[LAUIL601] Practical Response to Research: Alexithymia

https://thepsychologygroup.com/alexithymia/ [Accessed: 10 April 2021]

• In 1972, Peter Sifneos introduced to psychiatry the term alexithymia, which (derived from the Greek) literally means having no words for emotions (a=lack, lexis=word, thymos=emotions). Alexithymia is not a diagnosis, but a construct useful for characterising patients who seem not to understand the feelings they obviously experience, patients who seem to lack the words to describe these feelings to others. Identifying this deficit in expressivity is important because doing so gives the clinician a leg up in making a diagnosis and charting a therapeutic course.

• Alternatively, emotional trauma later in life may compromise the connection between what is felt and what can be grasped about this feeling and can be put into words, particularly if that link were tenuous to begin with.

• Alexithymia is when an individual has difficulty identifying, describing, and expressing emotions. This term was coined by Peter Sifneos in 1972 and it comes from the roots of Greek words that literally means "lack of words for emotion."

• Poor emotional awareness 

• Difficulty expressing feelings

• Difficulty understanding how others feel through empathy

• Alexathymia is different from apathy

 • Alexathymia and PTSD: Trauma is one of the most important risk factors for developing the trait. Trauma may impact the individual's capacity to identify, understand, and express their feelings. 

• Experiencing traumatic events in general can contribute to individual's using strategies such as avoidance and numbness of feelings as means to bypass uncomfortable experiences which could become a risk factor for alexythmia and PTSD. 

• Some studies suggest that alexythmia is higher within people diagnosed with PTSD. A study performed within 22 Vietnam combat veterans with PTSD found that 41% had alexyithmia. (Rodriguez, G.S))

• Alexithymia was a term mentioned in the Eating Disorder video from the AATA "Art Therapy in Action" website and I'm quite taken with the name, so much so that I"m thinking of naming my project and my dissertation after it.

I, too, struggle with finding the words to describe my feelings and often experience that disconnect with finding my words that other trauma sufferers do. I really struggle to reach out to people whether that be friends, tutors or student support. I go especially quiet and cut myself off from the world - both personal and academic - because of the trauma that I have suffered as I find it difficult to be around people in a space but struggle to explain how I feel.

I don't mean to do this and I feel like it's my fault - when it isn't. What happened to me in terms of experience with trauma isn't my fault and neither are my ways of coping. After listening to the videos and hearing the explanation and definition of Alexithymia I feel so much more validated. I'd like to create a piece of artwork around this word as this feels like a transformative moment in my project already and on my own personal journey.

• I wanted to create practical responses to the definition of Alexithymia and my own personal experiences of being overwhelmed with feelings and emotions. Using loud, neon oil pastels and building up the textures of both dry and creamy layers, scratching away with my fingers to create discord, I have created an abstract world of what it feels to be inside my mind; busy, overbearing, disconnected to my quiet exterior. A strange jungle of the mind that I hide in to avoid reality and facing my trauma and having to put it into words, into terms, into a timeline.

Reflection

Happy with the piece and where the project is headed so far in terms of art therapy and trauma. This was an interesting discovery to make on my own personal journey too. I do feel quite limited in what I'm able to make at the moment though and do hope that as time goes on o can start to explore more with mediums and canvases. I feel like I'm in a state of comfortability with the tools I'm using which comes from a place of being scared to branch out at this time but also self-isolating and not having many tools at my disposal.