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I Get on My Own Nerves When I Cannot Express How I Feel, or Why

I had a plan. I was going to get up, get something accomplished, do some writing, work on a paper that is due this weekend, shower, dress, and head to the bookstore just to get the heck out of the house for a little while.

One hour later, I am staring blankly at my computer screen not wanting to do a thing. I don’t want to get out of my pajamas. I can’t think of a single thing to write about, or organize my thoughts enough to start on the next chapter of the book I am working on. I don’t want to read, leave the house, or see another single living soul.  What happened?

I wish I knew.

These kinds of things seem to happen to me often. My mood changes direction almost instantaneously with seemingly no reason. I can begin my day feeling positive, and an hour later feel like everything in the world is just shit. Nothing is worth doing, nothing is worth moving for, and nothing is ever going to change or get better.

I can tell myself the permanence of my feelings are not reality–but anytime I seem to get to feeling this way, it feels like it will be FOREVER. It doesn’t matter that I know in a little while, or even by tomorrow morning I will feel better. My brain doesn’t register that in the moment I am in. The feelings I feel seem permanent, un-moving, unchangeable–impossible to overcome.

Impossible makes me feel helpless; helpless makes me feel miserable. I feel unhappy about everything, but can I really trust those feelings?

Maybe I am having such difficulties when these “feelings” hit because I find it difficult to identify my own feelings. I find it difficult to put to words what I feel, and even more difficult to discover what is causing my distress. Many times I mistakenly think that it is my environment, my work, the house, where we live, and a host of other things that I can come up with. But–are these things really the cause for my distress?

Maybe it is a build-up. A cumulative effect of the extremely sensitive days I’ve been having.  The days were the rabbit drinking water in the other room are way too loud (through the earplugs) and I must wear a baseball cap or some sort of visor in the house at all times because the overhead lighting is bothering my eyes and giving me headaches.

These days have been constant for about a week now.  Am I headed for the depressive meltdown? A depressive shutdown? And if so, how can I stop it?

 

 

 

 

Jeannie Davide-Rivera

Jeannie is an award-winning author, the Answers.com Autism Category Expert, contributes to Autism Parenting Magazine, and the Thinking Person's Guide to Autism. She lives in New York with her husband and four sons, on the autism spectrum.

5 Comments:

  1. it seems to me that going on the computer/phone can cause this to happen to me. if i go on in the morning (even for something as important as paying a bill or something) – i have a hard time ending that computer time, and then i feel horrible out of energy, cranky, touchy, and unable to walk away….

    • Agreed. For me though, it is hard to walk away after accomplishing what I set out to do (i.e. pay bills, write blog, chapter, school work or whatever is pressing that day). Then I wind up tinkering because there is so much I think of needing my attention…that is when everything spins out of control, I lose track of time, and get nothing done. Very frustrating indeed.

  2. wow thats just how i get sometimes. I think its because I don’t recognise my emotions as they develop, so by the time I feel them they are strong and feel like they have come from no-where. By then I am in what i call the “red zone” and can not do much except write it down, walk it off with the dog and camera or just plain wait it out. I am the same with anger and even hunger (I dont realise i am hungry till I am shaky or light headed). x

    • Hey Jess,

      Ya know what? I hadn’t put that together before…the anger and hunger, that is. I too, do not realize I am hungry until I am shaky, lightheaded, flying around the house on my broomstick, yelling and almost in tears. The anger hits like an explosion because that too, I do not feel build up. It is just not there one moment, and there the next!

  3. Oh, I get this too. It’s inexplicable and sudden and I hate when it happens. I don’t have any solutions except to wait it out and maybe not try to be too hard on yourself. So . . . totally useless comment of solidarity. 🙂

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