How Do We Know If There Is Something Missing....?

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How do we know if there is something missing in regards to our feelings?

I have discovered though I can't quite work it out, that something is missing. I mean... Example. I was never able to explain what shutdowns were to doctors before they were called shutdowns. Somehow I was never able to use the right words.
Anxiety.. I did not know that a feeing I had on and off throughout my life was anxiety. I heard people talk about it. I never knew what the feeling actually felt like only to discover that I almost daily knew what it felt like if that makes sense?

Sympathy and empathy. Has been explained and explained to me and I can repeat what was explained, but I still don't "Get it" because the two are the same thing to me! I can't seperate them. This does not mean that I do not show sympathy and I do not show empathy. I show them very much I think... I just can't seperate them. (Could be also connected to how I "Group" faces in regards to prosopragnosia, and there is also this grouping effect in regards to other things like a few peoples usernames.

But anyway. Is it possible that some feelings I get are missing something? How would I know?

(I never realized this until being on this site! Aaah! (HAHA!).

Alexithymia?

Aphasia?
??? Hfxitcohvljsvipqbihfijaojd ??? No, wait...

Pure inexperience turn lack of inner discernment or just not enough inner scope of awareness?

Or plain verbal; vocabulary-recall difficulties mixed with emotional immaturity or inexperience.

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I have a hard time to understand my feelings in real time--this is common for autistics. I also have real difficultly in broad questions. "How are you feeling?" is a tough one for me. But "are you stressed?" I can figure out.

I was told by a girlfriend once that there is "something missing" within me.

I know there's something missing just by observing other, "normal" people, like my wife.

There are many times when one is able to make up for what is supposedly "missing." Through something that's alternative to what is supposedly "missing."

One might not be the most efflorescent social butterfly----but that same person can, perhaps, perform CPR really well.

I don't think it's so much that anything is missing, so much as it's a knowledge gap....

I'll try really hard to give an example....

I have heard of and known the definition of emotion A*, then I feel and experience emotion A. But I don't make the concious connection right away.

So if someone asked me "Do you feel emotion A?" I would not be able to answer immediately, because the emotion feels foreign and I need time to process and categorize it.

It's like the neural pathway that would normally make a fast connection between the title and the feeling is blocked, and the information had to take a roundabout way to get where it makes sense in the brain.

*insert chosen emotion here

Other people seem to insist that's the case.

_________________
"Standing on a well-chilled cinder, we see the fading of the suns, and try to recall the vanished brilliance of the origin of the worlds."
-Georges Lemaitre
"I fly through hyperspace, in my green computer interface"
-Gem Tos

Emotions confuse me sometimes. Most times.

I don't know how to know if I feel things different than anyone else or am missing feelings others have. Until I find a way to put myself in someone else's mind and body, I'll never know for sure. I've asked people about their feelings, and from their answers I think I am missing emotions others have. My mom, for example say she she feels things like frustrated and angry as different things. And she feels excited and anxious as different things. I don't. For me I only use different words based on the context of what happened to me. Both 'feel' the same to me, but I know I'm excited because say, I got a package I've been wanting v/s anxious because I don't want to stoop a thing the gas station, but I don't want the car to run out of gas either.

I got diagnosed with general anxiety disorder and actually argued with my therapist a therapist the time about it because I didn't think I had anxiety. I thought anxiety was like panic attacks where you thought you were dying and I never thought that. But apparently I get all the physical symptoms of anxiety but never knew that was what I thought was. Point being, I think I understand what you mean.

It is not that I don't have feelings and emotions. I have lots... But trying to put feelings into words... It is like I can have an exploding force of feelings inside me but no way of knowing how to get them out or express them into words.

I don't know if it is normal or not.

I never forget my brother having a feeling which he was in great disscomfort with but he did not know what it was. This happened when we were younger. My Dad asked him to try to describe it. He said that his toes kept curling up. Turns out it was cramp, which is actually a brilliant description of cramp in ones foot in which he had.

But sometimes one can have deep emotional feelings from the depths of ones soul, and not know how to describe them or how to express them. How to let them out!

I remember as I child I was often really frustrated and get huge rages because I was unable to express what or how I felt. When I was a baby my mother nearly chucked me out the window to stop my crying as I was unable to express how I felt. Now that is expected at that age because one is not able to talk...
But as an adult, though I can express myself better as I speak English, I still feel limited. I know my use of the English language is limited. I keep to simple words I remember. My vocabluary is limited, so I am wondering if there is a link between these?
I can learn words and words but soon after it has gone! Is why I was hopeless trying to learn other languages. I only am able to use words that "Stick" so I am often having to ask others what certain words mean. You see myy brain works well in pictures. I translate word scenes into pictures so reading books, I have to stop and wait for a picture to form in my head before I can move on. If my Mum reads something to me I am often still forming these imaginary pictures in my mind before I can move on so I have to get her to stop ans go back to where I was whilw I was forming the last picture before I can form the next picture.
In school when learning to read, I was told off because I needed to see the pictures relating to the words for me to make sense of the words... I think it took me longer to learn to read? But once I let go of real pictures and made my own imaginary pictures in my head, I then was ok to move on to books with the occasional picture... But even today I love "Reading" pictures!

I was looking into this a few years ago.

Autistic people do seem more likely to have internal states that are harder to describe and may not be experienced broadly by others. I believe this is from using different social input in developing ideas about internal states, what they mean, and how to discuss them. For example, I am NT, and can distinguish facial expressions and vocal tones easily. Some autistic people can’t, and may also use less (or different) facial expressions themselves and have a different or smaller range of vocal tones.

So, I can point at a tree, say “tree”, and you may hear me, see the tree, and agree that it is a tree. I could say “I feel fluttery inside.” You would then have to ask me more questions or examine my mannerisms closer to get an idea of what I meant. Even then, you may not be correct.

Empathy is like if you are a guy and see another guy get hit in the “goods” and it makes you involuntarily cringe, perhaps grab yourself protectively. I am a woman and have no idea what that feels like so I may feel a little sad for the guy and comment that it sucks. I would be using sympathy.

Empathy and sympathy seem to serve the same function. Do not worry if you don’t think you experience one of them.

Also, among NTs even, there is likely to be as not as many many shared internal states as is commonly thought. But we have to have shared general concepts to be able to communicate and make rules.

If you point to a tree and say 'tree' ... right now, I can feel the rough bark un my palms, see the dappled sunlight through the leaves, hear some squirrels chittering nearby, and smell the musty, moldy aroma of the dirt beneath my feet.  My emotional state is 'calm'.

Imagine trying to sit through a botany class when all of these sensory impressions bombard you from within.

Thank you all for your repliws. I have read them.