Love Drove Me to Insanity

How is it that love can transform a reasonable man or woman into a raving lunatic? I recently spoke with a good friend of mine who told me how he is almost done paying off his $8,000 criminal fine for something that happened with his ex-fiance. Now you'd be hard pressed to find a nicer, more easy going, stable, romantic guy... so I of course had to know what happened. We'll call him Joe. Joe had suspected something was amiss with his fiance. They had their disagreements and problems to work through like every couple and it seemed the relationship was getting worse than better, but a commitment to each other was still intact. Enter the competitor. Joe knew his fiance was getting buddy-buddy with a new guy and that's when the stomach acid production kicked up. I'm assuming this is the part where the phone calls started getting more scarce, texts took all day for her to respond to, she suddenly became more busy. Following Exchange Theory law, the person with least interest in the relationship has the most power. The incredible part is what we learn about ourselves when we feel the ground disappearing beneath us. How can a reasonable, logical, placid individual be driven to a moment of complete insanity so uncharacteristic of himself? I know you're dying to know what happened, so I'll tell you. Apparently, Joe's apartment front door faces the front door of his fiance. Joe recognized the vehicle of the man who had replaced him, parked in front of her place. He also watched the front door like a hawk and at 3:00am it became apparent that this man was going to stay overnight. Feeling his world coming crashing down, Joe decided he must take action. Not wanting a personal confrontation with the man, but wanting the man and his fiance to learn a lesson, Joe began by slashing the man's vehicle tires with a knife. This didn't leave him satisfied, so he found some caustic paint remover and applied it to the sides and hood of the car. Needing some aggression release, he topped it off by repeatedly throwing a cinder block on top of the hood and windshield. Having felt he did what he had to, he went to sleep. The next morning his fiance and the man called him on the phone, accusing him of the crime. Joe denied he knew anything about it until he was confronted by the police who told him he was caught on video. Although Joe feels remorse, he jokingly says he would do it again if he had the chance because the guy will think twice the next time. Now to some of us, the possibility of facing criminal Class A Misdemeanor charges would be enough deterrent. There was a much simpler way at getting back at them. The private school where his fiance was enrolled forbids overnight visits by the opposite sex within school housing. Joe could have reported this fact to the school authorities and both his fiance and her new love interest would have been expelled from college. Why did he resort to criminal activity?

Haven't we all at least felt like Joe at least one time in our dating careers? If you've been around the block a few times, you come to realize that Anyone is capable of Anything. The difference between being in control and slipping off the edge in a moment of complete insanity is closer than we realize. It's not uncommon for lovers who are losing ground to go out of their way at odd hours of the night to do a drive-by to see who's parked in front of their mate's house. I'm sure if you haven't tried this one, you've thought about it: sneaking into their cell phone to check texts and recent calls. I've even been guilty of tracking down a girlfriend through a reverse search of a telephone number she once called me from. I found an address and her car parked there- all night long. I felt the same accelerating heart beat as I drove closer, refusing to believe it was her car. I know the same gut check, like a pro boxer just socked you in the stomach. Unlike Joe, I didn't trash her car, but I did leave a strongly worded note. Even during the fact, it can seem crazy to us that we may have someone followed or do something like record phone conversations. Statistically, if you go to such measures to verify if you're being cheated on, your intuition is most likely correct. That's a topic for another day... But when we're faced with the truth, why don't we just accept it and move on quickly? Why do we dive into the moment, subjecting ourselves to unspeakable pain when we know it's over? The answer to this one is composed of two factors: 1) Fear 2) Brain chemistry

1) Fear overcomes us when we lose our power. Any control that we perceive fear has over us, comes directly from our belief that we have no alternative. Joe felt that he had no alternative. As illogical as it might sound now, he felt that he couldn't ignore such a betrayal happening before his eyes. He also felt the fear of a physical confrontation because the guy was bigger than he was. He also didn't want to wait until morning for the slow administrative process of getting the two in trouble with the school. His emotions were real, painfully acute, presently happening, and he presently needed to remedy them. He felt he had no alternative and he succumbed to the fear of losing his power. Only in retrospect does he realize that he lost his power anyways. Now he has a criminal record and has to pay for the vehicle damages. No one can take away your power. We either keep it, give it away, or try to use to to control.

2) Brain chemistry creates an actual physical addiction. We've all heard of the differences between healthy compassionate love and lust/infatuation. A Time Magazine article states that lust is fueled by testosterone. Compassionate love involves the neurotransmitters vasopressin and oxytocin. In a more romantic type love, there is a higher degree of passion. This passion engages the same dopamine system that is utilized in obsessive drives like drug and gambling addictions. Now this usually is a good thing. Being "Addicted to Love" like many love ballads proclaim, is real and it's generally beneficial to some degree. It's part of the glue that keeps us coming back to the person to work things out after an argument. It's part of a healthy heartache when we miss someone. Our minds set up actual, physical, neurological pathways dedicated to that person. Imagine a network of fiber optic cables running through your brain, all assigned solely for your thoughts and actions involving your lover. Now imagine how anchored some of these pathways can be fixed in your brain after a lengthy or intense relationship. Research proves that dismantling this bond can be as difficult as quitting a heroine addiction! We literally crave the other person like a drug. The fear of losing the ability to satisfy our dopamine urges, can influence us to do crazy things just like any drug addict.

Combine the fear of losing power with our dopamine addiction, and it's a wonder we don't tread on the pathway of insanity more often. But of course, we can train ourselves to manage both. A good place to start is reading up on the subject. I would suggest reading a book like When Love Meets Fear by David Richo. It's a little out there in the holistic, healing side at times, but it offers excellent advice. We can also give ourselves more options before we are presented with such a fear evoking scenario. As humorous as it might sound, while we are in a sane state of mind we can imagine painful scenarios and then the terrible possible consequences if we chose to respond out of control. Then we will already have healthy alternatives and coping strategies in place if the painful event does happen. Usually problems such as cheating are preceded by a long list of suspicions. The time to prepare for the worst is not when the storm finally hits. Instead, we should begin to manage our emotions when we feel the winds start to change.