Absolutely.

I believe that "going numb" is a defense mechanism. For some of us, it's
our minds going into protection mode, especially after a trauma.
After repeated battering, sometimes our hearts do the same. Okay, it's still
our minds, but you know what I mean.

Yes. It's a survival mechanism, kicks in after a traumatic even or if the trauma is re-triggered or if I'm under too much stress. My mind shuts down to protect itself.

Yes actually. When I woke up on November 9, 2016. Still waiting to recover.

in 1982

Asolutely....was married for 23 years ...the life was drained from me ..to the point of feeling anxious and unhappy.Life started to lose it 's point ..despite all the blessings that I should have embraced .
But now .. divorced ..and not regretting a single day. Love my life ..and living again.

No, but sometimes I wish I could.

I was overloaded and shut down after my wife passed.

Yes, for years when I lived with my parents. I think it's the only way I survived my mother's narcissism.

Yeah, the last 18 months to two years of my marriage. It's a long story but didn't really appreciate where I was mentally and emotionally at the time until I was out of it, nor did I appreciate the long term effects and damage that period of time did

I have been numb emotionally, the first time was after my first wife died. I became very introverted kept the curtains closed in a sence i was like the Pink Floyd tune i was comfortably numb in my own thinking. the thinking was numb an far from free.

Oh yeah I'm way numb.

It has happened to me also... sometimes i don't even laugh at funny things...I feel like Spock sometimes...

I have. Probably I still am.

What do you mean? What is numb emotionally? Although I read your comment, I am still not convinced I even know what it is, but then I have never run out of F**** (whatever that is) to give. Obviously, I have never experienced such a situation. Pain yes, pain to the point of wanting to turn off, yes, and that resulted in depression which is certainly not numb. So my challenge is conceiving of a situation where I don't have emotions anymore, and although I NEVER use emotions to argue a point, I am still very emotional. Cheers

Unfortunately only when alcohol was involved.. otherwise there's too much anxiety (mentally and emotionally) and I feel I can't breathe and will want to get out of that situation as soon as possible

Absolutely! I think it's a common response, perhaps to long term stress factors.

That's practically a daily thing for me. Lifes journey isn't easy and ponder what's next to continue the journey.

My wife has been (apparently permanently) in this condition since a major extended family kerfuffle some years ago. Let's just say it involved a culmination of years of emotional abuse from her father and monster-in-law and the realization that she was an unloved child. And I have been this way since my son's death a couple of years ago. In both cases it was really reaching a long-developing tipping-point of emotional overload (I had experienced other major losses before). Too much unwanted and unasked-for drama and grief and loss. I think the emotional subsystem can only take so much long-standing stress, and then a circuit breaker trips somewhere. Or the subconscious decides to install an avoidance mechanism to protect from further emotional pain.

Another cause aside from the PTSD-like triggers mentioned above is childhood emotional neglect, which is doubtless a factor for my wife. When you grow up with the notion that your feelings are unimportant or not worth acknowledging you can fall into a pattern of being estranged from them.

I suppose that it could happen on a shorter term basis in some people too. Don't know why not.

The problem, from our experience and what I've read, is that you can't selectively avoid just certain negative emotions, you end up blunting all of them, with the result that you don't experience emotional highs OR lows, except maybe when it's not personal. I can blubber over a sad movie but I cannot blubber over my own sadness anymore. Same thing for satisfaction or laughter. It's like trying to brown bread in a toaster that's not plugged in. Or perhaps more accurately, it only works on its lowest setting, you get warm bread but no crispness.

Another weird effect of this is that the only strong emotion that still arises at times is irritability / irascibility. I have to exercise a lot of self-control sometimes not to be cranky, which, of course, feeds the cycle.

We have not found a solution for this and in some ways it's a mercy. My wife has had a lifelong problem with anxiety and insomnia and this has improved considerably. In her case, that is probably saving her life, particularly since she seems physiologically very atypical in her reactions to mind altering substances that a shrink might prescribe to help her. She's had some really horrible experiences trying those.

On the abundance-of-caution theory that what you're experiencing could be warning signs of more pervasive or even permanent problems, I'd urge you to use meditation, therapy, or any other means at your disposal to avoid emotional overload. Eject the asshats from your life, for instance. I wish I'd done it much sooner, and I know my wife does.

Here's a pretty good article about the more persistent numbness I'm talking about, I don't know how much it applies to you but -- for what it's worth: [drjonicewebb.com]

So much, yes.

November, 2001. Second full month of work at the World Trade Center recovery. Hit the point that i had no emotion left and just worked and barely thought. Lasted until February of 2002.

Sometimes I wish I could.

Yup

Most of. My life

Yes..I think is a way to protect ourselves from being hurt again. ...