Emotions

Post Reply New Topic

How do you guys deal with emotions? I am a very emotional person. I wear my heart on my sleeve. I know another aspie who people could describe as cold when it comes to emotion, but this person gets angry more than usual. She probably holds it all in.

In the past I used to drink, Now I just let it out. I cant be botherd by holding it inside anymore.

I donno I go through swings of emotional coldness, to super sensitivity. It all depends what`s crossing my mind at the time.

I find I`m very cyclical.

I seem to find it difficult to recognise my emotions...until they they reach some sort of tipping point when I suddenly feel overwhelmed by them. It's tricky. My wife will often notice that I am getting stressed out long before I see it myself. I often tend to only be able to attach a specific label to what exactly I am feeling by taking a step back and trying to analyse the context and my own behaviour. It's always been like this but I never understood why and, only finding out about AS now, it really was quite disturbing knowing there was something seriously off with me emotionally (compared to those around me) but not being able to understand or explain it. Now I have read up on AS the common Alexithymia trait seems to sum me up exactly. I feel the physical sensation of hormones being released and affecting my chest and heart (if the emotion becomes strong enough for that) but not much else a lot of the time. I always just told myself that this (physical) sensation WAS the emotion. Now that I understand there really are supposed to be more I can make sense of that sense of not being quite 'right' emotionally.

I'm exactly the same way, but I wait until I'm alone to deal with the overwhelm since yeah, I don't like others knowing how emotional I can get. I used to just cry all the time though, and publicly so maybe that's why I just learned to keep whatever I feel to myself since the embarrassment used to just make things worse.

Personally, I have to find creative ways, like drawing or writing, to calm myself down. But I find that strenuous exercise helps a good lot as well. Though, because of this, I've found myself way more creative and stronger than ever since yeah, I'm too emotional too, so I have to express my emotions ASAP. :p

I don't really feel or identify many emotions. I tend to categorize them as "frustrated," "annoyed," "nothing in particular," and "okay." I can identify anxiety as well. I can tell I have experienced sadness, but I tend to characterize it as frustration.

And then of course there is meltdown that happens when my capacity for emotional processing has been exceeded. Since I do not identify my own emotions easily, this can happen without warning. However, I can identify some of the relevant emotions and can sometimes notice it is happening. This ability is recent, as in the past four or five years. Sometimes the meltdown leads directly to shutdown.

This answer may not be precisely the same as other answers, as I tend to refer back to recently experienced and identified emotions. However, I still do not have a very wide range.

I don't really show or talk about my emotions to anyone, but I would say I'm a very emotional person. I typically deal with them through listening to music that I can connect with. Or sometimes, by coming to these forums and talking about things lol.

I treat my emotions like intrusive little brats, metaphorically speaking ...

Grief: "WAAAAH!! !"

Me: "What now?"

Grief: "Someone called me a doo-doo head!"

Me: "Well, quit complaining and go tell Anger!"

Anger: "*&^%$#@!"

Me: "Hello, anger; what's up?"

Anger: "*&$^&#^&* idiot! Stupid &%#&* piece of #$&^&*)@!$^! called me a doo-doo head!"

Me: "Okay, let's you and me go for a run and we'll see about what we can do afterward."

Frustration: "You always put things off!"

... and so on ...

Chrissy (ETA:Chris is my best friend) recently told me I have a very expressive face. True. On the other hand, if I'm not interacting with only one person, I have a very blunted affect.

Often, I have trouble knowing how I feel "in the moment" unless I'm looking at my face, and like I said, I'm interacting with someone 1:1. I can figure it out later. Sometimes, I figure it out by having a meltdown.

I don't have a lot of emotions.