Why does it seem like my emotions are hitting me so intensely?

Hi Tee, thanks so much for asking this question; I am sure that you are not alone in feeling that your emotions are hitting you really intensely at the moment. 

I probably have more questions than answers for you right now, as it can be really difficult to answer these kind of questions without knowing more about what has been going on for you over the last few months and what your circumstances are; however know that it is really normal for our emotions to feel more 'near the surface' from time to time. There are a lot of reasons as to why this might be, for example feeling stressed, certain life events happening, our age, hormones, relationships, wellbeing and general day to day. I will try and cover some of the common things that can come up for people, but please do know that it may not be suited to you. I would really recommend speaking to a therapist to get a more in depth, personalized answer. 

When you say you don't know how you feel like it's somehow because you suppress your emotions, I am not sure I fully understand however if it is what I think it might be, in that you keep emotions bottled up and then they all come out at once, this makes a lot of sense to me. I say to people that bottling up emotions or trying to push them away can be a bit like putting a beach ball under water; the more you try and push it down under the water, the more it wants to come up and the more force it will have behind it too, which can be really overwhelming and overpowering at times. 

What you say also makes me think of something I tell people in terms of our stress tolerance/stress bucket. We are all born with a bucket or holder for stress and emotions, and when this becomes full or near to capacity it can make us feel that things are really overwhelming and that emotions are at an all time high, as our capacity is full! What we can do here is think about what helps to take some of that capacity down (for example seeing friends, watching a good tv show, reading a book, achieving something) and that can sometimes create more room for us and our emotions. This can be one of the reasons you're feeling your emotions more intensely at the moment, your capacity for stress is near to full! 

I like to work with people to begin to make sense of what is going on for them, and to learn ways of living with their emotions when they come up, rather than fighting and struggling against them. This can go against a lot of what we have learnt though - in that we should get rid of 'bad' emotions; but in the long term it can be really helpful for people. 

I hope that makes sense, and I am really sorry to hear that you are feeling this way at the moment; thoughts and feelings always shift and move. I do hope you get some space away from these intense emotions soon.

Best wishes,

Nikki