Attachment and Sex After Marriage: A Good Biological Reason?

 

Seriously: what's wrong with me?

 

Oxytocin (the "attachment/trust" hormone), phenethylamine, and a number of other explainable processes. Does it comfort me to be able to blame my nostalgic love nonsense on biological phenomena? Yes, very much so. Does it lead me to further thoughts on whether to or how to help myself and others, specifically women, be prevented from feeling so helpless in the future? Does it make me think about  to what extent is it better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all? You bet.

 

Love, be it between a parent and child or between a couple, is a strange thing, and a rather addictive thing. There is strong reason to believe that attachment patterns formed since birth between a child and his/her primary caregiver give rise to attachment patterns or expectations in relationships developed later in life. My parents absolutely doused me in physical affection and emotional support, fostering my curiosity and my self esteem. My mother has always been a stay-at-home mom, and my dad never took business trips. The love they provided me at an early age has made me significantly more willing/able/unafriad to pursue loving relationships with my peers in adolescence and adulthood. However, my capacity to love has been a blessing and a burden.

 

I am a loyal person, and I trust people easily because I was never given reason not to when I was little, but I've had to learn the hard way that trust isn't always-- isn't usually-- the best reaction. I would have fared marvelously in the age of hunters and gatherers, playing the proper and necessary role of an emotionally invested female: "A monogamous pair, each with specialized roles and responsibilities, provided a context to enhance survival and offer maximal protection and nurturance to their offspring. This social arrangement required a sense of loyalty, deeply felt emotional attachment, and commitment to mutual goals."[1 http://library.adoption.com/articles/attachment-biology-evolution-and-environment.html] But life isn't like that anymore. There are more than enough people from which to choose a mate, and more than enough babies already born and in need of a loving parent. Additionally, individuals are self-sufficient, and no longer need the gender roles of a male hunter and a female nurturer as humans did when environmental conditions were more threatening. Alright, so I'll make a loyal companion and a great mother because I'm prewired to attach, to trust, and to love. But why, if in my Neocortex I have reasoned that I will not be a mother anytime soon and that I have no real need for a boyfriend, can't I simply choose to move on and be done with it?

 

It turns out my "'prewired' attachment" was brought out by "the necessary external (parental) ingredients,"[1] and I am forever chemically prone to falling in love, and hard. Can something as simple as childhood attachment behaviors really pave the road for the rest of a love life?

 

It all starts with a meaningful look, "chemistry," as we appropriately call it. Chemistry can occur at points in your life when you are far away from thoughts of family planning; procreation is wedged into many of the choices we make as a species intent on surviving. When falling in love, the body produces phenethylamine, a psychoactive drug that stimulates hormones such as adrenalin. [2 http://clinical-psychology.suite101.com/article.cfm/broken_heart_syndrome] Adrenalin causes those initial love highs and feelings of exhilaration. When a relationship gets more serious, new hormones are introduced that are even more addictive than this adrenalin rush. "During sex, opium-like substances known as endorphins are produced," along with a hormone called oxytocin. Oxytocin, nicknamed the attachment hormone, also occurs after a woman gives birth, making her affinity for and attachment to her baby skyrocket. This is obviously an effective biological use of oxytocin. But with sex, it is a different matter, and a somewhat gendered one, too. According to Crichton-Mille (2005), oxytocin levels rise in men “by three to five times during orgasm,” while those in women increase “even more and seem to climb with every subsequent” climax. In other words, falling in love is addictive because the body "behaves as if it is under the influence of a narcotic." [3 http://clinical-psychology.suite101.com/article.cfm/broken_heart_syndrome] Do the increased levels of oxytocin in females account for the stereotype that women are more emotionally attached than men? Quite possibly. I am not totally crazy for still missing my ex. A biological need is no longer being met.

 

But to avoid the pain, perhaps prudish social expectations that have been largely disregarded in the past forty years in American culture (since the cliché free love/sexual revolution of the 1960s?) should be reconsidered. Sex after marriage might have a strong justification in the biological effects of sex. I've often questioned and criticized the institution of marriage, believing that people should naturally stay with whom they love-- but love necessitates trust and trust comes in more than just a rational form: it's chemical, too. Deciding to have one partner, at least for women, will likely make them much more mentally content because of the biological attachment formed after sex to that specific person.

 

"Love" as defined here may be free, but it isn't necessarily healthy in heavy doses. Social rules such as marriage, and perhaps even the stigma connected to losing virginity in some cultures exist for biologically sound reasons. Speaking from my own experience, if you can bear the aftermath of a broken heart, then in retrospect and with time, the love experienced was worth it. But be warned: the sudden loss of love "shocks the body's chemistry and produces a number of intense changes in physical behavior," and symptoms include chest pain, breathing difficulties, fluid in lungs, elevated adrenalin levels (up to 35 times higher than normal), low blood pressure, and heart irregularities. [3]. "Broken heart syndrome" can even mimic a heart attack.

 

Personally, I cannot say whether I choose to love or whether I am chemically programmed to love; all I can say is that with equal uncertainty I have had to handle loss. Is it my fault that I failed to think ahead and prevent myself from feeling painful loss? Or is the pain as unavoidable as my biological predisposition to attach to people, i.e. to love? It is an interesting mix of instinct and choice that humans, especially women, are presented with in regards to love. The same balance between choice and instinct may be considered in all human desires.