Love Is In The Brain – Not The Heart
Love Is In The Brain – Not The Heart, which is true of all emotions, actually. But that’s good news because it means we can better understand the source of love and emotions, and from there, we can learn to healthily interpret and react to them. How? And how does this relate on a blog about the issues surrounding addiction, substance abuse, and help for families of alcoholics?
Love is in the Brain – Not the Heart – which is true of all emotions.
One of the most heart- and gut-wrenching feelings comes from believing you are not important enough to your loved one for them to want to stop drinking. I know this was the case for me.
It took me F-O-R-E-V-E-R (as in decades) to finally understand the reason that I and/or my children were not important enough to make Alex* want to stop drinking. And the reason, stated simply, is that love – as with all emotions – originates in the brain, not the heart.
It took my understanding that alcohol dependence (aka alcoholism, one of the chronic, often relapsing brain diseases of addiction) causes chemical and structural changes in the brain that make the brain more vulnerable to the risk factors for developing severe substance use disorders. It is those changes that get in the way of emotions, memories, feelings and judgment. It is those changes that create cravings for alcohol that are three – five times stronger than our hardwired, instinctual cravings to eat food when hungry. It is those brain changes that get in the way of love. Why?
Because our brains control everything we think, feel, say and do, and alcohol dependence hijacks – takes control of, if you will – a person’s brain. And when a person drinks more than the brain and body can process – regardless of whether they have the brain disease of alcoholism – they change the way their brains work. This post explains why this is the case, “Understand How the Body Processes Alcohol – Reduce Secondhand Drinking.”
If only we did love with our hearts. Then, this brain disease — alcoholism — would not keep our loved ones from “loving” us the way we need and deserve to be loved. Nonetheless, it is entirely within our loved one’s control to do what it is they need to do to treat their disease and stop the drinking; sadly it’s hard for them to make that connection because of the kind of disease they have — alcoholism, a chronic, often relapsing brain disease.
And what does this mean to the person who loves an alcoholic or alcohol abuser? It means you can let go of the notion that your loved one doesn’t love you enough and that there is something you can say or do to make them. As long as their brain is compromised by alcohol, they can’t. To further understand how alcohol dependence (alcoholism) affects the brain of an alcoholic and the brain of the person who loves them, consider reading my latest book, 10th Anniversary Edition If You Loved Me, You’d Stop!
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*Alex is the composite I created in my book, 10th Anniversary Edition If You Loved Me, You’d Stop!, available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble. com and other retailers, as well as some libraries.
Updated January 2020.
Lisa Frederiksen
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