From feeling nothing to feeling everything

[Desert Flower]

I already wrote some things on this forum about how I never used to feel any feelings and now I do.

In my youth, there was no place for any feelings, especially sadness and anger, but really any feelings. My brother and I needed to make our mom feel better and we were supposed to be happy so she could feel good about that (not for our sake) so we weren't supposed to be sad or angry or anything. We also weren't supposed to feel jolly or enthusiastic or something, because that would involve us being noisy. And we needed to be quiet.

And for most of my life I didn't feel anything. (I used to work at some place where I felt totally inadequate, despite good reports, and I wouldn't even feel I needed to go to the bathroom until after three days my belly would ache so much I would start to wonder what was going on.) And because I wouldn't let myself feel any feelings or the anxiety of not allowing myself to feel anything, my body would give me all sorts of physical symptoms instead. And I managed to ignore them for many years too.

Until three years ago, when I 'woke up from' my Long Covid (which consisted of enormous fatigue, tingling sensations, tinnitus, headaches, shortness of breath, etc.), and it dawned on me that my body was giving me these physical symptoms because I was pushing away my feelings and emotions and I started to FEEL.

And this newly found awareness of my feelings is by no means easy. Now, I actually feel how anxious I am going to work. All the time. And I just can't seem to shake it. This is another form of EF I think. And trying to shake it is not helping.

Like Papa Coco said:

So, what I've been doing as of the past few weeks, is when a thought or memory causes me pain, I stop what I'm doing, close my eyes, and allow myself to feel the emotion. The trick is to NOT use any words or thoughts to stop the emotion, but to let it breathe.

That would be it. And sometimes I can do this a little bit. But for a very large part, I just feel overwhelmed. I'm not used to feeling anything and then just letting it be.

it's going to be about noticing the reactivity as becoming aware that shame is present.

And today I had the really lousy experience of my husband wanting to accompany me into the city, whereas I had planned to go alone and then I felt I had to relate to him while being in the city and that made me even more anxious and I felt so bad that he could not be having a nice time with me because I was being so difficult. He didn't make any criticism (he wouldn't ever) but my Inner Critic was more than enough to deal with. And I knew this was because I was in an EF or I am shame based and I was aware of that, but that didn't make it any better. And then things started piling up after that. And now I feel guilty for spoiling our outing while he had only been trying to help. And I feel like such a stupid *@#!~.

Some part of me thinks it was easier dealing with all the psysical stuff instead of dealing with this. Although I believe it should be called progress.

[AphoticAtramentous]

And this newly found awareness of my feelings is by no means easy. Now, I actually feel how anxious I am going to work. All the time. And I just can't seem to shake it.

Interestingly I have a similar problem, though it was caused by medicine, not COVID. These days I actually know what anxiety feels like now (of course, we've had this anxiety for probably all our life but got so used to it that we're not aware of what it actually feels like). I guess I'm trying to reassure myself, and maybe it'll help the same for you, that now that we're aware, it should hopefully be easier to manage. After all, can't find a monster that you can't see. It of course is a skill though that needs to be practiced. And although the awareness causes its own problems (meta emotions... getting anxious because I realise I'm anxious  ) I hope it's at least a platform we can use to jumpstart some recovery.

And I knew this was because I was in an EF or I am shame based and I was aware of that, but that didn't make it any better. And then things started piling up after that. And now I feel guilty for spoiling our outing while he had only been trying to help. And I feel like such a stupid *@#!~.

A familiar conundrum. I'm sorry that EF struck you. If you're comfortable: 
When I get into situations like that I find it helpful to talk to my partner honestly, at least just to reassure that it was not my intention to spoil anything. But this is just my own personal recommendations, no pressure to do anything with it.

I hope you're feeling better now, Desert Flower.

Regards,
Aphotic.

[Dante]

You're describing something I've been realizing lately, too.

As a child, I stuffed all my feelings.  They weren't going to get me any care anyway, and only negative attention.  I was completely emotionless for most of my life, adopting addiction and dissociation as a way to continue to keep those emotions at bay when I got older.

Since I started healing, the emotions come fast and furious now and are OVERWHELMING.  I cry at movies when someone is kind to someone else.  (Ironically, the part everyone else cries where the hero dies and the heroine is left alone or whatever, I'm completely stoic about.  But if someone is kind to someone, oh forget it.  I need a tissue).

I've been working on - and made a lot of progress on - both my addiction and dissociation issues.  I'm not better, but I'm better than I was.  But as those go, the feelings are coming back.  It's not unlike when my hand goes to sleep and it hurts like bloody heck when the blood comes back.  That's where I'm at.  I hurt like bloody heck most of the time.  On bad days, I think about the Matrix and ask myself why oh why didn't I take the blue pill.  Sometimes I wish I'd never started down this path because it hurts too much and it's too overwhelming knowing I'll have to deal with this for the rest of my life.  Fortunately, that's not too often, and the horse is out the gate so to speak, so whether or not I wish I'd ever started this, I did, and there's no way but forward.

Anyway, sorry, that was a long response.  I need to try to be more economic in my responses.  I wanted to just validate what you're feeling.

[Desert Flower]

On bad days, I think about the Matrix and ask myself why oh why didn't I take the blue pill. 

I need to try to be more economic in my responses.

No need whatsoever!

Thank you for your replies Dante and Aphotic. I'm glad to find people here who understand.