"I don't know"

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"I don't know" seems to be my go to answer for a lot of things that people ask. My mom just gets annoyed and often drops the question when I use it, but my best friend's mom won't allow me to answer questions that way and literally tells me to give another answer. Lol. I laugh when she calls me out cause I usually don't realize I'm saying again it until it's said. She is the one who first pointed out to me that I say I don't know a lot.

I'm not an ignorant or unintelligent person overall, but I THINK that I tend to respond this way when people ask about feelings, emotions, or expect me to make a quick decision without time to think it through.

Just wondering if anyone else defaults to "I don't know" and if you have an explanation or reasoning behind it?

I have this problem as well. More often than not, I don't entirely understand the question or can think of two (or more) completely different questions that they could be asking with the same words. It often stems around emotions and feelings. I tend to use "I don't know" the most when I am feeling something, but don't really have a clue what it is I am feeling. I also have this problem when the questions are entirely too general, like "what is your favorite movie?" or "did you see that person?" or "what do you want to do?"

I have noticed that I sometimes say it at the beginning of a verbal response where I am fairly certain what I am about to say is something they don't want to hear (but I'm not sure why I do that; it is not a conscious decision, just something I notice after the fact).

That sounds like alexithymia: "How are you feeling?" = "I don't know."

Also I find myself saying "I don't understand" why people act the way they do. I seem to have a severe lack of social and emotional awareness. I just don't know how I feel, how anyone else feels, why they're behaving the way they are, and how I should act in response.

I do not default to "I don't know", but I aspire to do so.

After a lifetime of feeling compelled to correctly answer every question tossed my way, and of stressing out should I not know an answer, I now quite enjoy making a conscious decision to shrug and say "I don't know".

As a mentor likes to humorously remind me: not everyone is entitled to my opinion.

I do that. It tends to be when I've done something that I should have asked to do. When asked if I know anything about it I will automatically respond with 'I don't know'.

I have noticed that it will be my go to response when someone asks me a question that I will need to think about, feelings being one example and my actions being another. When in fact I know that taking time to process the question will lead to me answering more 'correctly'.

So in fact, I do say 'I don't know' a lot but I also don't know why I say it (maybe to give myself thinking time or to let this fast world continue without me)

I do the same thing

I do this too.

When I was younger, "Because" and "I Don't Know" were my default answers. I particularly remember using them, when in therapy in 3rd grade. Because, I really didn't know.

I also do this, and people have commented.

I do that very often and it irritates some people. On the other hand, I am often irritated by the way so many people always feel so sure about things they have no reliable knowledge of. If someone asks me something and I know the answer I will tell it. If I just have some idea but it's not based on facts and possibly wrong (just an hypothesis or an elaborate guess) I will explain exactly that, and other people will say that I lack self-confidence or that kind of things. If I really don't know I will say I don't know. I don't see the point in making up something else ; that would just be lying or misleading people.

A related thing is when I give my opinion about something and people ask "Are you sure ?" I almost always answer "No" which unsettles people. How can you be completely sure of anything except if it is about something you are directly involved in or have personally witnessed?

It makes me very bad at reassuring and comforting people, too, because what most people want when they need to be comforted is that I lie to them and tell them that some good thing will happen while I have neither the knowledge that they will nor the power to make them happen.

I try to avoid its usage as much as possible. Of course I don't know the answer to every question floating my way, it just seems more polite to give an answer other than "I don't know" only because the other person went through the trouble of asking it. The least I could do is not insult them with a simple "I don't know" answer.

Yeah, now that really grinds my gears. I sometimes want to explode and say; "Yes I am sure. What? Do you think I just sit here and spew words like I am vomiting bad egg salad? I think before I speak, thank you very much."



I love this approach. I think I am going to start saying "No" just for spite.

Here's a suggstion-

You're not a puppet for other people to control.

If you don't have an answer for a question they ask, and they don't like that...

TOUGH.

Let them live with it.

If they "call you out" because you haven't given an answer that THEY approve of, TOO BAD.

Your answer is YOUR answer, and they don't get to limit what answer you can give.

Maybe another way of answering would be "I'll have to think about that"

If they push it further, just say "I said I'll get back to you. If you don't want to wait, sorry, but I'm not going to answer you before I'm ready. My answer is MY answer, not the answer YOU want me to give without thinking about it."

When I say I don't know to preferences or feelings, which is quite often, it's because I'm unsure of what I want or what I'm feeling. It's not that I have no conception of what I'm feeling or what I like etc, but rather that at that moment in time, I simply don't have a decision. Like, if I have to choose between 2 foods or something, I need to spend time thinking about each food in particular, try to gauge the pleasure I will get from eating either food and then make a decision. Sometimes I will not be able to make a decision because either seem equally appealing or unappealing. Sometimes I will not be able to deduce what I would actually like. The same can be said of my emotions. I will know if it's something that's enjoyable or negative, but I will not necessarily know what specifically it is.

I often give this answer if I genuinely don't know, am too tired to answer or don't think the question I'm being asked is anyone's business. An example is when my parents ask my what time I went to bed or how many hours I slept. I hate being asked that question and I don't think it's their business. Instead of saying that it's none of their business I just tell them that I don't know or I forgot.

What is wrong with answering "I don't know" if you don't know? What else is there to answer, make something up and lie?