Processing emotions

I only know what my feelings were/are about a specific situations DAYS later. And then get stuck with that particular emotion for days, sometimes even years...

Don't know whether you finished writing your post, if so, let me know!

I don't really know what the phrase 'processing emotions' means when people say it. I don't think people used that phrase 40 or 50 years ago. There's a word that's been cropping up on these forums a lot recently, 'alexithymia', which means not knowing or being able to explain what you're feeling.

Supposedly you can notice your emotions by noticing sensations in your body, how you're acting and moving and what your thoughts return to. I suppose meditation can help with noticing sensations, and probably with thoughts as well, because the thoughts are what stop you meditating. Mindfulness can be used when you're out and about and reacting to things too. I've been recommended books by Jon Kabat-Zinn. There are courses in the same type of mindfulness that are about £200. I might do one of these in the future.

I think some of us may have grown up in situations where our emotions weren't of interest to other people, or we weren't allowed to act on them. I expect if we get a chance to talk about our feelings in detail then we might get a better understanding of what they mean, what triggers them, and what it tells us about what we need. That's often the idea of counselling and therapy, but unfortunately I've never found it to work for me in practice. I think friends give better feedback. Sometimes there are lots of different incidents and thoughts that contribute to an outburst, and it's only the most immediate thing that we notice.

Wishing you well too.