Emotional numbness

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Has anyone else experienced this? It's been ten years now that I've been numb and it's ruining my life.

It started when I was in early high school and I was pretty happy at the time until, for some reason, I got very depressed. It was like it just came out of nowhere. And during that time it felt like a part of my brain just switched off, like somebody turned out the lights. I didn't "feel" anything. At the time I thought it meant I was cured. But my emotions never did come back. It's so weird, I can't describe what it's like. It's like I know that my emotions are there I just can't feel them. It's like they're trapped under the surface somehow. Sometimes I have negative emotions but they're blunted somehow - not like they were before.

Nothing gives me pleasure or enjoyment any more. Nothing is fun. I've lost passion for life. Everything is boring and I can't concentrate on anything any more. It's making me completely unable to function. I've been searching unceasingly for answers but nothing has helped. I've learned that depression is common in people with AS and I'm hoping someone here has experienced the same thing and can shed some light on it for me.

I feel the same way. Depression hit me pretty hard around 3 years ago, but I couldn't afford to go to therapy. Instead, I started reading whatever books I could find on depression and anxiety, and over the next several months my mind taught itself not to spiral out of control with negative thoughts, so I rarely get genuinely depressed anymore. It's as if I've pushed it out of the way to allow room for joyfulness, but can't seem to find that joy in anything. I'm always in a kind of neutral emotional state. And as you said about yourself, I know the emotions are there. I can sense them, but they are somehow muted. Things I was once passionate about barely interest me now.

I don't know the reason for this, and I'm sorry I can't offer a solution. I mainly just want you to know you're not alone on this.

There are many intelligent, insightful and informative people in these forums. Maybe someone can offer some help.

Good Luck!

Well thanks for trying. I appreciate it. I too have managed to pull myself out of the trap of negative thinking. I always try to think positively but it doesn't really help. And just like you I've been reading a lot. It's the only thing I have any motivation for: looking for solutions to my problem.

From what I've read it's called dissociation and it happens in response to an especially traumatic event. School was always very hard on me but I don't remember suffering anything bad enough to trigger something like that. But then, I remember very little of my past. I've also read it can be a side effect of Prozac, which I was on at the time. I've been off it for almost 10 years, though. I told my psychiatrist and he dismissed it out of hand.

Did you consider Depersonalisation/Derealisation? In the past my emtions felt very distant, like I could only see them, not feel them. They said it was Depersonalisation. Maybe do some internet search, it might fit. Take care...

Yeah I've been doing a lot of reading and I've come across that too. Dissociation was the word. Depersonalization is when you feel like you're observing your life from the sidelines, if I remember correctly. They're defence mechanisms the brain uses in response to emotional trauma. The brain "numbs out" when it can't take any more.

I believe that is what happened to me. The problem is I don't know what triggered it. I feel like if I can find out what it was then I can make peace with it and be free. I don't remember any really traumatic incidents happening at the time. I was never physically or sexually abused. My parents have always been kind and loving. School was painful for me emotionally as it is for any kid that has AS. I was frequently teased, humiliated and afraid but that was actually subsiding at the time it happened. I remember being somewhat heartbroken too at the time but I've long since accepted it and let it go. I don't know what else it could be.

Yes, I experienced that for a period of three weeks, but only because I took Zyprexa. I'm grateful for that numbness because it killed my depression. But yeah, what you said is exactly how I'd describe it- like I knew they were there, but couldn't feel them. It was like getting cut on a numb patch of flesh. It was disturbing.

I'm sorry you have to live like that. I'm kinda emotionally flat, always vaguely depressed, but I can feel.

I am not so sure it will stop once you understand the cause of it. For what I have heard, is that the mechanism does not switch off like it should. Finding the cause will mostly not cause it to switch off again. But this is only what I have heard, let's hope it will work for you...

Take care.

So if finding the cause won't help what will? Am I stuck like this forever? Surely there must be a way.

Well, maybe in your case it can be the solution to find the original cause. But it may not be the case. So all you can do is try to find out for yourself.
There are also some other options I guess, like therapy. And I heard that some type of anti-epileptic medication can work. Maybe worth asking a neurologist.
In my case, I am not able to find the original cause, so no luck there. I still have this problem with low level DP, sometimes with high level DP episodes.

Yeah I'm currently seeing a therapist actually. He says my super ego is overpowering my id. Apparently I'm putting too much pressure on myself and it's wearing me out. He says if I change my behaviour and act happy then the emotions will follow (which is one of the main ideas behind CBT). Thing is, I've been trying to do that for years and years. I respect his experience and everything but I don't think it'll work any better than it did last time. I've also been working with my psychiatrist for two years now trying to find a drug that works.

I realize that makes me sound stubborn and impatient but I'm just dying for some kind of emotional stimulation. Part of me feels like there's something I used to do that I'm not doing or that there's a truth I knew that I've forgotten. I'm just so frustrated right now.

Yeah so I see that my experience is not so unique after all. I know AS has something to do with it. It's not the main problem but it sets you up for these kinds of emotional problems further down the line. I've been hoping to find someone on here who has been through it and recovered so they can provide the answers.

I hope you feel better, man. I know how much it sucks being numb like this. If you find some answers, please, let me know.

I'm going through that too, i have been going through this for 3 years. It has become way better. When it first started I was nothing. I didn't understand anything that was going on.

I feel that way. It is a side effect of my SSRI. I don't feel that gut-wrenching emptiness of depression, the physical numbness, the heaviness, or drowsiness. However, I think my emotions. I don't feel them. I listen to my thoughts to know what I'm feeling. I have gotten use to it. Before I fought against it. It is better than major depression. I'm going to talk to a psychiatrist about it though. I have become resigned to a life of mild depression, but apparently there are solutions to get rid of this feeling. I will keep search, and I wish you luck in your journey as well.

I get periods where i become very negative and when the sky seems black all the time. Some days i have to pretend or fake things to get by or fit in , there are times when i have to pretend to be happy when i am not and also when i have to pretend to be normal.
I go to see a therapist , the one thing that makes me anxious is that i am not using my brain , apparently because i am not using my brain enough and using it constructively i have been told that it has the power to turn in on itself - quite worrying.
A lot of the time i make eveything out to be a lot worse than it actually is , there have been occasions in my life where i have suprised myself. I also have suffered from low self-esteem , also i have trouble trusting myself and i do not believe in myself or my abilities. I have been told that having aspergers is a good thing , but i am not glad to have it and i feel that i am the black mark on my family. Sometimes i tend to catastrophise a bit too much and make things out to be the end of the world and i also get periods where i feel that my life simply is not worth living , i hope that positive things will come out of my therapy i am not there yet. Being realistic i can see pitfalls and booby traps in my way , but i have been here before , i have been told that it is possible to be content if you try hard enough , maybe i need to try harder.

I'm no expert, but to me, this sounds like depression. Depression can manifest in many different forms. For instance, you don't necessarily have to feel depressed to have depression. It could just manifest in a form of emptiness or numbness. I have pretty bad depression, and lately I've just been feeling kinda empty and numb. I've also not really been taking my anti-depressant like I should, so I'm gonna get back on that and hope it helps.

I don't mean to sound rude, but if your therapist is basing his treatment off Freud, I think you need to find a new one. Freud was a crack pot.

Also, after noticing that some of my friends could just "think their depression away," I talked to my therapist about this and why I couldn't do it. She said that while some people are able to do that, others are so rooted in their depression (not by choice, of course, but most likely by chemical problems in the brain), that they need more help, such as a really good support system and medication.

Do you take any medication for this? If so, maybe you should consider changing to a different med. If not, you should think about taking something.

Depression is certainly a component but I doubt it's the whole story. That was my original diagnosis when I started having problems around ten years ago. My Asperger's and ADD only serve to complicate things. This isn't just a textbook case. My Psychiatrist refers to it as Treatment Resistant Depression and he recently referred me to a specialist. I think I mentioned already that I have been taking anti-depressants and I've completely lost faith in them. So far I've been on Prozac, Cipralex, Wellbutrin, Effexor, Cymbalta and Imipramine (and there's probably more I can't remember) and none of them did much for me. The only drug that even remotely helped was Adderall, which is a stimulant I was taking for my ADD, not an antidepressant. It was only a small improvement but I still felt fairly numb. I'm still willing to try more drugs but I'm not about to rely on them solely as a means for recovery.

I see another therapist for talk therapy and the reason he is using Freudian terminology is because I specifically asked him to take a more psychotherapeutic approach. I did so because I remember that for much of my life I was was consciously repressing my emotions, especially when the numbness hit. There came a point where the emotional pain was bad enough that I simply dissociated from it. This doesn't happen in plain major depression. I know that I have a lot of psychological baggage I need to sort through and it's at least partly to blame for everything that's gone wrong.

I am not a passive patient, I've made recovering my full-time job and I take it very seriously. I read vociferously. I'm not willing to sit back and wait for doctors or therapists to figure out wrong, that could take years. I've read about depression, CBT, trauma, psychotherapy, ADD, etc... Whatever I feel most suits my situation, I explore that avenue in detail. I'm not just doing this blindly. I put a lot of reasearch into it.