Being Indifferent

[Shiver]

Maybe I'm strange, I really don't know, but I'll post it here anyway.

I can't stop thinking that I should be crying all day, but I'm not... I can talk about things (traumatic experiences) that happened without feeling anything, but not always. It's mostly when I'm being sucked in to dissociation, then I start to tell people way too much about myself, without any emotions whatsoever.

I'm living in a rollercoaster of emotions atm, I feel as if I'm guilty for everything, which makes me angry at myself, but then I feel completely wrecked by what they did to me, later on I don't feel anything, ... Everything feels so blurry.

It makes me doubt myself, it makes me doubt therapy. Therapy is supposed to be about the emotions, isn't it? What if I don't feel any at that moment. When I read things about EMDR, I always see how the person is overwhelmed by emotions, but I just don't know, I think I would just blank out.

Can anyone make sense out of this?

 

[Silver.]

I feel similar, in the way that I've taught myself to tell my traumas from a clinical, distant point of view. If I didn't do that, I would have a total breakdown. A defense mechanism to protect myself from really healing.(?)
I think if I stopped disassociating from the reality that was my life, and learn in therapy to tell it, talk about it, from my actual self, maybe I would heal from it? (does this make sense? sometimes things make sense in my head, but not on screen).
I just know that I cannot do EDMR because the repetition is a hard no for my ptsd, though I know many have had great success with it (and maybe it would help bring the feelings that need to come out, out) x

edit: But then again, I strongly feel like talking about my past is not going to fix me (been there done that too many times).

 

[Shiver]

I feel similar, in the way that I've taught myself to tell my traumas from a clinical, distant point of...

I get what you're saying about strongly feeling talking is not going to fix you... But yet, it doesn't feel like not talking is helping me either. I'm afraid of everything that might come with it, even if it's just feeling blank. But I will also be angry at myself if I don't at least give it a try. If someone with a lot of experience in trauma-therapy keeps motivating me to continue my search, then I feel like that's the only way up I might have...

 

[EveHarrington]

I don't believe it's indifference so much as emotional numbness. (To me the two are very much different.)

It sounds like you bounce from emotional overload to emotional vacancy with no happy medium. Therapy will help you get to a balanced place in the middle.

I think as you talk to more people with PTSD that you'll find that what you're experiencing is quite common. :hug:

 

[KeepingTime]

I'm right there too. My t tells me it's about re-associating the knowledge and the physical memory and the emotions.

I've seen the term emotional disregulation and it seems to fit.

Right now I'm stuck with the no emotion...just numb. But tomorrow I may be all over the map ridden with guilt. Never anger and never tears. Idk why.

I wish I could cry but I can't. But then it terrifies me because I'm afraid if I give into it, I will "fall out the other side" and I won't come back from it. Probably doesn't make sense.

But yes therapy is about emotions...reaching them and attaching them appropriately to the right memories. At least that's what I'm told.
So don't give up on it.

 

[Ka-9]

Maybe I'm strange, I really don't know, but I'll post it here anyway.

I can't stop thinking that I shou...

I've been up, down, and the entire "condition" has totally morphed over the years. I used to cry, or had the violent outbursts- defensive ones mind you, and now I'm more akin to you- I feel little, and can't enjoy anything...books, food, sports, old hobbies and interests. They say there can be a huge issue of Seratonin depletion, or permamenet receptor damage, thus the ability for happiness or more extreme emotions. Then with an SSRI, its no wonder emotions are absent. I find this state even worse- would rather feel the extremes again.

 

[Gs172003]

I don't believe it's indifference so much as emotional numbness. (To me the two are very much dif...

That sounds exactly like me. The more I read these forums the more I learn about myself.

 

[shimmerz]

I think the idea of healing is that we learn to 'learn' the emotions we were never able to acknowledge before.

Answering the question 'How did that make you feel?' is a looooooonnnnnngggggg road for most of us PTSD'ers.

 

[Stealtharcadia]

***Oh wow I wrote a lot. Peruse my inane ramblings at your own risk xD

It's definitely a real issue for me, as well. I seriously will tell random people the most personal shit and not feel a damn thing. Later, I'll feel confused as to why I confided that dark shit to somebody random in the first place. Honestly, it bothers me for a bit afterwards. Guilt or shame, perhaps.

The numbness or perspective indifference is a strange issue, as it fades in and out. It's easy to lose sight of what is going on in your head, because to you it feels like nothing. Then, seemingly at random, you get a tidal wave of emotions that you're too busy drowning in to try and understand where they come from.

Logically, you can direct the source to recent stressors in your life. However, to me it seems there is a disconnect between identifying something in an abstract way ("I got a lot on my plate that's why I'm symptomatic right now") and actually feeling it as affects you. So, effectively, you deny yourself the attached emotions until they more or less overwhelm you in some form or fashion. We've been conditioned that way.

For instance, imagine two runners. Somehow, they both pull a muscle on their run. One slows down, makes sure they're all good and takes it easy the rest of the way. The other runner? Well they've broken their legs before, tore an ACL last summer, this pain is nothing! They just keep on going like nothing happened. Well, guess who's gonna be really hurting in the morning?

My point is, I think our PTSD brains do pretty much the same thing as the mangled runner above. All the things that we ought to feel in the moment fly right under the radar, and eventually it catches up. The best we can do is try to feel every moment we can. Like, f*ck the world that cloud is pretty and I'm gonna cry about it because I feel things. I don't know, really. I just know that helps me.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

You sound exactly like me, 9 months ago and today I still talk in therapy about my past like im talking about the weather (that analogy given to me by my therapist) and today still tell people too much.

I also was to blame for it all, completely 100% without a doubt, in my head, and also completely defended by abusers, didnt call them abusers or what happened to me abuse (that was a bit more than 9 mo ths ago) and for years in therapy went into this merry go round of defending, i was to blame, they did nothing wrong because it was done to me.

I had to counter my own thoughts with what i felt were lies to myself that eventually started to stick.

A BIG thing for me was blame shifting over to them. Which was done the same way, I kept saying a phrase that was given to me (id never think it up) over and over and over in a time that i was at my lowest and suicidal so my defenses were down and it just shifted over. After that i wasnt running in fast tight circles but was running straight for the first time, but remember i had already been in therapy 6.5 years, the first year of therapy my therapist had no clue why i was really there.

I dont think therapy is about emotions. My therapy hasnt been as i am so out of touch with emotions. Its about healing and healing happens many different ways and for varying lengths of time.

I am seperated from it and talk about it like its the weather because, per my therapist, i had disassociated so often during the trauma and back then made up "alter personalities" that had names at the time so i could say it happened to this person, not me.

I dropped the names after i left so it never turned into anything like DID. So that can and does happenen without DID.