Now we know it’s true. True love can last forever. At least so say scientists at Stony Brook University in New York. Using brain scans, they have found that about ten percent of couples feel the thrill of first love with their partner until they die.

For most of us, according to research, this feeling fades fast. In just over a year. Britain’s Sunday Times explains that researchers scanned the brains of couples who have been together for over twenty years and compared them with scans from couples who were new lovers. Based on chemical reactions in the brain, ten percent of long-time couples had the same reactions as newbies when shown a picture of their mate.

Research (gotta love those researchers!) also shows that first-love, raise-the-hair-on-your-neck, make-you-crazy, in-love feelings die off completely for the rest of us after ten years. So…if you are not within the ten percent and have been married for over ten years, maybe it’s time to get those chemicals racing again.

“The findings go against the traditional view of romance…that it drops off sharply in the first decade…but we are sure it’s real,” said Arthur Aron, psychologist at Stony Brook University.