Dr. Asad Rafi

It usually takes an unexpected curveball.

That's what life brings at you.

An acute trigger, an acute stress,

And you've not got the capability to be able to manage it.

And it almost kind of tips you into that overwhelm.

So you're either here where you're lacking motivation, struggling to get going, or it tips you all the way over there.

And that becomes unsustainable.

So that overwhelm, however, then results in the human body almost saying to you, you need to stop.

You have to stop.

And those defense mechanisms kick in.

that manifests as, you know, bodily shutdown, physical symptoms.

And, you know, we talked about how that can manifest in terms of, you know, that presentation, but also from a mental health perspective, what happens, the mood issues, the emotional issues.

And it's then resorting to try and manage that with substances, behaviors to compensate.

I think very quickly, within seconds.

But I think it's understanding the mechanism behind it.

Because I don't think it's as simple as A equals B. The rejection sensitivity results in a certain outcome.

Think about that explanation or that description that you've just provided there.

And how much of it is that inability to be able to even articulate how you're feeling?

So going back to bringing alexithymia now to RSD, bring those two elements together, yet you're emotionally driven, yet you can't even recognize or communicate that emotion or that distress.

Now that's going to be problematic, isn't it?