Numbness, lack of emotion, not depression?

[Ripley123]

Hi all, I'm a teen and new here as I've recently joined to talk about this issue that has been bothering me lately. I've found myself to be emotionally numb as I don't feel any strong emotions to anything at all. This is odd as I still show a lot of personality and find myself to be quite an extroverted person. I once thought that maybe I had some sort of minor bipolar mentality as I found myself quickly turning to these seemingly depressive thoughts, but I now found that maybe I only have these thoughts when I have time to myself and basically talking to myself about how I am 'feeling'.

Sometimes I find myself having somewhat obsessive thoughts as I often think about certain people romantically when they have no contribution to what I'm doing. A few years ago I was obviously depressed after my friends were bullying me as well as some other complications. I cut off these friends and moved to a new school, it was hard but I was able to do it, although recently I've made friendship again with one of them and I am glad we are friends, we are now very close, although I often get scared of her hurting me like she did a while ago and sometimes find myself trying to push her away. I don't believe I've felt any strong emotion since this time. I'm fairly certain I am not depressed, it's just this numbness I feel now and how little emotion I actually have - I'm just rolling.

Sometimes I think that I am happy, as I know I am in a good place at the moment - I have a lot of friends, good grades and a healthy and happy family, but I think that maybe I only acknowledge that this as a good position I am in and I'm not actually happy - I can differentiate the good and the bad and acknowledge and identify which is which, but I can't actually feel anything towards it... I think. I don't know what I'm looking for when posting this, but I would value your opinions. Thank you!

[james1]

Hey Ripley,

Thanks for posting here and welcome to these forums. I'm always really pleased to see teenagers like yourself posting because, I'm 24 now so it wasn't too long ago that I was a teen and I certainly wouldn't have had the courage to post! Good on you.

It sounds like you're confused about how you feel. You think you should be feeling a particular way, but you're not. Your situation seems to suggest that you shouldn't be having this numbness, but you are.

The truth is that your feelings don't lie. I'm not suggesting I know what, but simply by needing to come and vent, you're showing us that something just doesn't sit right with you right now. That's totally okay and it makes sense that you don't know why - it's not something you had to think about when you were younger.

Is this something you're able to share with those around you like family or friends? Even extended family can be great if your immediate family are "too close" to let them know at this stage. Don't forget, you can also talk to the GP.

If you don't mind telling us, when did you start thinking about this? Is there a pattern to these thoughts?

For me, little things that go unsaid bottle up and put me on edge. I then put my feelings in a box because I don't want to say those unsaid things, and then, ta-da! I'm numb.

I hope you feel safe posting whatever you feel comfortable posting. We're not judgemental here and, more importantly, there's a lot of wonderful people who have advice and experience to share.

Great to have you on board as well.

James

[Narniakid]

Hey Ripley123, welcome to the forums and thank you for reaching out to us 🙂

I'm sorry to hear that you're feeling confused and a little disconnected from your emotions. Often I feel similarly if I am being overworked or have too many commitments all at once, and I seem to just stop feeling any sort of emotions as a way of dealing with stress.

I am wondering if reconnecting with your old friend who hurt you was the best idea - of course, while I encourage you to patch up what is broken, rekindling a risky friendship can be stressful, and you seem very uncertain about her. Have a think about why it is you are keeping her in your life - does she make you happy? Do you support each other? Or is it a one-sided friendship? Holding on to someone like that simply to have a friend is not always the best decision, especially if you've got yourself some new friends that treat you right.

As James has mentioned, it's a good idea to mention how you're feeling to a family member. Perhaps they could accompany you to a trip to see your doctor? Your GP will be able to give you a professional diagnosis of how and why you're feeling this way, and guide you on the right path.

Crystal