[L.P.]

Okay so I am not good at the whole feeling your feelings thing. I can identify angry when I feel it. I can identify amused when I feel it. Everything else is.. I dunno. I know I feel something when my heart rate gets elevated or I get to acting worked up or hyper, in a frenzy like. But I don't know what it is that I am feeling when that happens. If I can recall what happened to get my heart rate up, sometimes I can think back and insert the correct emotion word. But I don't really know if that is what I was feeling or if it's just the most suitable word. It all registers as general upset to me. That's how I have been viewing this problem I have. I also tend to think it's an autism component or some degree of alexythemia.

Now I have to wonder if it is neither of those things and some result of my life. It might be me detaching from emotions. Dissociation, right? I'm pretty sure that's what it really is and now is time for me to own that and work on the whole feeling feelings thing. I don't know how to do this though. When I do get to feeling internal upset (just me, on my own) it refuses to stick. Even when I am not fighting it, it's like my brain is still fighting me and saying nope. It stops right in the middle. I can go from zero to a thousand back to zero in half an hour or maybe even thirty seconds. I was talking to my spouse last night and I full blown flipped out on him and cried hysterically for like ten seconds then nothing... like pass the salt, wouldja, kinda nothing. And when I do feel things for longer... like the half hour type, it's like when it's over it's gone from my mind. Even though it happened to me, it's like it didn't. I have no idea how to move forward with this.

I have no idea how to make myself really understand that feeling is ok. I can say that it is, and I think I believe it is, but I guess I can't really believe it if I can't manage to do it, right? I dunno.

I guess I'm wondering if any of you know anything about learning to let yourself actually feel things. Can people do that? Are there books about that? As dreadful as this all seems to me, I would like to try to move forward with it, I just don't know how to proceed. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

-Veda

[elevatedsoul]

the body keeps the score talks about the brain functions and stuff... im not good with feelings... im trying to identify them but its messed up...

[amandalouise]

here in my location when a person cant identify their emotions and cant express their emotions its not a dissociative problem... its called lack of affect... it comes with many different mental physical and normal situations and can also be part of things like medication side effects, poor diet, lack of sleep.... gosh I could go on and on with all the different things this problem is associated with in my location.

here we have many great ways to learn about emotions and how to express them....

just about every yoga, meditation or sports/ leisure activity class teaches how to pay attention to ones body and emotions and how to express them in appropriate ways...

head start/ preschool and pre-k all teach children about emotions and how to recognize them and express them.

go to any elementary, jr high and high school and you can get great fliers and pamphlets on how these school levels are dealing with teaching their students about emotions and how to recognize their emotions and express them in appropriate ways.

work places usually have work related code of conduct orientations and HR office where people who work can talk to someone and learn how to recognize their emotions and express them appropriately on the job.

all treatment providers in my location are also great resources for being able to help someone to recognize their emotions and learn how to express them in appropriate ways, as do any medical treatment providers....

they all usually start by handing out the rights and responsibilities paperwork then hand out a paper or poster with all these pictures of faces in various states of emotions (if you google the words "emotions drawings" you will find many illustrations of the various papers with this)

from there they work on things like keeping a journal of when you notice you have felt these emotions and how you expressed them.

my standard suggestion is to re read any of your past posts here, when someone posts online they usually do contain information like how they felt and expressed their feelings about what ever the person is posting about. this may help you to see that you do feel emotions and know how to express them in appropriate ways during those times when you do feel you lack emotions and are having problems with whether or not you know how to express them.

[finding_my_way]

emotions are difficult. for me, a large part of my dissociation is linked to emotions. i dissociate when things feel too hard, dissociate when anxiety/panic/fear comes up, etc.

i also have a baseline mild numb depression, so that is part of what not feeling is related to for me also. i have an idea of things that make me feel kind of excited, content, etc. or things that cause me to feel anxious, frustrated, etc., but i normally only feel things more (and/or a wider range of things) when i feel something from one of the others or something reaches me enough (like a trigger) positive or negative if i am not dissociated so i can actually feel it..but if it's overwhelming (in a good or bad way), i also will be dissociated.

i don't know.

[Luce]

In my location (and pretty much anywhere really, because the symptoms of dissociation don't change from location to location, even if the understanding of it does) this can be part of a dissociative problem. Strong emotions that seem to go from an intensity of 10 to nothing at all are recognized by leading international researchers as being part and parcel of dissociative symptomology. Same thing for strong emotions that 'come out of nowhere'.
This happens to us a lot too. Like we have one little who has very intense fear, and whenever she makes an appearance we can go from 100% okay to a state of absolute terror in zero seconds flat. And then in an instant she can disappear and we just pick ourselves up and get on with whatever the heck we were doing. But for that time when she is out we are (she is) a freakin mess.
It kinda makes sense that you aren't familiar enough with those emotions to name them in you, since you don't seem to experience them as integrated emotion.

[ruh roh]

Originally Posted by L.P.

I guess I'm wondering if any of you know anything about learning to let yourself actually feel things. Can people do that? Are there books about that? As dreadful as this all seems to me, I would like to try to move forward with it, I just don't know how to proceed. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

-Veda

I don't know if books can help with this. A good therapist can, though. But they are hard to find.

It could totally be dissociation. No one here can tell you it's not. And like Luce said, the symptoms exist no matter what any particular state, county or country calls the sum total. I remember not long ago, during a therapy session, talking about one thing and crying but the crying didn't fit with what I was talking about--so I said to my therapist, "Why am I crying?" I don't remember what she said or we said after that, but I do know I can't read about this in a book or figure it out on my own. I hope you have someone in real life who can help you get connected to what the feelings are.

[amandalouise]

from L.P. post

"I guess I'm wondering if any of you know anything about learning to let yourself actually feel things. Can people do that? Are there books about that? As dreadful as this all seems to me, I would like to try to move forward with it, I just don't know how to proceed. Any thoughts would be appreciated."

one thing that helped me was when my treatment provider explained the difference between lack of affect and dissociation....

here dissociation is a normal reaction to a trigger.....

example being scared when a storm hit would cause me to feel numb, emotionless, detached emotionally from my body parts. like I was a watcher not a participant.

the solution to this kind of thing is learning how to not dissociate, learning things like breathing exercises, and other grounding techniques. by deep breathing and focusing outward on what is going on around me and stimulating my senses by smelling flavored foods and candles I was able to stop feeling dissociative kind of numbness.

where as lack of affect is when a person physically does not feel their emotions...

example when my medications or my bipolar disorders depression phase is causing me to have lack of affect I do not recognize my emotions. do not recognize being happy do not recognize the physical sensation of excitement, when someone tells a joke I do not feel that urge to laugh or smile, my expression is flat emotionless. if someone asked me what I was feeling I would say "I dont know what is a feeling?" if someone asked me what does feeling happy feel like my answer would be "I dont know what is happy" when experiencing lack of affect I may also laugh at something sad or when someone gets hurt rather than show sympathy or cry, I might show anger or cry during something that would be exciting or happy for others.

Some people that I know when feeling lack of affect sometimes bait others into making others feel bad or upset just to make others express their own emotions to take the focus of my own lack of emotions.

example someone I know at work will read an article and there may be something in it that she doesnt like, she cant at that moment write/ email to the publisher so instead of acting appropriately by saying you know every time I read this I see thingss I dont like so Im not going to read this anymore. this co worker tries to pull other co workers into her mental struggle. she walked over to me and said here can you read this and tell me what you think, doesnt it make you angry, or this person just doesnt know what they are talking about I bet when you read this it will make you angry. yesterday instead of getting pulled into her dramatics I turned the problem back to her by saying I didnt have time to read it but if it makes her feel angry or upset then dont read that article any more. this co worker looked at me with this flat stare to see if I was going to change my mind then went back to work. so far today she hasnt tried to make her problem mine. I know this co worker is on medication that is preventing her from showing emotions and expressing emotions correctly but its my choice as to whether I get pulled in to her drama and I choose not to.

the way to fix lack of affect is different than how to fix dissociative numbness. to fix lack of affect a person learns what emotions are,how to feel and express their emotions. sometimes a change in medications or other changes to a persons physical health will fix a persons lack of affect problems.

my point lack of affect is vastly different than dissociation. its the inability to know what emotions are, the inability to feel emotions correctly, its the inability to show appropriate emotions correctly,

where as dissociation is knowing what emotions are, having the ability to show emotions physically and mentally, but also having the mental version of numbness.

for books on lack of affect and over coming this problem.....if you go to amazon and type in the word "emotions" you will find many great books on how to identify emotions, what they are and how to express emotions. a great one is called name that emotion by erin olivio

for dissociative numbness which is different than having lack of affect you can do the same thing... go to amazon and type in the word dissociation. those books will be able to explain what dissociation is and how to use grounding like breathing exercises and focusing outward rather than internally to solve the problem.

[Luce]

Originally Posted by ruh roh

I remember not long ago, during a therapy session, talking about one thing and crying but the crying didn't fit with what I was talking about--so I said to my therapist, "Why am I crying?" I don't remember what she said or we said after that, but I do know I can't read about this in a book or figure it out on my own. I hope you have someone in real life who can help you get connected to what the feelings are.

That reminds me of our last therapy session in which a fairly happy (attachment orientated) child one of us was out. The therapist asked her "What's wrong? What are feeling so sad about?" and the kid part said "What? I'm not upset!" but even as she said it she could hear her voice quavering with emotion. She said "Oh... I can hear it in my voice..." and touched her face to find it wet with tears. She told the T she wasn't upset at all and felt quite happy and fine.
I don't know if the other part came forward fully or not, but I know we had lots of lost time that session.

L.P. I think it is fairly common for dissociated emotions to come forth in all kinds of weird ways.

[finding_my_way]

Originally Posted by Luce

In my location (and pretty much anywhere really, because the symptoms of dissociation don't change from location to location, even if the understanding of it does) this can be part of a dissociative problem. Strong emotions that seem to go from an intensity of 10 to nothing at all are recognized by leading international researchers as being part and parcel of dissociative symptomology. Same thing for strong emotions that 'come out of nowhere'.
This happens to us a lot too. Like we have one little who has very intense fear, and whenever she makes an appearance we can go from 100% okay to a state of absolute terror in zero seconds flat. And then in an instant she can disappear and we just pick ourselves up and get on with whatever the heck we were doing. But for that time when she is out we are (she is) a freakin mess.
It kinda makes sense that you aren't familiar enough with those emotions to name them in you, since you don't seem to experience them as integrated emotion.

yup. i have similar things happen a lot. i can be totally okay and then someone inside will be sad or scared, and then i can feel that usually intensely, but it isn't what 'i' feel, though it does then cause me to have my own feelings ABOUT what they feel, etc. it works the same way with triggers, though that varies.

Our emotions have their own part.

[L.P.]

Thank you all for your sharing your thoughts. It is sooooo appreciated. Ya'll are awesomeness and then some. And thanks, Amandalouise, I will check out that book.

There is question about what and where my lack of/inappropriate emotional responses come from. Having an autism spectrum disorder kinda throws a wrench in things for me. I do have a flat affect... not just in how I present to the world, but how I respond on an internal level. That is how I have been proceeding since I showed up in this body again to be one who lives life. Until now it has been really helpful and allowed me to get a lot accomplished on an intellectual/practical level. But as a result, I have never spent any time dealing with anything on an emotional level. I just figured I did not have it in me, so I should focus on my strengths and that was my contribution to bettering myself as a whole. Now I wonder if that was me just ignoring what would seem impossible or intimidating to me... a chicken sh** route, if you will. I think it would be not only practical and sensible for me to explore if I even can feel and process emotion on my own (in an even somewhat balanced and 'normal' way), but something that would help me grow as a person and benefit me, the whole of me, in the long run. I don't know if flat affect can be fixed with me or if it simply something that I must accept. I'd like to figure that out though. Or at least try.

I do not have a therapist... I have been wondering if I should get one, but I have no idea how to get the rest of me/us on board with that. I'm also not sure how to get there or pay for it. The best I have at this point is a friend who gave me a ton of info about me as a teen that I had completely forgotten about. That helped set off a kind of chain reaction in my head and I have been working on creating a 24 month span timeline. That gave me a huge reality check that I don't really like... I thought I had a good handle on those couple of years and I was really wrong. I don't know if we had someone living those years we didn't know about or what, but that's kinda step one... get a handle on what was going on.

Now, I'm kinda thinking maybe a good thing to do is work on reassigning blame next. I always thought it was me who was the main jerk in that time frame. Not that I was all innocent or anything... I was a rotten teen, but there were reasons for it and I need to own that and deal with it. Ideally, the next step in this process would be to experience the emotions attached to those things in order to move through and beyond them, and that's gonna be hard for me since I'm not sure if it's my emotions or someone elses or if I can even feel the emotions in the first place. It's messy. Guess it's good I have the time to drop into this... I was thinking about blame last night and that I was not to blame for x y or z and I thought on who was to blame so I could own that reality and my brain was not having it. I kept stopping mid thought and then would struggle to get back on track. I wasn't melting down or getting set off or anything... heart rate not even elevated... it just shut off. I keep shutting off with this stuff. Maybe all I need now is time to keep settling into it. It really did tilt my whole lil world. Time seems reasonable.

I'm not sure where I was going with that and I think I got sidetracked. I'm gonna revisit this later and maybe have a better handle on what I'm trying to say.

-V

[L.P.]

Okay... gonna try this again.

Part of what makes me think that this could either be someone else inside or me having to come to terms with the idea that I do feel and just suppress them on automatic... eh... I am not the only one in my head right now dealing with this stuff so I know someone somewhere in here must be feeling something. More than a few of us have been flooded with unfamiliar emotions about what seem to be new memories. It seems sensible to think we are going to be getting to know someone else inside a little better soon... that might be what we are doing now. I dunno. Then I have to wonder to if this is just me having an emotional reaction to those new memories because while they are different than memories I hold and feel as though are mine, the general idea is the same to me... not so great stuff happening, people reacting poorly to events happening and to me... and me reacting poorly as a result of general crappiness all around.

I think I am still overreacting to all of this and will be able to see it more clearly once the metaphorical dust has settled a bit more in my brain. This stuff shook me right on up. Not trying to downplay my reaction here... it is just that I know I don't think clearly when I get flooded with emotion. That's reality. My thoughts get way distorted and little things seem giant and I get lost in it all. I don't even know how to be comfortable feeling happy, or if I can feel happy. Nothing is my idea comfort zone where feeling is concerned. No elevated heart rate, no sped up thinking, I just like to feel nothing. I need to learn some new coping techniques to deal with the new feel of this... regardless of what this is. Three years ago, I was effectively using some coping skills picked up and practiced by the previous few who were living life. Right now I can barely remember to use those or if I am remembering them all or if I do remember all the learned skills and they are just not working for this or working for me. I've been on airhead mode for at least a week now... can't seem to get things to stick in my head for too long. Maybe it's as simple as what worked for them just doesn't work for me in this case. They did have a better grasp on emotion than I did. Meh.

This whole thing is so weird to me. I'm trying to be positive about it though. Who knows, maybe after all is said and done, I'll have a better understanding of emotion just from having to live through this. If nothing else, at least I have a more realistic understanding of what my life was like as a teenager...

Thank you all again. I'm the only person in my reality who has things like this happen... one second okay, the next not at all, then fine again. Not that I want people to have to deal with that, it is nice when someone else can relate. You all are awesomeness.

-V

... it is just that I know I don't think clearly when I get flooded with emotion.

Our emotional parts emotions when triggered (spontaneously?) are overbearing and overwhelming difficult to handle because they will trigger the one having them out and it's a battle then to stay present and focused.

For example...when touched, Barbara gets lusty and starts to dominate the mind in thought and feel...so I got to speak up in my head and tell them no...not now not right time...and push them away.

Fear is a hard one because it's so strong that it has embarrassed us a time ir two in a fight.
The Angry One is hard to control when triggered....he erupts like a volcano. We can feel him simmering at the bottom of our gut over some injustice or wrong then explodes to the top of our head and outward....we can just watch in horror. Swallowing hard and talking him down when triggered sometimes works....but a lot of times not. Crying joy over a tender moment just pisses the guys off because they can't stop a tear jerker while we fems just cry over the silliest things. They fight it like it was their last beer.
As far as memories evoking emotions....our biggest mostly reactive emotions are surprised, bewilderment, embarrassed, horror, and shock amazement. Our memories are silent and just flashes of an event with no emotions tied to them. The immediate emotions comes in when we realized that we did the things being flashbacked with the mental words og "OMG, i can't believe we did that!"

The only tool in our aresenal against any intrusive emotion when triggered is distraction. I'll swallow hard and physically tighten my muscles up, pushing, getting a grip, look away and focus on another topic, thought, idea, what I see describing it....all intently until I've settled and the emotion has passed and sometimes take a deep breath breathing again blowing out slowly- which is actually a grounding tool.

I'm not sure if this helps because we are "poly-fragmented"- like we are a 3-d picture puzzle where every piece is it's own part.