Alexithymia (from the Greek “lack of feelings”) is a human cognitive feature that often occurs as a concomitant symptom of various psychosomatic disorders and is characterized as a pronounced difficulty, and sometimes a complete lack of ability to describe one’s own experiences, feelings and distinguish them from bodily sensations. People with alexithymia tend to focus on what is happening around them, without noticing what their circumstances are. Such people are also called “emotional colorblind.” The symptom is not limited to difficulty describing one’s emotion; it is also difficult for a person to fantasize about anything. A retelling of any events from such a person is unlikely to be colored with emotionally flavored phrases. Alexithymia may be a consequence of: - a psychotraumatic event - pedagogical neglect - organic disorders (insufficient development of the nervous system, brain damage as a result of exposure to various hazards) - increased personal anxiety - a unique approach to education (sometimes parents do not welcome the child’s ways of self-expression due to the discrepancy between the ideal in their understanding of the self-concept, and the child, receiving this kind of “social ban” on emotions and feelings, chooses the path of least resistance, then the reluctance to express oneself turns into an impossibility. broadcast projections. You can read more about this type of psychological defense in my article. In addition to projections, such a person is characterized by rationalization (in this case, this is an attempt to change the meaning of what is happening or one’s state in order to defend a point of view). Thus, alexithymia can accompany not only people with certain mental or organic disorders, but may well be a feature of a relatively healthy person. As described above, alexithymia may be a consequence of untimely learning or lack of learning for a person to hear himself, identify and, even more so, differentiate emotions and feelings. During sessions of a psychological nature, the client is offered activities aimed at that same training. In addition, keeping in mind the peculiarity of such clients, there are projective techniques, such as metaphorical cards, where the client can interpret the drawing, and the psychologist will form a hypothesis and offer it to the client. If you feel the need for a space where you will be unconditionally accepted and listened to, if you have a desire to explore yourself and your relationships with people around you, I invite you to an individual consultation via Skype. --Nikolai Ustimenkopsychologist-consultant, sign up for a consultation