Irreconcilable Indifferences

My girlfriend of two years seems to be gradually moving me out of her life. Seeing her two or three times a week has dwindled into maybe once -- and no overnights. She'll meet me at the movies and then ditch me afterward, saying she's got a bunch of things to do. She denies anything's wrong, claiming she's just "very busy." I think there's more to it.

--Left Hanging

It seems you're right; she's really looking forward to your dates -- the way a cow looks forward to a personal tour of the slaughterhouse. People talk about what a high falling in love is, and they aren't wrong, because their body's basically in the throes of a biochemical drug binge. University of Pisa psychiatrist Donatella Marazziti looked at blood samples of people who'd been madly in love for less than six months and found that they had serotonin levels comparable to people diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder. Luckily, obsessively having sex is more fun than obsessively washing your hands. Falling in love also alters testosterone levels -- though differently in men and women. Men's drops -- making them more cuddlywuddly -- and women's goes up, increasing their interest in sex. Unfortunately, this increased interest is temporary. Marazziti found that T levels went back to normal between the one- and two-year mark -- which is when the feeling "We're perfect for each other!" can start to be replaced by "We're perfect for other people." This may be how she's been feeling. To get an answer -- beyond knee-jerk denials that anything's wrong -- email her. Ask her whether you two have a problem, and tell her to take a couple of days to think about it. Upon reflection, she should either decide to try to fix things or break up with you -- and not in a way that mimics continental drift.