Intimacy, hormones, and fiction genres

Intimacy, hormones, and fiction genres

What happens when, for instance, a trekker meets another trekker or a poet meets another poet or an artist comes across another artist or a movie-enthusiast meets another movie-fan or a tech-fanatic meets another gadget-lover or a traveler meets another travel-enthusiast or a married person meets another married person? They share concerns, they talk about the problems they face, they seek solutions, and then if professional rivalry doesn’t raise its head or if one-upmanship doesn’t pop up, they evolve to the next obvious stage, that is, they get drawn into becoming intimate friends. They could both be from the same or from the opposite sex. They do not necessarily have to take their relationship to the bedroom… or some shady motel somewhere… or behind the bushes, if I may add for good effect.

To move on, intimacy is not just about eye-contact and touch, but also about bonds creating relationships that last. These bonds are born when thoughts and words in the form of conversations meander seamlessly between actions that are called intimate. Hugging, cuddling, and even sexual intercourse, if I may add, are just other actions that may happen when intimacy gets stronger and bolder… and persons of the same sex may experience them all in addition to the usual male-female equations. The keyword for intimacy is ‘nearness’ or ‘proximity’ and the main triggers are generally revolving around shared sensibilities, ideas, and subsequently the desire to open up personal spaces. Without conversations and time spent appreciating each other’s social and other concerns, any relationship is bound to remain a mismatched output of an over-dose of an unhealthy mix of diverse hormones. Obviously then, an intimate relationship isn’t always between a male and a female but can be between two persons of the same sex. In simple words, physical intimacy resulting in sex is more of an evolution of feelings and definitely not something that one rushes into blindly.

This does not mean that every time two males or two females have heart-felt conversations and share each other’s sensibilities, they are going to wind up in bed together. What this implies is that intimacy can be with or without sex popping up like an insistent necessity. I know of friends who hug each other, share intimate concerns, and sometimes even let their helplessness about situations crop up in conversations. Relationships are solution-seeking devices that we are embedded with. Relationships are about talking to each other to mitigate problems and conflicts that happen all the time. Relationships are definitely not aiming to always lead two intimate friends to have sex. Wikipedia writes: ‘It is possible to be physically intimate with someone without actually touching them; however, a certain proximity is necessary. For instance, a sustained eye contact is considered a form of physical intimacy, analogous to touching. When a person enters someone else’s personal space for the purpose of being intimate, it is physical intimacy, regardless of the lack of actual physical contact.’ Allow me to explain intimacy and the role of hormones by talking about fiction genres like fantasy, science fiction, horror, historical, mystery, young adult, children, domestic, adventure, speculative, family, political, western, invasion, absurdist, hysterical, mythopoeia, philosophical, humorous, suspense, crime, detective, melodrama, romps, tragicomedies and legal. There are others as well, but I intend to pick just a few of the few mentioned here to connect intimacy with hormones.

Intimacy, hormones, and fiction genres

Desire, attraction, and attachment happen in the order mentioned. This sequence has nothing to do with an overtly physical intimacy that is sexual in nature. According http://www.swiftwatermedical.com/facial-peels-chemical-peels-facials/ even our hormones do not push us into any action that is socially undesirable. When a relationship is getting all the right ingredients in the form of cosy discussions and meaningful expressions and positive body language, the heart-rate goes up, attention spans get better, adventurous in-roads into previously unshared moments happen, spontaneous touching enters, personal spaces get dissolved, and a social bonding emerges. Hormones and True Pheromones help accelerate all this. Hormones like epinephrine, dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, and vasopressin do their job well. Take care to understand that though specific genres are mentioned with each hormone but this does not mean that other hormones are absent. Men suffering from ED may also notice their sex lives suffering. Thankfully, there are now vitality supplements like Red Boost that can help cure impotence.

Epinephrine, for instance, the ‘fight-or-flight’ hormone secreted by the medulla oblongata of the adrenal glands happily increases heart-rate to let you know that you like the way things are progressing. Palpitations may increase and perspiration may also be there… but these happen when, for instance, the protagonist in a thriller knows he has zeroed-in on the culprit and knows that his tryst with another operation is imminent. Something like this may also happen in a romance when the lovers feel they are about to be discovered by a nosy neighbor. Even in fantasy, horror, and science fiction we see this hormone pursuing characters relentlessly. However, in a normal relationship, epinephrine makes a suitor shy away when intentions are other than thoughts and ideas that need to be shared to nurture.

Another neurotransmitter produced in substanta nigra and the ventral tegmental area of the brain is dopamine and is deeply connected to a feeling of pleasure and thus has a lot to do with love. Dopamine is a ‘feel-good’ hormone and when this one gets going, attention spans, memory, adventure, and risk-taking goes up as a natural phenomenon. In any relationship it is that initial burst of lust that ultimately gives way to a more sublime form of love. Dopamine is also bringing people together in its own way. We find a lot of this hormone in adventures, westerns, suspense, crime, and detective fiction where characters are forever creating relationships sometimes triggered by complementing music or when the surrounding colours are helpful. In a hall full of strangers, it is dopamine that pushes a person to go out of his or her comfort zone to initiate a conversation with another attractive person and this is what being adventurous or being inclined to take risks is all about. The relationship may very well progress into the first stage of love if it must happen, but until then, things must remain platonic. You can read more on the difference Platonic and Non-Platonic to gain a deeper understanding of this kind of love.

Serotonin is another neurotransmitter that fascinates me because unlike others, it is found in the gastro-intestinal tract, platelets, and the central nervous system and initiates that essential burst of infatuation. Look at mysteries and you’ll know how one seemingly unrelated clue becomes an obsession and the protagonist pursues it until it finally emerges as the vital link to a solution. In real life too, every relationship does begin with some form of infatuation and the trigger could be a smile, a glance, the way a word is said, a choice of clothes, the way a question in a conversation is answered… the options are endless. However, serotonin alone cannot be blamed for anything unsavory in a relationship because it is simply laying a path to intimacy and never constructing bedrooms right in the middle of any.

Now we come to the hormone that promotes and encourages cuddles and feelings of love in a rather positive way. Oxytocin is produced by the hypothalamus and its main task is to prepare mothers for childbirth. We see a lot of its work in fiction that deals with romance, family, young adult, and philosophical genres. Togetherness and comfort with complex ideas and complex psyches need a lot of cuddles and positivity and one weaves through oceans of these in such genres. Oxytocin also increases during active phases of love, sexual intercourse, hugging, and touching and one sees so less of it in hard-core mysteries and thrillers. In a real life relationship, oxytocin surrounds actions with its subtle protective gears and tells every character that even if there must be sexual intercourse it has to be between partners who appreciate and approve of its arrival.

Vasopressin is the last hormone in my list for this post and it is called the anti-diuretic hormone or the ADH that is released and stored in the pituitary gland in the brain below the hypothalamus. In reality this hormone has everything to do with controlling water content in the body and goes along with oxytocin to create and promote bonds between two persons. In real life wherever we see someone successfully creating invincible social bonding, it is this combination at work. Most genres of fiction have a natural tendency to thrust forth pair formation and social approvals and we must be thankful to both vasopressin and oxytocin for this.

Physical intimacy isn’t evil

It is said that fiction is merely a reflection of reality and we have seen that intimacy has simply too many forms that are not always physical. Fiction has instances of physical intimacy where the story demands it and sounds appropriate when the writer understands the way hormones work. Physical intimacy becomes an evil force only when a ‘nay’ is either suppressed or is misinterpreted to be a ‘yeah’. Whenever this happens it is the result of an over-dose of misaligned hormones kicking up a storm. However, when hormonal secretions happen in the sequence for which they are trained, a relationship has the validity and sanction to evolve from a glance to a touch to a cuddle and onwards.

I guess it is only right for any relationship to have a healthy mix of surprise, wit, and depth, meandering between mystery, adventure, and risk-taking to finally be called love.