Forum member Struggling wrote this as her opening post in the "Feel Good Thread", elsewhere in this section.
I was absolutely blown away when I read it, and now I'm wondering whether this is an actual ADHD quirk that many other ADDers share, or if its just something that could be a problem to anyone, ADD or not.
I added the bold face to the parts that stood out the most to me, and would like to hear from others about this.

He not only accepts and tolerates the things I do (not being able to talk about my feeling and emotions is a big thing I have) but he actually tries to help me communicate w/ him. Most people just say stuff like...how do you feel, or why do you feel that way. I can never answer that type of question. He goes a little deeper and says do you feel this way or that way...is it because of this or is it because of that. It's so much easier to get things out from my brain to my mouth when he takes the time to help me.

For a bit over two years, from the summer of 1998 through the fall of 2000 I was in a group therapy program that met for 1-1/2 hours every week. One of the requirements of remaining in the program* was that I had to keep a daily journal recording my feelings in it. Each week this was to be turned in to the counseler(s), who then returned the journal we had handed in the previous week, with their questions and comments written in beside our entries.
For the most part, I was completely incapable of fulfilling this assignment.
Sometimes, I thought it was because I was being stubborn and refusing to do something that I didn't want/like, but for the most part I was absolutely clueless as to what I was supposed to do. I'd sit and look at the journal with no idea of where to begin, much less of how to continue; may weeks I handed in a blank journal, and was on the "hot seat" more than once because of this.
There were several other written assignments, much more difficult than this one, that I was able to complete with no problems at all.
To this day, four years later, I still find myself wondering about this thing, and asking myself whether it was stubbon rebellion, or whether it was an assignment that was beyond by abilities.
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*All the other members were court-ordered to the program; I was not, but I wasn't exactly their voluntarily, either.

This is changing for me. I suppose there are a bunch of factors influencing this but I'm far more in touch with how I'm feeling than I was ever a year ago.

I'm doing everything in my power to slow the thought process down and maybe now there is a little more room for other factors to come into play. It's all relatively new so I'm not clear on much here sorry.

My coach and therapist has commented that the shift is very clear to her. I seem to be more comfortable with myself.

I used to joke with my therapist when she would ask me how I was feeling. I would respond to that question by suggesting that was why I kept comming was to find out from her!

It's no laughing matter though. The only think I can think of is that it's calmer inside now and there is room for that information to percolate up no where before there wasn't.

The only remaining concern is the "paralysis of will" (procrastination) that I have regarding some tasks.

I'll be interested in your continued thoughts on this Swamp. I'm not really sure what's working for me so I'm a little scared it might all just slip away.
ian

I read stugglings post earlier and also had some thoughts about it...

How do I feel ????????

I have to answer that with , I don't feel.......

I AM Angry

I AM Sad

I AM Happy

I Am Frustrated

Its not like I feel The emotion

Its more like " I AM " the Emotion

I feel when I have a Headache or an upset stomach

Im not sure if this makes any sence in words but it does in thoughts

That sounds like it might be related to something more like an autistic trait though I don't know enough about that to say. I do not think it is an ADD trait directly. Part of it could be just that you are a thinking type of person not a feeling type, like with the Meyer Briggs personality test I come up INTP, the T is for thinking rather than feeling. Another thing is it could be indirectly related to the ADD side effects that cause poor self esteem and depression due to being a social misfit. I was just introduced to the concept through an old friend of "disassociation" which in our case it's when life is so unpleasant that you detatch or dissasociate from life, in our case the symptom was extreme introversion but the same principal applies to repressed emotions which are too painful to feel so we disassociate with them and with feelings in general. This goes along with what Ian was saying about feeling his feelings more recently as he's basically cleaned up his act, quit drinking and become more mature.

I feel like I can relate to this thread (um - pun intended).
My husband is forever telling me that I lack introspection. I am aware of what that word means, but personally it means nothing to me.
I was once compared to a Mazda engine, as in, I am not on an emotional roller coaster. I seem to be steady, and my DiSC assessment we took at work even pegs me as a steady....
I can rarely tell a person what I am feeling. My husband, being the keen observer of human nature that he is, is telling me I am depressed lately. Yet, I feel no different than usual. However, I am sleeping a lot more, and drinking more wine than usual - my mom died unexpectedly in April, and we just finished off the estate business finally.
I always thought it meant that I was just not in touch with my feelings, for the most part anyway, because sometimes I do feel paranoia, helplessness or left out or like everyone is talking about me/staring at me....what I thought were the ususal ADDer "feelings" we had to fight against.

For me...I can write really well. I still have to be in the mood..usually feeling some extreme emotion...but if I am, I can write it...I just can't verbally express it. My friend that I talked about in the other thread, jokes around and asks if I need a keyboard, lol.

Slightly off topic but much the same for me

I have new hearing aids which really work well

I can hear things I haven't heard for a long time

I hate them as I prefer the silence of not hearing all the external distractions

I prefer to be at peace with myself and living in relative silence

I can hear well enough for a normal conversation and all

Just many low tones I dont hear

Any bodys thoughts on this are welcome cosidering as much as I enjoy the silence I imagine there is probally some "Linear Thinkers" terms for the fact that I am happy in my solitude........

Brief point.
Turn them off when the noises start annoying you. The nice thing about hearing aids is that you can.

Oh dear.
I started this thread with the question:
"How do you feel?"--Do you even know?
Now I realize its the wrong question to be asking.

What I need to ask is:
"How do I know what I'm feeling?" :confused:

Help!

This is something that many people have trouble with, not just us adders. Many of us were forced to control our emotions as children and never let them out or have them identifiably labeled. No one said, "Are you feeling sad?", or "You must be disappointed!"or "How embarassing for you!" They just said, "Suck it up."
So we never learned what was going on with us. Could this be part of it?
I guess to learn what they are, one would have to stop and identify what is going on inside whenever there was an emotional disturbance. Sad? Mad? Disappointed? Happy? Positively giddy? Jealous? Expansive? Proud? Start with the basics, and go on to the deeper shades and variations.
Dunno if this helps or is just rambling....

Andi shared a mood chart she created to keep track of her moods, link follows. This might be a good first step. BIG's post (#3) on this thread has the actual file.

http://www.addforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8467&highlight=chart (http://www.addforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8467&highlight=chart)

"The chart is designed to track your mood morning, noon, and night. If you look at the chart you will see that there are two categories for mood.

One charts your anxiety/irritability in different columns using a 4-point scale (0=None, 1=Mild, 2=Moderate, and 3=Severe).

So let's say that in the morning you are feeling anxious, first you would determine at which level, let's say moderately, and then place a 3 under the anx. column in the row marked morning.
anx.
3

Then you would determine if you are irritable, let's say no, in the same morning row you would then place a 0 under irrit.
irrit.
0

The other section is a check box system that determines your cycling. This helps track the state of depression, normalcy, or euphoria. Once you determine how you are feeling at that particular time of day you would place a check mark in the corresponding column and row.

The sleep cycle is also tracked as a check box system and depending on your schedule you can track this morning, noon, or night.

Always make comments to allow your doctor to see what it is that you are truly feeling. Like I stated before, I had no idea that what I perceived as normal was incorrect. Keep trying and if this doesn’t help let me know, I will do what I can to help."

I don't have problems knowing what I feel just how to process and the why's, as in why am I down all the sudden for no explainable reason?
Am I not looking deep enough into your question?