Emotional Blindness

Alexithymia is something that came up during my autism evaluation earlier this year - I guess I was fortunate to see someone who was aware of it.

I have read elsewhere that people on the autism spectrum are significantly more likely to have Alexithymic traits, and also that those who do are likely to have the traits more severely than the general population - though non-autistic people can be affected just as extremely in some cases.

I know for sure that it has given me problems when dealing with other people.  When folks ask "How did that make you feel?", they expect an answer straight away.  If I say "I don't know", the reaction is just "Well, if you don't know, who the hell does?".  Unfortunately, people so often jump to the conclusion that I either just don't care, or that I'm deliberately concealing my emotions.

It is very common that I genuinely don't know which emotion I'm experiencing at the time.  It's not even just that I can't find the name - I often can't even tell if it's something I've experienced before or not.

Over time, it will sometimes sink in, and a few hours or days later I'll realise what the feeling was, and a more typical reaction will kick in.  Other times, I need to see someone else experiencing the emotion, even just a fictional character, and then it will suddenly become apparent to me.

With the counsellor I'm seeing at the moment, I have been in the odd situation that she can read my emotions faster than I can.  For example; I can be exhibiting all of the physical reactions to anxiety; agitated eye movements, higher heart rate and breathing, tense muscles etc. - and she will see this for what it is, while I am totally oblivious to the fact that I'm anxious until she points it out to me.

At my evaluation, they had an interesting explanation.  It seems like the subconscious feels the initial emotion, then uses physical reactions, hormones etc. to signal this to the conscious - at which time we then become aware of it.  It seems that for some people, like me, our conscious cannot properly read the physical and hormonal signs that the sub-conscious is sending. 

Alexithymia is something that came up during my autism evaluation earlier this year - I guess I was fortunate to see someone who was aware of it.

I have read elsewhere that people on the autism spectrum are significantly more likely to have Alexithymic traits, and also that those who do are likely to have the traits more severely than the general population - though non-autistic people can be affected just as extremely in some cases.

I know for sure that it has given me problems when dealing with other people.  When folks ask "How did that make you feel?", they expect an answer straight away.  If I say "I don't know", the reaction is just "Well, if you don't know, who the hell does?".  Unfortunately, people so often jump to the conclusion that I either just don't care, or that I'm deliberately concealing my emotions.

It is very common that I genuinely don't know which emotion I'm experiencing at the time.  It's not even just that I can't find the name - I often can't even tell if it's something I've experienced before or not.

Over time, it will sometimes sink in, and a few hours or days later I'll realise what the feeling was, and a more typical reaction will kick in.  Other times, I need to see someone else experiencing the emotion, even just a fictional character, and then it will suddenly become apparent to me.

With the counsellor I'm seeing at the moment, I have been in the odd situation that she can read my emotions faster than I can.  For example; I can be exhibiting all of the physical reactions to anxiety; agitated eye movements, higher heart rate and breathing, tense muscles etc. - and she will see this for what it is, while I am totally oblivious to the fact that I'm anxious until she points it out to me.

At my evaluation, they had an interesting explanation.  It seems like the subconscious feels the initial emotion, then uses physical reactions, hormones etc. to signal this to the conscious - at which time we then become aware of it.  It seems that for some people, like me, our conscious cannot properly read the physical and hormonal signs that the sub-conscious is sending.