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If you're not feeling the love this Valentine's Day, you may want to check your oxytocin level.
Produced mainly in the hypothalamus, oxytocin, also called the love hormone, may be responsible for our ability to have healthy relationships and to simply like people more. Oxytocin is the chemical that bonds mother and child and was previously thought just to be associated to birth and lactation. However, further research shows that it's also secreted within the testes, is present during ejaculation and may play a role in male reproductive.
Oxytocin is responsible for our feel good emotions of love, infatuation and pleasant memories. It activates our ability to trust, act with generosity and seek out social situations. It deceases anxiety and anti-social behavior. Studies done by Professor Carol Ryff at Penn State University reveal that levels of oxytocin have been linked to lowering blood pressure and heart rate.
Oxytocin Deceases Anxiety and Anti-Social Behavior
In other words, we don't just want love, we need it. A lack of or low quality relationships are a precursor to an increased risk of premature death. Studies at the University of Illinois showed that when test animals that were isolated, i.e. socially stressed, were given oxytocin they did not demonstrate the normal findings of depression, anxiety or cardiac stress. Stressful events can be greatly alleviated when we have personal contact with others. Without healthy oxytocin levels, the drive to seek social contact is diminished.
Increase Your Oxytocin Level For a Happier, Healthy, Longer Life
- Smile. To yourself or to others, which is a double whammy if you get a smile back.
- Touch or be touched. A traditional form of healing, "hands on" can lower blood pressure, diminish aches and pains and increases oxytocin.
- Get a massage or body care treatment. Self-care does more than make you look good.
- Practice body/mind therapy like yoga, Tai Chi, mediation and breath work.
- Go maternal. Caring for others including animals stimulates that loving feeling.
- Lose the fear and anger. Nothing will block release of oxytocin like negative feelings. The less you dwell in the negative the more love you will feel.
- Fall in love with another or just life itself. Love is a magnet; if you can feel it, sooner or later you will attract it.
- Enjoy loving, orgasmic sex. Women have enhanced production of oxytocin when they are in committed relationships.
- Try serotonin 5-HPT. Drugs and alcohol affect the serotonin receptors in the brain. 5-HPT supplements have a kinder, gentler and saner effect on your psyche.
Save on 5-HPT at Vitabase Health Supplements.
Nasal Sprays - Remedies or Risks
Oxytocin nasal sprays are readily available on the internet. The sprays are not classified as a drug and, thus, not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration. Therefore, the risks and side effects of these sprays are undetermined. Prescription oxytocin is prescribed to start or increase breast milk in nursing mothers. Oral oxytocin is destroyed in the gastrointestinal tract and has a half-life of about three minutes in the blood stream.
The potential effectiveness of nasal oxytocin is disputed given the minuscule amount contained in the various products. Risks, however, are possible and include interference with prescription medications and with management efforts in treating blood pressure and heart function. Another interesting side effect of using nasal oxytocin is in its ability to increase trust to the point of the user takes risks not otherwise considered.
Until more is known, go natural and find the love within
Read more about oxytocin at Hug the Monkey, founded by Susan Kuchinskas author of Chemistry of Connection. How the Oxycotin Response Can Help You Find Trust, Intimacy and Love.
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