Emotional Numbness: What Causes It and What To Do About It

Do you ever feel like you’re watching life happen, instead of being a part of it? You may be experiencing emotional numbness.

Psychologist Susan Albers, PsyD, explains what emotional numbness is, why it happens and what you can do to start feeling your feelings again.

What is emotional numbness?

Emotional numbness, also known as blunting, is when you feel flat, shut down or disconnected from your feelings. It’s your brain’s way of protecting you when you’re overwhelmed, stressed or traumatized and unable to process what’s happening to you.

“It’s a protective mechanism — it’s like your mind is pressing the pause button,” Dr. Albers illustrates.

Emotional numbness isn’t a mental health diagnosis. It’s a common reaction to difficult moments. It can also be a symptom of an underlying health condition.

How long the numbness lasts depends on what’s causing it.

What triggers it?

Common triggers of emotional numbness include:

• Trauma: Think of emotional numbness as part of your fight-or-flight response. By dimming your emotional lights, your brain makes it easier to focus on doing what you have to do to survive.
• Overwhelm: Grief, shock and other intense emotions can trigger your body’s built-in protection system. “You may feel numb because you’re trying to process the moment,” Dr. Albers says.
• Chronic stress: Your body produces the stress hormone cortisol when it thinks you’re in danger. When cortisol levels stay too high for too long, like with chronic stress, it can cause cortisol insensitivity. That means your body doesn’t respond as well when your cortisol levels change, leaving you numb.
• Long-term emotional suppression: “If you grow up in a family where you aren’t encouraged to express your emotions, sometimes, you cut them off,” Dr. Albers shares. The same thing can happen if you’ve experienced complex trauma, like growing up in an abusive household.
• Substance use: Using substances to dull difficult feelings can dampen all of them. That’s why emotional numbness is a common side effect of substance use disorder.
• Medications: Emotional blunting is a side effect of several drugs, particularly antidepressants. Let your healthcare provider know if it’s happening to you. They may need to adjust your dosage or switch you to another medication.
• Mental health conditions: Anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and dissociative disorders are a few of the many conditions that can trigger emotional numbness.
• Neurological conditions: Your limbic system is a collection of structures in your brain that form your “emotional nervous system.” A medical condition that affects your limbic system — like a tumor, multiple sclerosis (MS) or dementia — may impact your ability to feel your feelings.
• Other health conditions: Your brain chemistry is sensitive to what’s happening in your body. That flat feeling could be caused by anemia, thyroid issues and more. If you can’t pinpoint a source, speak to a provider. They can run tests to check for underlying medical conditions.

What it can feel like

Emotional numbness doesn’t feel like much of anything — that’s kind of the point. Emotional numbness, as Dr. Albers describes it, is the absence of feeling.

“Sometimes, people describe it as being in a heavy fog,” she explains. “You're still functioning but not feeling. That lack of emotion can be distressing.” That’s especially true when your emotions aren’t aligning with what’s happening around you — like being unable to feel sadness when a loved one dies.

Common symptoms include:

• Struggling to feel connected to people you care about
• Losing interest in things that you used to enjoy
• Feeling physically and mentally fatigued
• Noticing that your responses don’t align with those of the people around you, like other people being happier than you are about your promotion
• Feeling like you’re on autopilot, or struggling to function at all
• Hearing others express concerns about your mood or behavior

Dr. Albers explains that when your emotions are blunted for too long — when you start to feel like you’re existing, not living — it could be a sign that the numbness has escalated into depression.

She recommends treating emotional numbness as a red flag, a sign that your brain is asking for help with something. It’s a symptom of a bigger problem. Your primary care provider can help you figure out why that red flag went up in the first place.

How to get your emotions back

When it’s not being caused by a medical condition, emotional blunting is a natural biological response to overwhelm. But that doesn’t mean you have to accept it.

Try the following to help you feel more like yourself:

• Therapy: “Counseling can help you name and identify feelings, which can help build the connection between the event and the emotion,” Dr. Albers says.
• EMDR: If you’re healing from trauma, try eye movement desensitization and reprocessing therapy (EMDR). It can help rewire your brain, so difficult feelings and memories are less likely to shut you down.
• Mindfulness: These practices are all about being present in the moment and observing sensations. “If you start by focusing on your five senses, that may help you figure out how you’re feeling,” Dr. Albers notes.
• Medication: If you’re numb because of an underlying condition, medication may be helpful. Let your specialist know so they can help fix it.
• Exercise: If you’re feeling detached from the world, try getting active. Moving your body can help you stay in the moment and reconnect with yourself.

Final thoughts

Emotional numbness can be disturbing, especially if all the possible medical causes have already been ruled out. But it’s important to remember: It’s not a sign that something’s “wrong” with you. It’s your brain’s way of protecting you. And when you have a powerful ally like that in your corner, there’s reason to be optimistic.

“This is something that you can work on and can improve over time if you give it attention and reach out for help,” Dr. Albers reassures. “Emotional numbness isn’t a flaw; it’s your brain letting you know you’ve reached your limit.

“With support and self-compassion, your feelings can return. Over time, you’ll find yourself not just watching life, but feeling fully part of it again.”