Emotional numbness is extremely rarely diagnosed as a disease in its own right. It often occurs as a secondary symptom of an existing condition. Affected individuals express an inability to adequately perceive their emotional world. The chances of recovery depend on the underlying disease. Drug or psychotherapeutic treatment measures have not yet been sufficiently confirmed in their effectiveness.
What is emotional numbness?
Emotional numbness refers to a temporary or chronic inability to perceive, process, and articulate one’s feelings and sensations in an appropriate manner. In many cases, the lack of emotionality is compensated for by intense physical stimuli. This may involve drastic measures to which the environment often reacts with alienation. Social isolation and self-alienation, even depersonalization, may be the result of a marked emotional sensation disorder.
Causes
Emotional numbness usually occurs in conjunction with another underlying disorder. It may arise on a psychological level, for example, as a result of post-traumatic stress disorder or depression. After traumatic experiences, the shutting down of the emotional world is often consciously self-induced by affected persons in order to cope with everyday situations. In order to avoid irrational states of panic in situations that remind people of past traumas, they necessarily enter a state of complete numbness. Acute states of emotional numbness are not necessarily due to serious mental or neurological illnesses. Sleep deprivation, PMS and stress can also be triggers of temporary emotional disturbance. Temporary sensation-free states can be achieved by taking certain hallucinogenic drugs or by intense meditation. Neurological diseases such as multiple sclerosis or schizophrenia can also be triggers of emotional numbness. Here, psychosomatic processes play less of a role than hormonal or functional disturbances of certain brain areas.
Symptoms, complaints, and signs
People suffering from emotional numbness perceive their feelings only very attenuated and feel alienated and left alone in their environment. Feelings such as fear, anger, love or lust no longer find an emotional basis and are subsequently classified as physical rather than psychological factors. Accordingly, those affected often try to compensate for an emotional state through physical activities or to activate it in the first place. This becomes dangerous if a connection to the outside world can only be established at all through major physical sensations such as pain or relevant stimulants. Incipient emotional numbness is most clearly visible in the decline of social interaction and a general neglect of former leisure activities. With the increasing lack of understanding of one’s own emotional world, it is impossible for those affected to engage with interpersonal needs or to maintain a basic empathic understanding of the emotional world of others. Often, such insensitivity is met with incomprehension and sometimes unwillingness on the part of fellow human beings. This reaction cannot be adequately compensated for by the affected person, which can lead to further emotional withdrawal. People who are forced to live in pronounced emotional isolation tend to experience general hopelessness in the further course of the disease, an inner emptiness that underlies everything. This becomes noticeable in severe depression, pronounced lack of drive and general joylessness. Not only social contacts suffer. The willingness to perform and learn at work and in everyday life is also severely weakened by the lack of inner motivation.
Diagnosis and course
Currently, science criticizes a much too little attention to the prevailing symptomatology. Often mental illnesses such as anxiety disorder or depression are falsely diagnosed, with emotional numbness only as a sub-issue. The disease can proceed in different patterns. Starting from a sudden or even insidious onset, symptoms may worsen episodically or continuously.Mixed forms are also possible – such as an inconspicuous onset, gradual progression, and ultimately a relapsing disease that is completely incomprehensible to the environment.
When should you see a doctor?
If the affected person finds it difficult to develop emotions or to interpret them in a counterpart, he should have his observations clarified by a doctor. In the case of emotional numbness, relatives often suffer more from the symptoms than the sufferer himself. Therefore, it is also advisable that the family members or partners of a patient consult a physician. They need a comprehensive explanation of the symptoms of the disease. In addition, it can be helpful if they seek emotional and psychological support in coping with the situation. Affected persons often perceive the lack of emotions very late. Usually they suffer from other diseases, the effect of which is emotional numbness. For this reason, a visit to the doctor should be made as soon as the affected person feels unwell, his participation in social life is low or he notices a lack of drive. Often he is pointed out by fellow men that his behavior is unusual. If the insinuations recur, it is advisable to consult a doctor and describe the situations. Emotional numbness may occur as a consequence of trauma. After experiencing a fateful event, it is generally advisable to see a doctor or therapist. This can be helpful in processing what has happened.
Treatment and therapy
Since emotional numbness per se is not considered a disease, the underlying disease is treated first and foremost. Relevant methods have not yet been able to establish themselves in this regard. On the medicinal level, great hopes are pinned on antidepressants and neuroleptics. These are supposed to influence the perception of one’s own feelings by selectively stimulating or inhibiting certain hormone releases. There are also no relevant psychosomatic therapies to date. Great hopes are pinned on behavioral therapy in the field of traumatology. The targeted reappraisal of traumatic experiences should enable the affected person to move about in everyday life free of fear and thus make a conscious restriction of the emotional world superfluous.
Outlook and prognosis
Transient emotional numbness has a good prognosis. It is often triggered by periods of emotional overload, hectic schedules, the onset of life crises, or traumatic events. Once these emotional challenges have been dealt with, the emotions return and the numbness disappears. With psychological care, many patients may find that their period of suffering is shortened or their symptoms are alleviated. In minor crises, a therapist is not always needed to achieve a cure. If the affected person is faced with coping with an intense emotional problem or several emotionally upsetting events, further discomfort and thus a worsening of the prognosis may occur. This is especially true if medical treatment is not sought. If emotional numbness does not represent an independent clinical picture, the existing underlying disease must be diagnosed in order to make a prognosis. If this is treatable, the emotional deafness will also be cured. If a disorder is present that cannot be cured with the current medical possibilities, the emotional deafness will persist in the long term. A very frequent criterion for the improvement of the symptoms is the patient’s understanding of the disease. If it is not given or if there is a lack of cooperation of the affected person in a therapy, the prognosis is unfavorable.
Prevention
In the course of an already known underlying disease, regular psychological assessment of emotional sensitivity is advisable. It is essential that appropriate medications be taken as directed by a physician. Short-tempered states can be avoided by a healthy, balanced lifestyle. Abstaining from stimulants such as alcohol and nicotine also promote a healthy relationship with one’s own emotional world and with the emotional reception and processing of environmental stimuli.
Aftercare
Emotional numbness requires more or less intensive aftercare, depending on the cause.The encapsulation of the soul in the face of attacks or stimuli can indicate autism in children or adults, but it can also suggest psychological abuse. In the first case, follow-up care is difficult but entirely feasible. Autistic individuals also benefit from receiving intensive care over time. In the case of sexual or psychological abuse, psychotherapy or behavioral therapy is the appropriate approach to track down the emotional numbness. In addition, emotional numbness may indicate post-traumatic stress syndrome. In this case, the stress disorder must be treated therapeutically after diagnosis. Emotional numbness can occur months or years later after a stressful experience. However, emotional numbness can also be a component of mental illness. Depression, for example, is a possibility. These often require long-term drug therapy. In some cases, however, psychotherapy can also be an effective therapeutic approach against emotional numbness. In most cases, emotional numbness is considered a symptom rather than being recognized and treated as a problem in its own right. It usually represents one before several disorders, for example, self-destructive behaviors such as cracking, alcoholism, and similar attempts at relief. Follow-up care is therefore based on the underlying problem.
Here’s what you can do yourself
The options for self-help with emotional numbness are very limited. Even if empathy is in principle equally learnable for genders, it is the sufferers of an emotional deafness usually due to an emotionally highly stressful event this ability is not retrievable. In most cases, the disease is also perceived as burdensome by the relatives. For this reason it is important that partners and family members are fully informed about the complaints of the affected person. They often need psychological support to help them cope with the symptoms in everyday life. Sufferers often experience lower levels of emotion or none at all. They lack the competence to establish access to their own sensations. At the same time, they are often unable to perceive and respond to the feelings and inner states of experience of other people. Tolerance and understanding are required from everyone involved. In everyday life, it is helpful to talk openly about the events and perceptions of all affected persons in the environment. Explanations about certain behavior are just as important as the reflection of behavior patterns. On the basis of mutual trust and the exchange of wishes and needs, changes can be achieved together. The goal should be to avoid conflicts and to achieve an improvement in living together.