What does "Empty" feel like? BPD

@winterspruce

My association with those words would be that "sadness" is like having an aching or heavy feeling of grief or longing... while "emptiness" is more of a lack of feeling, like everything is flat and lacks color/life/meaning.

Found an article where a researcher interviewed people with BPD about how they experienced emptiness, and some of the themes that came up were "disconnection", "numbness", "nothingness", "purposelessness", and "unfulfillment".

Does that description of emptiness feel like it fits? Or did your psychiatrist maybe just use the a different word that doesn't resonate? (That's totally possible too.)

in this case to me feeling nothing has occured more as "numbness" when i was severely depressed. Which isnt a very common feeling for me. But i do feel like general use of the word doesnt really describe what im feeling in those momments. I think my psychiatrist might be refering to a void inside of me/"an emptyness" that is causing me to feel depressed? or maybe shes using the word emptyness as like meaning feelings of sadness and depression (as others who replied seem to suggest that it can be interpreted as meaning those things to some).

I dont know. But thanks for the reply and the info!

@winterspruce

Yeah, I don't know either. 😊

Maybe you can mention to her what you said here and ask her to explain what she meant? ("You used the word 'empty' but I'm confused by that. Because I never thought of myself that way... I'd say I feel sad and depressed. What did you mean when you said I feel 'empty'?")

Possibilities:
1) She's seeing something that seems "empty" to her and she could maybe explain what she meant and provide an outside perspective
2) She wasn't using words carefully and saw "empty" and "depressed" as having similar meanings and being interchangeable
3) She was guessing what you were feeling and assumed you'd agree that things feel "empty" but she guessed wrong 🤷‍♂️

I feel like nobody around me and people judge alot

@winterspruce

I can’t say for sure what your psychiatrist means or is trying to say but all those other words like depression, sadness, etc are what I have always thought of or associated with feeling empty. Maybe your psychiatrist might’ve been telling you in a certain way using certain wording how you were being diagnosed by saying you’re empty?? I know you already said you were diagnosed with borderline personality disorder but sometimes people can/are diagnosed more than once and as a result are given more than one diagnosis officially by medical/healthcare professionals such as a psychiatrist. 

May I ask why you feel empty? Is it bc you’re lonely? Is it bc you’re left out of everything? Any of these can make someone feel empty as I’ve been there as a result of both of these things for many years. But for the most part it’s in the past. 

I dont think she meant to use empty as a diagnosis in my situation. She was saying it as like a describing me having an emptyness in relation to my feelings of depression and sadness.

For the past couple of years I havent experienced as severe depression or persistant daily feelings of sadness and dread, thankfully. In the past im not really sure why i was so depressed tbh. I guess i felt alone and like i didnt connect with others and society and i felt burned out and trapped and i mean prob other stuff but i just had this general feeling of sadness and depression that just wouldnt go away for like 2-3yrs straight. I don't know why really... I just was. Sometimes it comes back a little and sometimes i still feel misunderstood and have aggressive feelings towards myself that can pop up at the back of my mind....

sometimes i try to buy things to feel happier/a rush of dopamine or binge eat junk food that gives me abit of a high and as an observation of my behaviour ive described that as persistantly being like trying to "fill something that can't be filled". and that would be a void inside me. All my life ive also tried finding the "it" thing that would be "my thing" and would feel liberating to me and like it'll make life amazing and i end up feeling a sense of disapointment bcz i dont find it. In that sense i can observe that there must he somekind of emptyness in me but i cant say i can really grasp feeling like my mood is "empty" if that makes sense.

What i know is when i feel sad, depressed and hopeless for period of time i reach to the point i feel numbness/ blank/emptiness ( too sad to feel any emotions).

same.