Emotional flatness

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I seem to feel emotionally flat lots of the time. Either that, or I feel negative.
For positive emotions, I sort of 'know' them more than I feel them. Like, I do feel happy, but the feeling inside isn't very strong and instead I sort of know that I'm happy rather than feeling it. When I like/love something, I know I like/love it, but I either don't feel it, or feel it very strongly.

But with negative emotions, such as anger, sadness, impatience, worry, fright etc. I can feel them. And a lot of the time I'm in a sort of flat state, feeling bored or feeling nothing.

Is this normal?

most of the time im feeling no emotions
anyone know if NTs feel some kind of emotion most of the time.

I'm more interested in this issue if they really feel strong emotions when some tragedy reverberating across the world takes place, for example when there's a catastrophe during which many people lost their lives like tsunami or flood or when somebody famous dies. Forums may be overfilled by virtual candles and countless statements of solidarity with the victims then but I wonder if an ordinary person is really touched in such a situation.

When people mourn tragedies like Virginia Tech and the New Orleans tsunami, I can assure you that the grief is real.

Again, I feel bad in my head, but I don't feel it. Then this means I am experiencing something abnormal

I sometimes feel bad for not feeling bad. It's a guilt borne of non-emotion, which is strange.

I felt that for awhile like I had a hard time feeling anything. Like I couldn't cry. It could be depression.

I (undiagnosed) am a lot like that. Usually I feel completely neutral, and the only feelings I feel easily are embarrassment and anger. If I'm happy, I feel hypomaniac almost. I have a high energy level and talk a lot at any opportunity, but I don't really feel happy. It's the same with sadness: I have no energy, nothing entertains me, and my head feels fuzzy, but I don't feel it. I was thinking alexithymia, maybe?

See
http://aspalex.blogspot.com/2007/03/asp ... ia_04.html
and
http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/con ... 61/11/2134
for articles on the overlap between Asperger's and Alexithymia.

I usually feel nothing emotionally, unless it's frustration, fear or anxiety. And it's a lot easier to make me angry or sad than it is to make me happy. I'm rarely happy, and sometimes that makes me sad.
Like slowmutant, I sometimes feel bad because I don't feel bad about something that I'm supposed/expected to feel bad about. There was a teacher at my school who I didn't know very well, and they died and I didn't feel sad because of it. But I did feel sad, because everybody else was sad, and because it made me sad that I wasn't sad.
I often listen to songs that make me feel sad because being sad is more exciting and interesting than feeling nothing (anger, however, is something that I never want to feel again), and there are no songs that make me feel joy.

Last edited by DJRnold on 22 Jul 2008, 11:01 pm, edited 2 times in total.

^^^Exactly.

Tho, I don't get sad easily. I've heard it said that people with Asperger's get cranked up over "objects" more than people-I don't find that to be true with myself (then again I'm not diagnosed, so...), I've lost 200 CDs on a busride once-entire collection containing every CD I'd ever owned. Didn't feel a thing. I do get upset over losing a piece of my writing however, this has happened to me, and I do get REAL upset over that...

Hm, maybe I do get upset over objects...

I’m somewhat the same way. I have that low energy, low interest, heavy headed feeling a lot lately, yet I rarely feel either happy or sad. Real life is too mundane to evoke any strong emotions in me besides anxiety, anger, and ennui. I’m very depressed at the moment but I hardly remember the last time I cried.

To really feel happy or sad I need to listen to emotionally evocative music or watch an emotional film. I also purposefully seek out music that others deem moody or depressing just because it evokes those strong emotions I can’t experience from real life.

(When I say 'strong feelings' in the following, it doesn't mean sexual feelings)

I've had really strong feelings for objects, including my car, my bike and probably other things, but I can't think what. The only people I've ever felt strongly about are my parents and a very good friend. I might have done for my brother. I don't know about anyone else. I've had strong feelings for God.

The trouble is, the feeling is either not there (and is replaced with a sort of 'mental feeling/knowledge of a feeling') or is there really strongly, like a sudden, slightly overwhelming burst of feeling.

I don't feel for people invloved with disasters, as in I 'feel bad mentally' and know it's bad, but I don't have the sort of feeling in my heart (I know it's not actually in the heart, but that's what people call it and that's what it does feel like when I do get a proper feeling). I feel bad about this.

I also have no feelings for children - everyone seems to find them 'cute' and can't resist them, but I cannot feel anything for them, nor can I feel any maternal feelings.

I do experience good emotions with music and films too, and I think they're more free-flowing this way, but sometimes there's still a sort of 'gap' in the positive emotions where there's nothing and then they 'emerge' again with a strong feeling. I hope this makes sense

I don't think it's alexithymia because I can describe my feelings to a certain extent, and it doesn't seem to quite fit with Flat affect although it might be restricted affect (aka constricted affect).

I don't know

Last edited by Greyhound on 24 Jul 2008, 10:56 am, edited 1 time in total.

I don't really feel many emotions, not that I can identify at any rate. I frequently feel amused at various things and I think this is an emotion.

Other than amusement I feel angry, frustrated and depressed on occasion.

I rarely feel sad for other people because this emotion is useless and doesn't help the people suffering.

I wonder at the irrationality of mourning strangers who you do not know and may never have known if they weren't dead. Anyway I don't think death is the terrible thing most people think. Feeling sad when someone dies is usually a sign of selfishness, I think because dead people feel no pain either emotional or physical. And feeling bad when utter strangers die is just very, very odd. I sometimes feel empathy for the suffering of others but feeling sorry for dead people is pointless and a little perverse. I suspect that some people enjoy feeling bad and invent concepts like guilt, grief etc. to rationalise this. Feeling guilty is not a good thing in my opinion and only bizarre cults would have guilt as a central idea in their philosophy.

I suspect my views may upset a few people who are fully entrenched in their concept of humanity but these are my views and don't mean I am a "bad person". "Normal" is a relatively useless concept because it is so vague and relative.

If you feel no emotion and start acting violently because you like the feeling seeing blood creates. This is not normal and will probably end in incarceration or execution.

I often feel "flat" or unemotional...not long ago, I had a reunion with a girl that had been a next door neighbor when I was 8-12 (over 30 years ago). When she saw me, she hugged me and cried and I felt so bad because I didn't really feel anything. I mean, it was interesting to see her again after so long...but that was it. I didn't feel any strong emotion. Our moms did everything together, so we spent lots of time in each other's company as children - she was clearly touched to see me again. I found it mildly interesting...but it was not emotional for me. That happens often...

Me too.