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Emotional Numbness/absolute flat affect


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Hi I was just wondering if my emotional numbness/flat affect is experienced by anyone on here. I can't feel a thing no sensations, no love, no joy, no real sad feelings although I can cry but that dosn't even feel the same emotionally. My doctor has diagnosed me with depression but I feel it may be something far worse. Im scared I have brain damage from the meds. It dosn't even feel like my emtions connect to the rest of my body. I have racing thoughts but no physical sensations with anxeity, I cry but the emotion feels like it's barely there. Does anyone think this is depression or am I having a problem with something else. It feels like it is causing the depression instead of it being the main symptom. If anyone has experienced this before please write me back. I'm scared I have done some real brain damage.
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That sounds exactly like how I experienced depression. When I got better I practically started believing in energy fields. Meaning l couldn't believe how dynamic normal non-depressed reality is. It's like you look at something when you're not depressed and it gives you some kind of feeling. i feel like it's the type of normal reality that only a formerly depressed person could marvel at. Anyway it just sounds so much like depression. Depression doesn't really mean sad. It means flat, like you've explained. Have you heard of the book hyperbole and a half? I recommend it.
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OMG YES!! Dear God I hope its not permanent.. Do you drink any alcohol? even casually? How long have you been off of it?
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Hi, I dont' think is depression because I don't even feel the least bit normal. I don't have sensations like when the weather changes or when I pet the dog. I can't feel anything when someone hugs me. I lay awake blank all night long and can't sleep, but I never feel tired. A dog got hit by a car one day and I didn't feel anything like my body isn't connecting with my mind. If I have racing thoughts I don't get any feelings in my body like numbness or sore muscles or anything like I used to before I took this drug with anxiety. If it is depression my symptoms don't match up with anything totally.

 

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I am talking about emotional numbness. I can't feel any emotional sensations that go with the weather changing or petting my dog or anything. I can feel stuff if I touch it just not any emotional sensations that go along with it.
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  • 4 weeks later...

Yes I can totally relate am going through the same thing....

I can't even cry no more!!i feel nothing,just dead inside

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I've been posting about this for years. When your brain is in an over excited state you start to lose pre frontal cortex function. Basically it's not permanent but it's very consuming and very scary. I had it and it's mostly gone now. I still have it to a degree but I can say with certainty that it's on its way out. I can 'feel' anxiety again and I can 'feel' sadness.  Not as extreme as I used to but it's slowly increasing in intensity
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Yes it's very scary,I feel mute most days like I cannot talk as I don't no any words to form together!!so very glad yours is coming back...it gives me some hope.after all those CT have had...
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Yes, it's depression. But it's not your regular "blue and melancholy" type of depression that you may have been used to before. I used to have that kind of depression, but that kind of depression could be cried out a bit and reasoned with, and it was often a signal to slow down a bit, shift priorities, etc. This is like an entirely different level of depression.

 

When I joined this forum, I had this idea, that the lower the dose, the more will that depression lift. However, it does take time for the brain to right itself, so the depression felt on benzo or while coming off of them can be quite profound. And when you put all the life circumstances on top of it, it becomes a very heavy, sticky, muddy, lost in space clinical depression that needs your attention. Basically, every little thing you can do to make your life more tolerable counts. While it's good to keep planning for the future, what helps the most to me is to reel in the thoughts of the future and deal with this just 1 day at a time. You somehow make it through one day, and then you make it through another one and so on. I know that crying doesn't feel really helpful, but it is, because your body does get rid of the stress hormones through tears....

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  • 4 months later...

Hi I was just wondering if my emotional numbness/flat affect is experienced by anyone on here. I can't feel a thing no sensations, no love, no joy, no real sad feelings although I can cry but that dosn't even feel the same emotionally.

 

It's called anhedonia, been there, feel for you!  :smitten:

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Yup, all that you described is not uncommon and part of the deal. It's all stuff I've gone through and even still. I've sort of felt emotionally suffocating - like from getting the slightest expression out. It's seriously tough to deal with -
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  • 1 month later...
This is an old thread, but upon reading it I find that I can really relate to what everyone says here. For awhile now I've had no feelings at all -- just this flatness. Day in and day out. Every once in awhile I'll have something that feels like an emotion, but even then I'm almost faking it. Today out walking my dog I saw some kids playing and one of them shouted a cheery hello to me. I smiled and said hello back but there was nothing behind my smile. I've felt no joy at all and haven't in a long time. I'm just beginning to taper off of a benzo I've been using for insomnia for close to two years. I wonder if this will get better as I taper down.
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If your like me it might get worse when you come off of them. It very much crept up on me while I was on benzos then when I came off it was worse. I hope it won't be like that for you. It's terrible. I've been like this for a very long time.
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Thanks for the comment Betterment16789the. I really appreciate it. Interestingly the past few days I've been feeling some emotions creep back in. I even laughed last night. The was the first time I'd done that in awhile. Hoping the emotional numbness won't get worse as I taper down. At the moment I'm holding and glad to be doing relatively ok for now.
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