# I don't feel love...



## Opso

(I think I have the right place to post this, and I'm sorry I don't post often!)

So I kind of just came to the realization of this and didn't really want to admit it to myself for awhile now. And I honestly don't even know if I've ever felt love in my life.

So ever since I was 8, I've had the ability to cut people completely out of my life without giving it a second thought or caring. I remember I had my two only friends around the age of 8 that I completely cut out of my life for something extremely small. I never talked to them after that day. I've done this countless times since then, with friends I've known for months to friends I've known for years...

Around the age of 15 or 16, (I'm 23 now) I went through a phase where I thought emotions were a sign of weakness, so I tried to get rid of them, I don't know if this was the cause of it though or they previously didn't exist. And I don't know if I would be capable of removing some emotions just by changing the way I think.

I don't feel love towards my close family members either, when an immediate family member passed away when I was 17, I couldn't of cared less, which sounds extremely bad, I know. And if that occurred today, I would feel the same... I had a pretty good childhood, no abuse, loving parents, etc.

Also, I do feel other emotions, I had a long term relationship with a girl and I felt jealousy, but I don't think I felt love. I also had trouble showing affecting (hugging, kissing, having sex wasn't an issue, but I had trouble showing my interest in it (facial expression, sound)) I also feel fear, especially the fear of being alone, which doesn't really make sense if I can't feel love... I honestly think the relationship only lasted so long was because I was jealous and feared I would be alone if we broke up. I rarely get angry, but in situations where people will get angry, I more feel violated more than anything.

I also obviously fear judgement from other people, obvious social anxiety stuff.

I really hope I can feel love someday...

Anybody have any thoughts or ideas of what this might stem from or what this might be?


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## Haunty

What about other positive emotions like humor, happiness, euphoria?


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## Opso

Haunty said:


> What about other positive emotions like humor, happiness, euphoria?


I feel all of those, I can't believe I forgot to add those emotions, I rarely feel sadness, if ever though.


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## odd_one_out

I used to be this way, till about 30 when my brain developed in certain respects. Although I still can't feel love for 1st degree relatives as always, it would eff me up if I lost any. I don't live with them or think of them much at all or make contact. It doesn't enter the mind. I do know that despite this, if I lost one it'd send me into a severe mental health episode.

I did experience love for someone around 30 and it's still there and can now have intermittent episodes of deep feelings for my gf that most people would agree is love. That kind of thing didn't used to happen. The feelings are deep but still atypical.

Although I can now recognise or experience love, it's very atypical. I got diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder.


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## Opso

Thanks odd_one_out, I also don't think I have a conscience, or if I do, I have complete control over what I feel bad about. So in essence I can do whatever I want if I convince myself it's okay. Is this normal? Also, don't worry, I have no desire to hurt people in any way.


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## odd_one_out

^ Do you have some examples of what you consider complete control over/lack of conscience?

My experience of conscience can be somewhat atypical. It's hard to tell whether most people are worse and just putting on a front. Probably. If so, I'm still atypical and suspect it's related to my condition and the theory of mind aspect and atypical socioemotional processing. 

It's weird - in some ways I lack emotional empathy, then in others it's excessive. With conscience, I get tortured in some respects over very minor events where I feel guilt, and not in some more important ones. Hard to describe.


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## Opso

Well, say I can litter one day without any remorse, and then the next I decide that littering is bad, I can make myself feel bad if I litter, it usually causes some small amount of anxiety. I don't know if I'm just over analyzing my thoughts on this or this is actually different.

I don't think I have any emotional empathy, so if I'm dealing with someone who is emotional for some particular reason, I just get annoyed that I have to deal with him/her. Which in past relationships, have caused a lot of problems...


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## Addler

I see a lot of myself in this. I went through a phase in high school where I was so upset all the time that I tried to make myself not feel anything, anything at all. And sometimes, I was in a daze/apathetic, but I couldn't be free of emotions.

But I'm pretty sure I don't feel love or happiness. I have moments of extreme attachment, but they're fleeting, just like I have fleeting moments of joy. I've struggled with the love thing for a long time. I know intellectually that some people love me--some of my relatives, some of my friends. And I know that. And I do care for them, but I can't feel inside myself that I am loved, and I have a hard time maintaining stable images of them. I still regard most people with suspicion and think that nobody could possibly like me, that they're lying or pitying or watching me or something. I never know how to respond when people say nice things to me or show affection.

My grandparents sent me a card for my birthday, and they wrote inside it, "we love you and we miss you," and I broke down--because how could they love me? How could they miss me? I'm not really a person. I know, intellectually, that it's their role as grandparents to love me, and I am fond of them--but I can't feel love.


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## Quinn the Eskimo

this cutting people out from your life and cutting off your emotions is a common thing. you've basically emotionally castrated yourself. you can get it back, though.

don't take all of it as a lack of empathy. for example you mentioned littering and other things. 

you say that sometimes you dont care about other peoples emotions and stuff. well, what do you believe about yourself and other people that makes this possible? we all experience a separate existence, but all of us perceive it in a different degree.

some of us feel very connected to the world around us and other people, and that allows us to feel for them. then there's some of us, like you, who don't feel connected at all. so it's only natural that your own feelings and priorities would come before others'.


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## beothuck1

My question for you then is do you feel hate? I think that hate is the inverse of love and where there is hate there can't be love. 

I sense some of myself in what you were describing in the beginning. The ability to leave friends quickly without taking a look back. You sound more extreme than me though. I didn't leave friends over something small, but because we had grown apart. However, I grew up with a Dad who seemed to like leaving people in the dust. I don't think this is a good trait because it has the ability to inflict pain and hurt on others. Do you find that you can empathize with others or do you have a hard time doing that? 

So so far I have wondered if this stems from feelings of hate or from the fact that you are focused on yourself so much that you don't think about the feelings or others and you can't empathize with them. 

Do you consider yourself a very independent person? I say this because my boyfriend reminded me of yourself in the long-relationship you described and he is definitely independent. I also question whether he loves me because he says and does things that make me believe he hates me, for reasons I don't understand. He is paronoid and reads me very wrong alot; he lacks any sort of emotional empathy for me; and he is extremely jealous of me even being in the presence of other guys. For example, he said he would've left me if I had said yes to dance with his cousin at a wedding I attended recently with him. 

I think that the fact that you don't feel love stems from your social anxiety issues. If you fear people all the time then you will probably grow to hate people/being around people and hate is the opposite of love. It is good to make forgiveness a practice in your life if you don't already do that. I mention this, because if you forgive people for things they have done to you then you let go of the anger, resentment, and hate you may feel towards them. 

I hope you don't take any of my comments here the wrong way. I don't know you personally and I can only go off of what you say here. I obviously don't have a surefire answer, but I'm writing this so that you can take some of the ideas I'm throwing out into consideration and hopefully something clicks with you. 

I really believe everyone is able to feel love, so it's not a question of if it's not possible for you. I think you should work on your social anxiety and try to think about others more in your daily life, like about how your actions are affecting them and not vice versa. Also, do you love yourself? They say you can't love others until you love yourself.


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## jimity

I'm sort of the same. I don't feel like I know what love is or what it feels to be loved and I feel that emotions like love and things like showing caring where all signs of weakness. I guess this can come from how your parents raised you. You mentioned you had a good childhood but what about validation of emotions. Many parents are more clinical than touchy-feely. And without validation of certain feelings in a child, those emotions can become unfamiliar and frightening and feel overwhelming.


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## Chalori

Anyone figured this one out yet? Im 27 and feel the exact same way. I dont want to though...Wish it would change..


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## Clivy

I personally have never been able to both love or miss people. Either way love is just some chemical reaction in our brains, as are all emotions and desires. I personally hate emotions, and wish I could not feel them. I have always hated emotions ever since I was a little girl, and I wish I had alexithymia, or that I had antisocial personality disorder so that I would not have to feel emotion.


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## Hattonmaison

Feeling same here....
Don’t know how to change myself or cure it.
It’s hurt and getting worse.
I felt like I’m running away from it.
But even tho I’m still 19 but 
I can’t do it anymore


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## FalseKing

You might look into schizoid personality disorder. Otherwise I believe it is just who you are. Your brain is more logical than emotional, although in your case it seems to be rather extreme. Think about it like this. There are people out there who have practically zero ability to think logically, and use feeling to navigate through situations where logic would serve them much more effectively, extreme vegans, extreme animal rights activists and the like, where their whole world view is grown out of feeling and very little logical thought. You are perhaps the same as they, but just opposite. I actually relate to you heavily in your issues, as a matter of fact I asked help for this same subject some time ago. Although I feel as if mine is even more extreme from what I've read here.


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