What Is Broken Heart Syndrome And What Causes It?

When Love Hurts: What Is Broken Heart Syndrome and What Causes It - How Missing Someone You Deeply Love Can Trigger a Real, Physical Heartbreak.

Love is one of humanity’s most potent forces. A strong, emotional, loving connection brings us joy, meaning, safety and sometimes, almost unbearable pain.

What many people don’t realise is that in certain extreme emotional situations such as when you deeply miss someone, or when a needed and perfectly aligned and compatible union between two people madly in love is delayed, or during a painful breakup, love can trigger not just emotional suffering, but fundamental, measurable changes in the heart. 😱🤯❤️‍🩹

This post explores what broken heart syndrome is and what causes it, with a special focus on how a beautifully intense and natural true love connection and bond in rare but real cases, can provoke this medical condition. This can also be true for passionate romantic love, separation, longing, traumatic but sometime unavoidable delays in relationship commitments, or emotional conflict.

I’ll explain the physiology, the risk factors, statistical evidence, and practical steps to protect yourself.

I aim to help you understand enough so you can see the truth: love doesn’t always heal without cost but you can learn to guard your heart. 💔❤️‍🩹

What is Broken Heart Syndrome?

Before diving into causes related to love, separation, and longing, let’s define broken heart syndrome clearly.

• Medical name: Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, also called stress‐induced cardiomyopathy or apical ballooning syndrome. Wikipedia

• Description: It is a sudden, temporary weakening of the heart muscle (most often the left ventricle) triggered by intense emotional or physical stress. The heart’s ability to pump blood is disrupted, not by blocked coronary arteries (as in heart attacks), but by other mechanisms, often hormonal or nervous system-driven. Cleveland Clinic

• Symptoms: These often mimic a heart attack: chest pain, shortness of breath, palpitations, and sometimes fainting. There may be arrhythmias, changes on ECG, and biomarkers of heart stress. Cleveland Clinic

• Prognosis: The condition is usually temporary thankfully and many people recover fully within days to weeks; however, sometimes, complications (rare) can occur.

  
  

What Causes Broken Heart Syndrome & How Missing Someone You Love Can Be a Trigger

1. Emotional Stress & Hormonal Surge

• When you love someone deeply, separation or rejection or delay can create intense emotional stress: grief, longing, worry, uncertainty.

• The body responds to severe emotional stress by releasing stress hormones, including adrenaline, noradrenaline (also known as norepinephrine), and cortisol. These can be beneficial in small doses, but in large surges, they can have toxic effects on heart muscle cells. Harvard Health

• These hormones may cause microvascular dysfunction (spasms or constrictions of small blood vessels in the heart) or stunning of the myocardium (the heart muscle), resulting in part of the ventricle failing to contract normally. Cleveland Clinic.
  

2. Psychological Pain, Loss, Grief

• The death of a loved one is a classic trigger. However, loss also comes in other forms: a breakup, rejection, being separated from someone you love who is in another relationship, or when timing and circumstances (e.g., one or both people being "stuck" in an existing relationship commitment) delay the union that feels like it should be destined to be and inevitable at some point in the future.

• These kinds of emotional misses or losses often include feelings of helplessness, despair, rumination, possibly guilt or shame, all intensifying the stress.

• The literature confirms that marriage status is relevant: being widowed, divorced or separated is associated with elevated odds of TTS (takotsubo) compared to being happily married. PMC.
  

3. Risk Factors That Make Someone More Vulnerable

• Age and Sex: Women, especially post-menopausal, are far more likely to develop it.

• Pre-existing mental health issues: anxiety, depression, raises risk. If someone is already emotionally fragile, longings or breakups may hit harder. Mayo Clinic.
  

4. Types of Emotional Triggers

Some emotional triggers are more intense or more likely to lead to Broken Heart Syndrome:

• The death of someone close.

• Breakups or divorce.

• Arguments, betrayal.

• Long and ongoing periods of unfulfilled love or "waiting" when you can’t yet be with the person you truly love, or when love is not openly expressed leading to lack of commitment.

• Emotional conflict arises when one partner is or feels stuck or trapped in an existing broken relationship. A relationship that is no longer loving, supportive, compatible or aligned to their life visions, beliefs, wants, needs and desires, (due to ethical, moral or complex circumstances or timing), yet they are deeply and truly in love with another. This can create high internal stress, guilt, shame, and longing.
  

5. Physiological Cascade

Putting it all together, here is the sequence (simplified) of what may happen in extreme emotional circumstances:

1. Emotional stressor: e.g. romantic separation, unfulfilled longing, delayed union, betrayal.

2. Immediate psychophysiological reaction: intense emotions → activation of the sympathetic nervous system (fight/flight), surge of stress hormones.

3. Cardiac response: Stress hormones affect blood vessels (microvessels), possibly causing them to constrict and reduce blood flow. The heart muscle may become “stunned,” particularly if part of the left ventricle fails to contract properly.

4. Symptoms: chest pain, breathlessness, weakness, palpitations, feeling like a heart attack.

5. Medical reaction: seeking treatment, ECG, imaging, tests to rule out blocked arteries.

6. Recovery or complication: In most cases, this is completely and fully reversible. But if compounded by other risk factors (physical illness, age, delay in seeking help), complications can occur.

   
   

Real Case Scenarios: Missing Someone or Delayed Love Bonding

• Delayed love due to an existing relationship: Imagine this scenario: Person A has fallen in love with Person B, but Person B is already committed elsewhere - perhaps in a broken relationship; but circumstances, timing, ethics, morals and family obligations, relationship status and other factors prevent them from being together at the moment unless they are both prepared to bravely face and carefully and respectfully plan the transition to be together in love and life. However, in the interim period, the longing, guilt, emotional conflict, secrets, and isolation may build. The unresolved tension keeps stress levels elevated.

• Breakup when deeply in love: When someone you see as irreplaceable is gone, when plans, hopes and dreams are shattered, when hopes tied to that relationship collapse suddenly, these are intense emotional shocks.

• The more intense the emotional love bond and aligned connection, the greater the potential for extreme physiological stress responses.
  

  

What is Broken Heart Syndrome Not

To make sure you understand what this isn’t, it’s as important to distinguish:

• It is not the same as a myocardial infarction (a standard heart attack) caused by blocked arteries. In broken heart syndrome, the coronary arteries are usually clear. Harvard Health

• It is not just emotional or metaphorical; it's not merely "just heartbreak" in the sense of being sad, but it can be physically dangerous.

• It is not permanent in most cases, it is temporary, but can have lasting psychological effects or physical complications for some people in rare cases.

• It is not purely predictable, you can experience intense love, a long separation, or a longing to be with the love of your life and still never develop it. Still, under some extreme combinations of stressors, it becomes possible.

  
  

Why “What Is Broken Heart Syndrome And What Causes It” Matters Especially in Love and Relationships

Putting emotion and physiology together gives us insight:

• Strong emotional love increases vulnerability. Vulnerability in love and connection is a very good thing, but love isn’t neutral; it primes your brain to invest, to hope, to dream, to ride the highs, the absences, the delays etc and rejections even if temporary rejections hit way more sharply.

• Emotional attachment means loss is more than change; it is identity change (future expectations lost, safety shaken).

• When people are unable to express love, or are forced to suppress it (more often than not) or are trapped between existing commitments and new deep feelings, there’s often an added layer of conflict or guilt, which tends to amplify stress beyond sadness.

• The timing matters: cumulative stress (waiting, uncertainty, unfulfillment) can weaken resilience. Then, a sudden or sometimes even a gradual event (such as a breakup, realisation, confrontation, or rejection due to difficult circumstances or timing) can tip someone over into a physiological crisis.

  
  

Steps & Practical Advice: How to Protect Yourself & Heal

Because “what is broken heart syndrome and what causes it” is not just for knowledge: There are things you can do if you find yourself in one of these painful love situations, to reduce risk and heal more quickly and safely.

Recognise the emotional stress

• Be honest with yourself: you feel intense longing, loneliness, guilt, and conflict.

• Notice physical symptoms: chest tightness, palpitations, breathlessness. Not always when exercising, but sometimes when thinking or being reminded of the person or situation.

Seek emotional support early

• Talk with a trusted friend, mentor, counsellor, or therapist like myself about what you’re going through.

• Sharing your burden can reduce isolation and help regulate emotional responses.

  
  

Manage the stress physiologically

• Practices like mindfulness, deep breathing, meditation, and yoga.

• Regular exercise helps regulate stress hormones.

• Adequate sleep and good nutrition to bolster resilience.

• Recognising what you can’t control (timing, other people’s situation, external constraints) and focusing on what you can control (your thoughts, actions, healing).

  
  

Consider professional help

• If symptoms of anxiety, depression, or physical symptoms arise (especially chest pain, breathlessness), get a medical check-up to rule out heart issues as soon as possible.

• Psychological therapy can help you process grief, attachment, relationship delays and or rejection.

  
  

Reframe the situation and build new meaning

• Sometimes, waiting, unresolved longing, or delay can leave one feeling powerless and in extreme cases, traumatised. Finding purpose, setting new priorities, or investing in yourself can help reduce emotional inertia.

• Cultivate practices of gratitude, new hopes, even if the relationship you desire can’t achieved and you can't be together at this moment in time. Have faith in positive outcomes and learn to trust your inner voice, your instincts and timing.

  
  

Medical follow-up if needed

• If by chance someone actually develops symptoms of broken heart syndrome, go to the hospital. Tests such as ECG, blood markers, echocardiography, and imaging will help distinguish broken heart syndrome from a heart attack. Cleveland Clinic

• Broken heart syndrome usually resolves on its own, and as it is often a temporary syndrome, the heart can often return back to normal relatively quickly.
  

Conclusion

What is broken heart syndrome, and what causes it? It is not just a poetic notion - it is a real, diagnosable condition known medically as Takotsubo or stress cardiomyopathy.

It is caused by a variety of intense emotional or physical stress; in love, that means longing, separation, betrayal, delay, loss.

Though extremely rare, particularly in younger people, the risk is real, especially for women, those with preexisting emotional vulnerability, or when the emotional bond, connection and alignment between two people is exceptionally special, rare and super deep.

Challenging circumstances or timing can sometimes traumatically force separation or delay in a couple being able to officially get together and form the true love relationship that both ultimately desire and know is possible due to the strength of their unique connection and unbreakable love bond.

If you are someone experiencing the severe ache of missing someone you love deeply, feeling caught between love and life’s complications, know this: your pain is rare but valid.

However, you do have tools to protect your heart, both emotionally and physically. Seeking support, naming what you feel, regulating stress, self-care, and sometimes therapy - all these are ways to reduce the chance that heartache or heartbreak becomes a medical issue.

Finally, let this knowledge both humble and empower you: love in its depths can hurt like crazy, but knowing what is broken heart syndrome and what causes it gives you the power to care for your heart, so that when the love connection is right, and if applicable, the circumstances and timing finally align, you’re in a place to receive it, not be crushed by it.

Had you heard about broken heart syndrome before you read my blog post? Do you know of anyone in your life who has ever experienced "broken heart syndrome"?

If you've been touched by the emotional impact of todays blog post and you're interested in learning more about how I can provide proven and empowered coping strategies for your love life or the love life that you desire, feel free to reach out to me here so that I can guide you today. You will have the flexibility to speak with me directly and privately at a date and time to suit you.

If you'd like to take action now, you can join my waiting list for my 'Harmful to Healthy Relationships Course' which will be launched soon. A proven way to change your current reality, change your toxic cycle and find love. Click here to be first in the queue!

Always here,

Livia