Public Heartbreak

Dearest Reader,

In the year nineteen hundred and ninety-three, the Trinidadian-German singer Haddaway lamented: “What is love? Baby don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me no more.” No truer words or catchier lyrics have ever been spoken. What is love, really? According to the science, romantic love, in particular, begins with a big hit of dopamine akin to alcohol or cocaine. But There are other chemicals that join the party especially as a relationship builds like oxytocin (which deepens attachment; released after sex) and vasopressin (linked to conduct that produces long-term, monogamous bonds). This is why some people, as the musical sage Robert Palmer once warned, “might as well face it, your addicted to love.” In other words, love can be a cruel mistress who draws you in and eventually leaves you for dead—in heartbreak, longing for your next fix. Now imagine all this drama unfolding on the public stage. Several high profile women have fallen in and out of love in the public eye and each one of them unlocks a little bit of the mystery beyond the science of what romantic love and heartbreak inspires or challenges us to understand about what it means to be human.

Read More Here