Managing emotions for which you have no explanation

Sometimes I feel down with no specific cause. Nothing new has happened. No event has taken place. I have no reason, trigger or stimulus to feel how I do. But I do feel how I do.

When someone asks what is wrong, I can point to things which are wrong in my life, but no specific reason for why now. No reason for why at this particular time I should be upset about x, y or z. But I do feel down about them.

Additionally, I also feel amazing at times. With no specific cause. Nothing new has happened, the same as before.

These feelings therefore are not explainable by the events in my life. They are not responses to a trigger. I can spend a day crying or anxious or just down, but I am unable really to explain satisfactorily why to anyone who encounters me like this.

Often I have periods where I fixate on things or people and become obsessive for no reason. Usually on the people most in my life at that point. The main trait I notice in myself at these times is fixation on believing my friends do not really like me. That they just tolerate me to feel like a good person. That I am a burden. That they are being secretive. Are drifting away from me. I spend time thinking about how long it would take for them to get over my death if something happened to me or I took my own life. Who would find me? Who would move on first? These are horrible, incredibly self centred thoughts to have, but I have had them, and will most certainly do so again in the future.

These periods where I have fixated on particular issues or friends are not caused by my friends. As far as I understand it from experiences over the years, I would have had a period, say a day, or a few days like this either way. It is just unfortunate for them that during this period they became the focus for my behaviour. The causality in this sense is reversed. Rather then causing my change of emotion/mood they are just affected by it.

I feel my closest friends deserve a medal. On far too many occasions they have born the brunt of this frenzied behaviour. Where I become obsessive, attention seeking and desperate for reassurance that we are still friends and that they care about me. When I am feeling better and I look back at my behaviour, I feel awful. The worst thing is usually how I could not see at the time what I was doing. It is like a different person and often quite humiliating when I see how I was.

At the height of my more frenzied periods I can also be highly irritable. I can be feeling good overall but I become difficult. And I make life hard for the people around me. If something is not as I wanted it, or a plan changes at short notice, I become unreasonably difficult. At these times it is all about control. I lash out and I go over the top and become nasty and snap at those closest to me, for circumstances which in any other scenario would seem quite trivial. .

Knowing that I can be like this is hard to know, but harder for those who repeatedly have to deal with this. And for that I really am grateful to my partner and also my closest friends who know what I’m like and just get on with it. They truly are a wonderful bunch of people and I feel grateful to have them and really should say it more.

To help me when I am like this I walk. Boy do I walk a lot. I can walk in the middle of the night. All day. I just like to walk. Open spaces are also good. It doesn’t fix the problem. But it is calming. It begins the process of putting thoughts in order and helps me to settle my thinking and get some perspective. Audio books are also good. Especially old people narrating their own biographies. It is very calming.

I also cook. I love to cook. The repetitive processes and creating something which I will enjoy makes me feel good. It also makes me feel like I am caring for myself. I am doing good things by eating well and that helps me.

I also go to the gym. I can exhaust myself to the point where people comment that I look unwell around my eyes. I find going to the gym helps to tire me out. Which is calming and helps me sleep. It also stops me thinking about whatever thing or person I have fixated on at that point. I imagine the endorphins are also helping quite a lot.

My main aim in writing this was just to get it down and be a bit open about it. I don’t need sympathy or anything. I am genuinely OK. I assume many others are the same and I feel it’s good to see it visibly that others are also dealing with these things. I hope in that respect it is reassuring that you are not alone if you are going through similar things. It can be incredibly isolating, so it is good to be there for each other in that way.

Thanks for reading.

P.S I walk even when I feel good. So don’t worry if you see me walking.