An Expose on Emotion by a Social Introvert

I often wonder why I struggle to express my emotions, but now I more often wondering why I do not experience them. In some rare moments, I have thought I could be a psychopath. But I am dismissing that one on grounds that I just don’t think it’s true, because I do feel things. I grow sad and frustrated. I get slapped with excitement and joy. I can feel everything; it just usually takes me a little longer.

            I recently had a meeting with a professor where I left feeling clouded and foolish. He spent half an hour talking about complicated domestic and international adoption and surrogacy policies, but that wasn’t what left me in a haze. When he asked me if I any thoughts on all that he had said, I sheepishly replied “No thoughts”. As soon as the words left my mouth, I felt I had disappointed him. He took thirty minutes to explain part of his life’s research, and the student in front of him whom he expected to respond with a question or make an intelligent statement instead said next to nothing. She sat in her chair listening to fascinating details, contemplating how her research would have a role in everything. So when he prompted for her thoughts, she had so many that it appeared they didn’t exist. It’s like looking into a full closet and thinking “I have nothing to wear”. The truth is that there are plenty of options and combinations, but none of them come to mind.

            At the end of our meeting, he said I was unlike most of his students, as they were much more talkative and outgoing in person but that I was quieter one on one and asked if I was always shy. I said that is just depended and he told me that he hoped that I would eventually feel more comfortable talking to him. I wanted to assure him and say that I do feel comfortable, I just take some warming up to. As I drove off campus, I felt that I had been rude in my lack of response.

Since that meeting, I have realized that I do not experience emotions like humans are supposedly wired to. It’s become a running joke with my friends that I “don’t do” emotions and crying. It makes me uncomfortable to be in the presence of vulnerability. We are supposed to be strong and sensible. Emotions and feelings cloud our judgement and aren’t logical. At least that’s what I’ve thought. Science says otherwise, and that’s exactly how I like to approach emotion. I categorize it into something I can understand and discuss with ease. But that doesn’t satisfy me anymore. I can’t discuss my aspirations in terms of x and y or acid and base. I can’t quantify my fears by density, mass, or volume.

Because the truth is, I feel everything, and I feel it strongly. When I love something, I love it whole-heartedly. When I am apathetic, I am colder than the arctic. But in casual conversation, I can express basic emotions: interest, wonder, gladness. Notice those are all relatively low-key emotions. The more serious ones, – excitement, fear, love, hate – those require more thought, which is how I process them.

I take a great deal of time in understanding my emotions and deciding how I really feel. The first time I tell a man I love him will be very important, because it will have taken a great deal of thought and consideration. Emotions are feelings but we express them in words, and words hold a great deal of meaning to me. I will not say I love you if I don’t mean it. I don’t throw words around casually just because I think I feel that way. I vividly remember telling my mother that I wanted to tell her I hated her but I couldn’t because it wasn’t true.

A few days after meeting my professor, I emailed him explaining some of this. I told him that I had difficulty in talking about my thoughts if I hadn’t had time to think through them, which I soon realized held true for my feelings.

So if we’re having a conversation and you begin to cry or ask me what I think about the most recent crime against humanity, I may not respond well or at all. But please don’t think that I don’t care. Be patient with me and my stumbling words as I fumble through my thoughts, speeding through a process that sometimes takes days or weeks. Feeling is part of human nature, and though it may seem like I missed that gene, I didn’t. It’s a social grace I’m still learning to navigate.