Extremely persistent emotional numbness/emptiness/inability to feel ANY emotion

[KatiesKarma]

Hello,

I think I've posted a similar question on here a year or two ago. Basically, ever since Corona hit (march 2020), I can no longer feel emotions. The moment I "shifted" into this imo lower state of consciousness it felt like my soul had been turned off or sucked away, which is also why I had some sort of Christian psychosis.
I now recognize that all of this psychosis nonsense is God (me) deceiving God (still me).

Doesn't matter, what matters is that I cannot feel. Like a dead rock I am on the inside, yet my intellect and  everything else works perfectly fine.

Nostalgia, dopamine rushes, sadness, anxiety, fear, surprise, awe, fascination, interest, all the subtle shifts in consciousness I no longer have.

Since I've been morbidly obsessed with trying to resolve this problem I tried a lot of things, prayer, psychoanalytic and psychodynamic therapy, antidepressants, mdma, lsd, weed, speed, cigarettes, meditation, astral projection... nothing.

How I even came back to this forum - a few days ago a friend of mine got very high on a substance I don't know the name of in english, and he gave me his HHC vape. It's the same as THC. I took three deep hits and continued playing cards, and as I got up to go back inside I noticed this shift in consciousness. I didn't expect to actually get high but I went with it. On my bed, lost in thought and after an intense dream that felt so real I didn't know whether or not it had happened, I thought

"What if I am God, imagining all of this?" Relief washed over me, you have no idea.

On weed I had significantly more thoughts than on baseline consciousness, I felt more "alive".

I was thinking that 50ug LSD or a few hits of the HHC vape plus holotropic breathing might do the trick. I don't really know whom to ask and where to go.

 

I would do literally anything and everything just to feel emotions again. It would be my most high pleasure and greatest goal in life, just to feel. To fall in love once, then I could die in peace.

[Salvijus]

What? ?

So have you laughed at least once since 2020? If yes, then you have emotions. ? problem solved.

[KatiesKarma]

Just now, Salvijus said:

What? ?

So have you laughed at least once since 2020? If yes, then you have emotions. ? problem solved.

Sure I have laughed, but it's always as though there is a thick fat wall between me and the outter world. The laugh might have been geniuene but the emotion, the joy, the dopamine is never there. It's really bothersome.

[Salvijus]

9 minutes ago, KatiesKarma said:

Sure I have laughed, but it's always as though there is a thick fat wall between me and the outter world. The laugh might have been geniuene but the emotion, the joy, the dopamine is never there. It's really bothersome.

I see. I guess I would call it a dense ego. And just a heavy mind in general. Should be solvable.  (Assuming it is actually that - a dense ego)

Edited August 1, 2023 by Salvijus

[KatiesKarma]

9 minutes ago, Salvijus said:

I see. I guess I would call it a dense ego. And just a heavy mind in general. Should be solvable.  (Assuming it is actually that - a dense ego)

I would say before I got this problem I was fairly neurotic, overthinking, full of social anxiety, shame, pride... I don't know if trauma plays a role here, I was very lonely and depressed and then I stopped feeling.

I am afraid of my mind, like I can sense this sort of crazy psychotic spirit in the far back of my mind which is why I am hesitant about more drugs.

[Salvijus]

9 minutes ago, KatiesKarma said:

I would say before I got this problem I was fairly neurotic, overthinking, full of social anxiety, shame, pride... I don't know if trauma plays a role here, I was very lonely and depressed and then I stopped feeling.

Mmm... sounds tough. Do u cry during therapy? Or is everything supressed?

[KatiesKarma]

Just now, Salvijus said:

Mmm... sounds tough. Do u cry during therapy? Or is everything supressed?

I cried lots here and then but it does not feel geniuene. It feels as though I am acting. The feeling remains eternally suppressed if we can call it that way.

It's so annoying to deal with this and I can't seem to get rid of this emptiness no matter what I do. It drove me to the borders of sheer insanity and back. 

[Salvijus]

7 minutes ago, KatiesKarma said:

It's so annoying to deal with this and I can't seem to get rid of this emptiness no matter what I do

You mean like, "life has no meaning", "everything sucks" , "everything feels so dull and lifeless, pointless"?

Edited August 1, 2023 by Salvijus

[KatiesKarma]

1 minute ago, Salvijus said:

You mean like, "life has no meaning", "everything sucks" , "everything feels so dull and lifeless, pointless"?

It's hard to explain...

It's not even that. Things feel neither meaningful nor meaningless to me, it's like I am 100% neutral most times. I can still get scared, but it's a superficial fear with no deep basis within my being. 

I know that life can have plenty of meaning, but yes things in the broader sense feel pretty fucking pointless, lifeless. I look at people and think: man, are they NPCs? They feel exactly like NPCs. 

It's like I am in a deep state of apathy but in a relaxed way.

I distinctly remember that before my shift into this garbage, life felt significantly more alive. Which is also why during psychosis I thought that all of mankind had died in spirit.

 

 

[Ulax]

@KatiesKarma Sounds to me like dissociation

I note also you haven't mentioned any somatic oriented practices. To my understanding, dissociation is often most effectively resolved via somatic work, i.e. IFS, craniosacral therapy, Somatic experiencing, acupuncture.

Edited August 1, 2023 by Ulax

[KatiesKarma]

2 minutes ago, Ulax said:

@KatiesKarma Sounds to me like dissociation

Yes but then this begs the question ... Why? 

It's not like I was raped and heavily beaten. I just felt particularly lonely and hopeless for a few weeks, why would that turn into such extreme dissociation for such a long time? It's been three years and counting...

I don't know if this is some form of ego death without the awe. 

[Salvijus]

I guess a loving relationship might restore and open the heart again. 

[Ulax]

1 minute ago, KatiesKarma said:

Yes but then this begs the question ... Why? 

It's not like I was raped and heavily beaten. I just felt particularly lonely and hopeless for a few weeks, why would that turn into such extreme dissociation for such a long time? It's been three years and counting...

I don't know if this is some form of ego death without the awe. 

@KatiesKarma Ye i get the confusion.

Maybe you have a child part that got pretty triggered by something and decided to dissociate. 

[KatiesKarma]

5 minutes ago, Ulax said:

@KatiesKarma Sounds to me like dissociation

I note also you haven't mentioned any somatic oriented practices. To my understanding, dissociation is often most effectively resolved via somatic work, i.e. IFS, craniosacral therapy, Somatic experiencing, acupuncture.

Basically after two years of intense talk therapy (utterly, utterly, useless in this case) I was so overwhelmed by this problem that I gave up on any other approach either.. it's also not so simple to find a competent therapist in the somatic field or so I think.. at least the last time I check I was quite disappointed.  I'm from Germany btw

[KatiesKarma]

1 minute ago, Salvijus said:

I guess a loving relationship might restore and open the heart again. 

Been there done that.. ultimately, my first intimate relationship ended abruptly after the honeymoon because my inability to feel got even worse. I thought I was loving my partner, but then I realized it's an empty, so empty facade...

[Ulax]

2 minutes ago, KatiesKarma said:

Basically after two years of intense talk therapy (utterly, utterly, useless in this case) I was so overwhelmed by this problem that I gave up on any other approach either.. it's also not so simple to find a competent therapist in the somatic field or so I think.. at least the last time I check I was quite disappointed.  I'm from Germany btw

I see. Perhaps you could consider working with an online practioner.

[Salvijus]

3 minutes ago, KatiesKarma said:

Been there done that.. ultimately, my first intimate relationship ended abruptly after the honeymoon because my inability to feel got even worse. I thought I was loving my partner, but then I realized it's an empty, so empty facade...

?

You remind me of this girl from Adams family.

Edited August 1, 2023 by Salvijus

[KatiesKarma]

2 minutes ago, Ulax said:

@KatiesKarma Ye i get the confusion.

Maybe you have a child part that got pretty triggered by something and decided to dissociate. 

I really don't know what to make of these psychology concepts. They sound completely made up to me

Idk. Let's say I have/ had Trauma, i.e. feeling completely abandoned by the world and my few friends. 

You would then think that friends and a lover will resolve the trauma, which is false.  This trauma seems to have fundamentally changed my being and perception on the deepest level possible.

Maybe a really competent somatic therapist plus a mild psychedelic COULD do something, but zero guarantees.

[KatiesKarma]

3 minutes ago, Ulax said:

I see. Perhaps you could consider working with an online practioner.

Yeah I guess I'll have to look into that

[KatiesKarma]

2 minutes ago, Salvijus said:

?

You remind me of this girl.

No clue who that is