Why can't I stop thinking about my ex?

The lovesickness it is one of the most painful phenomena that human beings can suffer and that we have all had to live.

Surely at this moment there are many people who are having a hard time and who still think that person they have loved and with whom they cannot be.

What happens when our sentimental partner leaves us?

Unfortunately, socially it is not well seen that an individual suffers for another person, as many associate it with a weak personality. Actually, forgetting that special someone, that someone you loved, is a process that has its phases and that must be overcome over time. Now, heartbreak is not linear, because we can relapse and suffer at different times in our lives. Over time, but, everything is overcome or at least hurts less. Believe it or not, most people have it inside.

Love is like a drug

Understanding heartbreak and stop thinking about your ex may not always be easy. And to understand that it is not a linear phenomenon and that there may be relapses, it must be taken into account that love, like drugs, use the same neural circuits. It is clear that we cannot explain this phenomenon only with biological factors, since cultural factors have a decisive influence.

But what love is like a drug not me, but rather a study by the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, which wanted to know more about heartbreak, he concluded that when love breaks, just like what happens to a drug addict drug, the separation from the loved one has serious consequences on our behavior, What depressive behaviors and obsessive.

Now, love and lack of love are such complex issues that there is no great consensus among scientists, but that at the same time Over the years, conclusions from different investigations have been provided that have helped to better understand these phenomena.

Love sickness hurts just like physical pain

But what exactly happens in the brain when we fall out of love? Some experts say that culture has a great influence on our tastes, for example, that we like a person who surfs or is sapiosexual. But the experts too They warn that there are inexplicable things and that, as you have seen throughout your life, you fall in love and period. Sometimes you don't have to look for an explanation.

But when we fall in love the brain undergoes a neurochemical cascade in which different neurotransmitters and hormones are involved, as the serotonin, norepinephrine (norepinephrine), dopamine or oxytocin, among others, which are responsible for changing our perception of life. When we are in love we are euphoric, we continually think about the other person, we sleep less, etc.

If you want to know what exactly happens when we fall in love, you can read our article: "The chemistry of love: a very powerful drug”

And of course, when love breaks up, the neurochemical mismatch causes a behavioral change that takes time to stabilize. Different investigations have concluded that the same part of the brain that functions as a processor of physical pain, also has the task of processing pain. emotional pain.

Psychologists recommend losing contact with the other person to get over the breakup. In other words, in this situation you have to apply "all or nothing" so that the brain pathways related to heartbreak (and drug addiction) are weakened.

Remembering the couple in those moments ...

In addition to the obsessive and depressive behavior characteristic of the heartbreak of the first months, it is common to remember the partner at certain times when time has passed. Those shows you watched together, a car just like your ex's, those places you went together, those songs... they can bring back memories of who your partner once was.

To understand this, you only have to think about the associative learning of the classical conditioning, which can remind us of the couple months later and can make us relapse and cause us pain when we thought we were over it. Something that also happens in drug addicts. In the case of drug addiction, this phenomenon is called conditioned withdrawal syndrome.

Open wounds and their acceptance

But does it take a long time to forget the person you've loved? Well, that depends on the situation of each one and the intensity of their feelings. But what is clear is that if we do not accept the break, the pain remains. Our beliefs are to blame for keeping us clinging to that person who is no longer part of our lives. If they have left us, the decision that the other person has made should be to respect them despite not liking them.

The breakup may have been traumatic and we need more time to forget that person. We may need to work on ourselves and our self-esteem before meeting someone special. But the first step to forgetting your ex is accepting that it is over. After your ex, life goes on. It is in your hands to resume the course of your life, distancing yourself emotionally from the person who is no longer there, and cementing your happiness in yourself, in your own options and possibilities.