The pain of heartbreak is not all in the mind. The body also experiences various processes when it happens.
The Pain of Heartbreaks
While falling in love could lead to euphoria and giddiness, severing the tie could trigger negative emotions that may also feel physically painful.
Hormones influence such negative feelings. Stress hormones noradrenaline, adrenaline, and cortisol go up, while happy hormones oxytocin and serotonin go down in the body. Such heartbreak hormones could also trigger physical symptoms that can make people feel the sensation of pain.
ALSO READ: Broken Heart Syndrome: Can a Heartbreak Really Kill You?
Why Heartbreaks Are So Painful
According to Dr. Deborah Lee, a medical writer at Dr. Fox Online Pharmacy, there is physiology behind the pain of heartbreaks. Symptoms are not just a matter of the mind.
She explains that when one falls in love, hormones naturally outpour. These hormones may include oxytocin, the cuddle hormone, and dopamine, the feel-good hormone. However, when a person falls out of love, dopamine and oxytocin levels drop. At the same time, one stress hormone, cortisol, also increases in levels.
The elevated levels of cortisol could contribute to certain conditions, such as acne, weight gain, increased anxiety, and high blood pressure.
A 2011 study also found that instances of social rejection, such as a breakup, could also activate brain regions associated with physical pain. As part of this study, recently "dumped" participants were shown a photo of their ex-partner. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans activated brain areas typically linked to physical injury, such as the dorsal posterior insula and the secondary somatosensory cortex.
Eric Ryden, a doctor of clinical psychology and a therapist from Couples Therapy clinic, also explains that heartbreak's neurobiological effects could reach such heights to the point where it has been likened to physical pain. This is evidenced by physical symptoms, such as panic attacks and chest pain, that are self-reported, as well as how sufferers describe their feelings. The doctor notes that heartbreaks appear to involve the neural mechanisms that also play a role in physical pain.
Lee also explains that the parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous systems, which typically counterbalance each other, could be activated during heartbreak. The parasympathetic nervous system is responsible for the body's rest, while the sympathetic nervous system handles the body's fight-or-flight response. Lee explains that the hormones released during heartbreak activate these two nervous system parts.
She explains that the heart and the brain get confused as they receive mixed messages. This could lead to electrical activity disturbances in the heart, with lower heart rate variability. This is seen by how widowers and widows have a 41% higher risk of dying during the first six months after the death of their spouse.
There are also rare cases when a broken heart could be a health condition known as broken heart syndrome or takotsubo cardiomyopathy. This condition results from extreme emotions or high-stress levels. It may also come from physical illness or surgery. The syndrome leads to temporary changes in the pumping of the blood. It may sometimes trigger the heart to exert more effort in pumping, typically felt as chest pain.
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