How has alexythmia affected you

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I'm asking this regards friendships and love life.

Do you find it difficult to make connections. I have some friends that I kinda like, but I'm not particularly invested in. Ok... acquaintances. If I never saw them again I wouldn't care. But its rare tgat i actually, truly
like anyone.

But I'm human and I need people around me or I'll go crazy, so I tolerate them.

Love life. Do you find it easy to know if you have feelings for someone? Do you feel like you know you want to be involved with someone or do you get confused?

Mostly I get confused!

There are a few people I consider good friends, some of whom I've known for a very long time. But like you, I do usually feel a bit "on the fringe of things", and I have long periods with no motivation to keep in contact with anyone, and plenty of burn-out times when I just can't. I sometimes think of people and miss them a bit; but in all honesty, I get so wrapped up in my own little world that, unless I'm reminded, I seem to forget that other people even exist half the time.

When other people talk about "love" and "comradeship" and such things, I still don't really have any idea what strength of feeling they imply. I understand what behaviour seems to go with them, and maybe I do feel them; but if so, I don't recognise them as such. I suppose you could say that my friendships are based on more tangible things such as respect, loyalty, helping out during a crisis, sharing hobbies, debating, etc. - things which I can more easily get the measure of. Maybe those moments where I do find myself missing people mean that there is more than this really going on, but if so, it's difficult to tell it apart from feeling a desire for any other thing.

Romantically? I think I'm OK at separating physical attraction from the rest, but infatuation, romance, love, "in love", etc. are all just a big fuzzy blob to me. There have been a few people whom I've had especially intense feelings about, but I couldn't describe those feelings to myself, never mind to them. I just end up with so many doubts whether I'm saying or doing the wrong thing, especially worry that I might be expressing an emotion that I don't really feel - so I end up treating them just like any other person that I'm friendly with. I struggle to make the other person feel "special", or even to work out what kind of "special" I ought to be trying to make them feel (and all without coming across as creepy, of course!)

I am dealing a bit better with my Alexithymia these days, in part due to a good therapist. But at my age, I feel as if I've got far too much catching up to do to ever really grasp it all properly. But I'm thankful for the relationships that I have, even if I mean a slightly different thing by "relationships" than other people do.

When I am facing unknown or uncertain situations, I find it difficult to engage with others. I would rather
either the other people do all the talking or to get away from everyone. Over the years I've studied psychology
and that helps on a logical perspective as to the other person in things they might be talking about, but it
never really brings out emotions of any kind in myself. I hope that all makes sense.

My default is to say I'm fine or I'm ok when asked how I'm doing or how I'm feeling. Most of the time though, the reality is that I don't know. That seemingly simple question is very hard for me. I feel like I could ponder the question of how I am all day and not be confident I'd have a concrete answer.

Going by what Magna stated I do the same with the saying I'm fine/ok hoping that will satisfy
their question. A lot of the time the closest I can come with is I am in the middle, neither good
nor bad, perhaps adequate. Other times I may be feeling anxious and don't know what to say
more than "anxious". I don't want to end up in an endless loop of pondering myself without
confidence that I'll figure it out ever.

Other times it gets frustrating on the other end. I'll get people who will talk until I interrupt
and just end up hearing a whole of random words which I'll have no clue really what they're
trying to convey, end up going back into my head thinking about something else and
randomly nodding my head or saying something like "right" . I would guess I am lucky that
they really don't come back later asking me if I remember this or that from what they were
saying.

I don't believe I have alexithymia, at least probably not to a full extent. I definitely feel something closer to the full range of emotions personally, but I'm only able to express around a quarter of what everyone else can. I don't know how to show intimacy, even if I may love someone, and that causes a lot of internal damage.

I am describable as "shallow" and "unfeeling", even though I feel a lot more than I could possibly show. I feel the full range, to a large extent, but again I can't show it.

^ I'm sorry to hear that. It's only many, many years later that, with hindsight, I've realised how often I've done just the same thing to potential partners. Ironically, it's often been worry that my poor emotional reciprocation might hurt the other person if we were to get together which has led me there. It's not such much that I "decide" that a platonic relationship is the most fitting one, more that "friend" is the default position I take while I'm caught in a loop of procrastinating about how I feel. Only well into my forties did I finally figure out that Alexithymia was such a huge factor in my insecurity and fear of commitment - and it may be telling that only then did I have my first, albeit brief, romantic relationship (as opposed to "casual sexual"; for those readers who seem to constantly conflate the two!)

It's something which can be helped though, which is why I feel strongly that Alexithymia needs to be brought out in the open more. I doubt that many people would be surprised that it's markedly more prevalent in males; the dreamy, aloof man who's love is always unrequited is, of course, a stereotype, but as with many of them, there's a nugget of truth there, IMHO. Just reflecting more on our feelings, and particularly sharing our reflections on each other's feelings, would be a good start. I certainly feel that my Alexithymia has, at the very least, remained unchallenged because I'd internalised the "boys don't cry" gender stereotype - it's one of the foundations of my masking behaviours (worrying that opening up to someone will put them off because I'll seem "more autistic" has always been another huge driver of insecurity for me.)

Lastly, thankyou for your posts, including your other recent ones on related subjects. I'm glad to hear any insights into how my Alexithymia might appear from the outside - they might make me cringe a bit sometimes, but I know they are good for me!

Social connections hard

Usually they want to talk about things and they have all this energy

They are so judgmental

Enthusiasm is not always a good thing


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Romantic relationship completely out of question

We're not even friends at all at the moment it seems.