#flat affect

[openmindpsych]

shoutout to people who don't speak in complete monotone but still have a smaller range of emotional expression than others.

shoutout to people who often get misinterpreted because they express a lot of different emotions in very similar ways.

shoutout to people who have the "wrong" reaction to a situation (e.g. laughing when bad things happen) and get treated worse for it.

shoutout to people who have exaggerated emotional expression and gets seen as overdramatic or manipulative.

shoutout to people who struggle to express their emotions in the "right way".

[loungemermaid]

I don’t have a clever way to start this post but!! Important!!

Shane probably doesn’t know he has a flat affect. I didn’t know I did until I was twenty six years old. I thought I was extremely animated in both face and voice. I’m not. At all. I have a very very flat affect, very Paris Hilton “that’s hot”. This had to be pointed out to me by my wife who has known me for (at that point) seven years. (To their credit, they thought I knew).

Anyway when I learned this a lot more things made sense. I’d always been told I had a “tone” but I thought a “tone” was something you put on, not just the natural way I talked, so I thought I constantly was doing a “sarcastic voice”. I didn’t realize that it sounded like I was deadpanning every conversation I ever had and as a bonus was usually rolling my eyes, because I didn’t know that a) I wasn’t really making eye contact and b) rolling your eyes doesn’t literally mean rolling them in a circle like a goddamn cartoon character.

Given that Shane doesn’t think he cries because tears aren’t falling, and how flat his affect is in very serious moments, I don’t think he knows he does this at all, and is going to have to be told by Ilya, and go through the bewildering experience of being known by someone better than he knows himself.

[ieatratsyummy]

I feel like the idea of flat affect has been so watered down for people. Flat affect doesn't just mean having a "bitchface", and it never has been just that.

How flat affect presents for me:

Limited expressions, I need to be actively thinking about making an expression to have it happen. Additionally, it often takes multiple tries to get the expression I intended. This isn't limited to positive expressions, I also struggle to make expressions conveying things like surprise.

Practicing facial expressions as a child. Being told my smile is "fake" by adults when they wanted a picture.

Having limited tone, I struggle to convey different emotions through my voice unless I am actively attempting. This presents for me mostly as, I will make a joke and people will think I am being dead serious. Multiple times I have made something I thought was very obviously a joke, and then someone will ask me later on if I was being serious.

Shocking teachers and counselors when I do show emotion, but also not showing negative emotions how people without flat affect do. I had a panic attack, and one of my counselors managed to walk right past me crying, because I had a flat expression despite being actively sobbing. The day after this another counselor pulled me to ask if I was ok, she said she was so worried hearing that I'd cried because I "never show much emotion".

I take selfies over and over, because I cannot get the "right expression", which has resulted in me giving up and just taking selfies with my resting face. Of course if I show someone a selfie I took, the conversation always is about how I am not smiling, and how weird that is.

If you have flat affect, please feel free to add your experiences in the comments/reblogs!

[schizoid-hikikomori]

There is a fascination people have with emotional unavailability and it's usually to everyone's detriment.

Someone who is not as outwardly expressive as expected, who is withdrawn and not really forthcoming with information, creates a sense of mystery for people. And like any mystery, people want to solve it. And when it comes to someone labelled as "mysterious", people feel a sense of obligation to "solve" that mystery—either to get to know them, to find a way to change them, perceivably "fixing" them, or something similar.

For schizoid individuals, it creates this sense of unwanted attention from people who cannot be satisfied with receiving nothing. At first impression, it's all about the fantasy—look at this stoic person who doesn't pay attention to anyone or care about anyone, imagine if they made an exception for me, imagine if I could get to see their "true" self.

You're not going to get this from a schizoid individual. This is a fantasy you're projecting onto them—that they're something special, something to be saved or explored. Don't expect an emotional response from someone who's frequently emotionally dissociated, it's not going to end up well for either of you.

And it's so common for schizoids to see themselves as not possessing any sense of personality, to be filled with a void. To try to dig deeper against what they're willing to show you, it's violating and can be perceived as controlling or exploitative, which can cause further withdrawal.

I do not speak for all schizoids, but I do speak for myself when I say to not try and make us into something different.

You will be disillusioned and frustrated when the emotionless person is emotionless.

[scramratz]

Got the kind of autism that makes me hard to love

[aurangg]

I wish not having friends wasn’t seen as such a loser, weirdo, and lame thing. I wish having a lack of emotion and empathy wasn’t seen as creepy or cruel. I wish being aplatonic and not having platonic attraction or being aromantic and not having romantic attraction wasn’t seen as some undesirable thing.

I’m not a robot. I’m not boring and uninteresting. I just experience the world around us much differently to you. I’ve seen things you couldn’t even dream of. I’ve experienced things you wouldn’t wish on anybody.

[luseals]

happy to be here!!! / flat affect

[vanpeltfoto]

Anhedonia noun

The inability to feel pleasure in normally pleasurable activities.

***

A reduced capacity for joy. A flattening of response. A landscape that remains intact but no longer registers. Everything still functions. Nothing feels.

(Photo: d.)

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