity and depression have increased amygdala stimuli and sharp memory. To study this, scientists observed a woman who had a non-functional amygdala and tested her reactions to fearful situations. She was observed in the presence of reptiles and ferocious animals. She was also taken to apparently haunted places and asked to watch horror movies. The notes she took at that time, about her reaction to those situations confirmed loss of fear. This reconfirmed the fact that our body is stimulated to experience fear due to the activation of amygdala. You may read how it affects the unrequited lovers in my blog Unrequited Love and Cocaine.

If things look misbalanced, even when the two of you are legally or socially bound in a relationship, you need to give each other time to improve them. Discuss where the problem is and come to an agreement. Both of you need to be on the same ground. When there is too much in one direction it will throw things off. Establishing reasons for being together and maintaining a healthy balance of interdependence will help the relationship bloom and will also let the two of you feel happy individually.

It is also true that some unrequited lovers are quite satisfactorily alone! When I talked to some of them, I found that their content lay in selfless giving. One of them even told me that he grew up loving one girl, but with time he understood that she is never going to love him back. Even after having understood this, his heart did not desire another love, because his eyes could not see anyone else worth loving. He continues to love her even today. It brings him joy to see her happy.

A broken relationship leads the unrequited lovers to a “withdrawal from addiction” sort of psychological state. It takes the ‘high’ away from their life. When an individual has reached the chemical stage of addiction to love, they start showing some/all of the following withdrawal symptoms that make it painfully clear just how addicted they are to the beloved.

• need to indulge more in the activity or drug to achieve the desired effect;
• failure to do so resulting in withdrawal symptoms;
• ensuring that the activity or drug access can be continued;
• reduce important social, occupational or recreational activities;
• persistent desire to quit or control the activity or drug; and
• disability to quit in spite of the knowledge of its physical or psychological consequences.

Unfortunately, persistence in spite of rejection, irrational and inappropriate behaviour are considered justified in case of unrequited love, which our cultural ideologies would not encourage otherwise. We mostly never worry about how uncomfortable unrequited love is, for the rejecter. Do we not feel guilty after rejecting someone? Does it not hurt us to hurt another human? As discussed in my blog Brain Chemistry in Unrequited Love when a love relationship is ended by one of the partners, it can be really hard to handle, especially for the person who wanted the relationship to continue. But is it not difficult for the other person to make the decision to end what was? In fact, as far as I can understand, rejecters understand the situation better than the unrequited lover and are more sensitive towards the circumstances. They have the sense to walk out of an unbalanced relationship, or never let the relationship start, because they know this is not where they want to be. While all this time, all that the unrequited lover does is to crying over rejection and gaining sympathy of friends and family.

Each relationship is different and there are a lot of things couples can improve by discussing and understanding. Love cannot be demanded. It can only be willingly committed. In my future blogs I am going to write about some famous and some not-so-famous unrequited love stories. Do keep coming back for the stories, and don’t forget to leave your comments and I will add them in my future blogs.