Crushes Make Everyone Embarrassing, Not Just You

Collage: Channing Smith. Images: Getty Images

Once I had a crush on a boy with an Italian-sounding last name. He and his family were English-speaking Americans, yet in an attempt to prove my love to him, I taught myself (basic) Italian with Rosetta Stone.

This went over about as well as you'd imagine, but my questionable behavior persisted. Every phase I went through through my mid 20s was also a case of being too “down bad”: I rode my yellow beach cruiser around LA because I liked a guy who was into cycling, dyed my hair dark and cut bangs because the next one I liked “into French girls,” and moved to the same neighborhood to be closer to another after graduating.

If you’re thinking that some things are so cringeworthy they can and should stay in the drafts, know that nothing I’ve described is unique. Regardless of age, gender, or sexual orientation, almost everyone has done something foolish to get closer to a crush—and publicly admitting these acts has become a viral trend.

On TikTok, thousands of users are sharing their similarly embarrassing anecdotes of embarrassing or bizarre things they’ve done—and posted—because of a crush, such as pretending to be a dancer, dressing up like and lip-syncing to Ariana Grande, and going so far as to perm their hair. Intrigued, I asked my own followers, friends, and colleagues what they’d done in the name of a crush.

“I pretended I was good at math and did my crush’s homework,” Lucy Weiss, a 25-year-old law student, says, while Chris M., a 33-year-old living in Boston, learned, lightly rewrote, rehearsed, and then performed the song “All I Ask of You” from The Phantom of the Opera in an attempt to ask his crush to be his girlfriend. “I thought it was the most romantic song I’d ever heard,” he tells Glamour. “It didn’t work.”

Jim S., on the other hand, was so committed that he learned origami. “With absolutely no background, I learned how to fold the Kawasaki rose, which is definitely not a form for beginners,” he says. “I folded enough to make a bouquet of them for my crush's birthday, which was equivalent to her new age.” Your move, Netflix.

One writer followed her crush to a different high school. “I begged my mom to let me switch schools because I heard a rumor my crush was going there after graduation,” Lily P. says. Clearly, having a crush can affect anyone, and it can drive us to do some questionable things. But why?

According to psychologists, crush-induced brain chemicals mimic the feeling of actual intoxication. “When someone has a crush, they’ll experience the release of dopamine, causing people to feel pleasure and euphoria,” says psychiatrist Ashwini Nadkarni MD, an assistant professor of psychology at Harvard Medical School. “The release of another neurotransmitter, norepinephrine, is also triggered, which causes people to feel alert.”

Since having a crush is not unlike taking a drug, according to clinical psychologist Marcia Longley, PhD, a relationship expert at The Eternity Rose, it can “also cloud judgment and lead to irrational behavior, which can sometimes be quite embarrassing.” Hence the never-ending material everyone seems to have about our crush-induced decision-making skills.

“Crushes make us sometimes do silly, cringe-inducing things because we are chasing an attachment need: needing to feel loved and accepted,” Jenna Brownfield, PhD, LP, a Minneapolis psychologist, explains. “Our attempts to meet attachment needs aren’t always logical.”

I did some wild things because I thought they’d make my now husband like me; I ranted and raved about the world’s most boring classic literature because I thought it made me seem cool. However, now that I’m in a committed relationship, I couldn’t care less that he knows my favorite hobby is online shopping for beauty products and pet toys.

According to Erica Slotter, PhD, a social psychologist and associate professor at Villanova University’s Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, that’s because initial attraction—as in, a new crush—typically activates different neural circuits in our brains.

“In layman’s terms, this deals with motivation and reward, releasing dopamine and serotonin,” Dr. Slotter explains. “These neurotransmitters are released when we experience or expect something rewarding or pleasurable, meaning the euphoria experience when around a crush, motivation to spend more time with them, obsessive thoughts around them, and so on, are all largely attributable to increases in dopamine and, to some extent, serotonin, released during initial romantic attraction."

The other “system,” which can come later, regulates emotional bonding. “In primates, and many other species, a hormone called oxytocin is upregulated during social bonding activities, such as cuddling, kissing, and, among apes, grooming,” Dr. Slotter explains. “Scientists generally believe that this is the system that keeps us emotionally close and bonded with our deepest relationships. We see oxytocin increases in pregnant and nursing people, in parents hearing their babies cry, and when we kiss, cuddle, or orgasm with romantic partners.”

In romantic contexts, these two systems often work in tandem, Dr. Slotter says: “But they can be activated separately, which is why we can be attracted to someone but not have it truly be a crush or be emotionally bonded to someone we aren’t sexually interested in.”

Actual science and brain chemistry aside, crushes also feel intoxicating because they provide a reprieve from the real world. “Crushes allow us to access different parts of ourselves and play with different versions of reality,” says Jasmonae Joyriel, PsyD, a licensed clinical psychologist. “They can allow us to escape the mundane, and add spark and spontaneity to our day if only for fleeting moments, allowing you to be the director and star of your own private production.”

That’s why some mental health experts, like Lynn Zakeri, therapist and owner of Lynn Zakeri LCSW Clinical Service, think of crushes as “mini thought vacations.” “They remind us of our youth, when we were innocent, and a crush was our biggest thought before our mind got cluttered with responsibilities and stressors,” she says. “Being able to take a vacation in our mind even as we are older is like going back to a carefree time of a crush.”

It doesn’t have to end there, though. As I learned while researching crushes and what people have done as a result of them, I was surprised to hear that despite the cringe, sometimes they really do end happily, rendering the need for a mini thought vacation moot.

For example, while Lily didn’t end up with her crush, the school she chose because of him was a blessing in disguise. “It was a pretty prestigious school, so I unintentionally leveled up,” she says.

Remember Chris, Mr. Phantom of the Opera? His grand gestures eventually paid off. “A mutual friend told me that my crush lost her favorite shoes in a cab, so I rode around to every cab company’s lost and found and then to several Goodwills and Salvation Army stores to try and find them. I had a photo for reference,” he says. “I didn’t find them but I told her what I did while drunk at a party and she thought it was sweet ,and we did end up dating for a few months.”

Brancey M., a 34-year-old teacher in New York City, has a story worth mentioning too. “I tried to create and orchestrate a meet-cute with my crush at a café near where we were taking grad school classes. I was there so frequently that the barista knew my name, comped some of my drinks, and gave me a thumbs-up when we came in together,” she says. “I also started taking an extra train to spend time talking to him on our way home from class, but most egregious is that I allowed him to think I was super into stand-up.”

It may sound straight out of Sex and the City, but it’s real…and so is the ending. “It turns out he was trying just as hard to hang out, but we’re both stupid,” says Brancey. “Now we’re getting married.”

As for me? Eventually I learned my lesson. After pretending to genuinely love cleaning (?) and American football, and exclusively eating salads while “not not caring about astrology” for far too long, I gave up and let my crush turned boyfriend see me for who I really was: messy, makeup obsessed, and far more invested in our sun, moon, and rising signs than anything about the New England Patriots. (Reader, he married me.)

The real happily-ever-after, though, isn’t just that we survived our most cringeworthy behavior: It’s that, at the very least, we can all laugh about it now.

Danielle Sinay is the associate beauty editor at Glamour. Follow her on Instagram @daniellesinay.

Originally Appeared on Glamour