On the comment box of my post “The Emotional Affair,” Beyond Blue reader Michael wrote:

I’m totally confused and caught up in this person. Some years go by without us speaking, but we always come back to each other. Convenience, you say, or possibly hoping for the best. I don’t now. The problem is that I’m hopelessly in love with this person and willing to give up all in every way there needs. But relationships are severely limited. You can justify anything in this world, especially the things you want most. The feeling of love is exceedingly strong and seductive, as is the feeling to be needed and to be loved. So I search spiritually, mentally …

If you read all the comments on the affair post and others like “12 Ways to End Addictive Relationships,” you might curse God for creating romance. After all, it’s like a drug (quite literally with all the dopamine and oxytocin that infatuation dumps into our systems) that drives us to do crazy things, like drive across the country in diapers (remember… the astronaut?).

Because I’ve read so many tales of heartaches from Beyond Blue readers, and I want to know what, if anything, I should say, I studied Time Magazine’s special issue awhile back on love and chemistry. The science of romance is fascinating to me because for some susceptible people, the rush involved in new love mimics a good buzz from drugs. Addiction is born very easily in the body of a person who craves the ecstasy created by elevated levels of dopamine and oxytocin in our blood.

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