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Emotional Regulation

Do you feel that your emotions often overwhelm you and you can't control them?

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Do you have difficulty expressing what you feel in a healthy way to others?

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Do you find it hard to manage emotions such as anger, sadness, or anxiety without them affecting your daily life?

Emotional regulation refers to the ability to understand, express, and control our emotions in a healthy and constructive way. When our emotions are uncontrollable, they can lead to behaviours that harm us or prevent us from functioning effectively in our daily lives. Self-destructive tendencies, such as self-harm or excessive substance use, are often ways that individuals cope with intense feelings of pain, frustration, or sadness when they don't have other strategies to manage them. Difficulty recognising or expressing our own emotions (or those of others) can lead to emotional distance, tension, and communication problems, as well as interpersonal difficulties with family, friends, colleagues, or romantic partners.

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Common difficulties:

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  • Difficulty controlling anger or aggression

  • Intense anxiety or worry that causes difficulty concentrating

  • Need to avoid or suppress our emotions rather than express them

  • Feeling weak or unworthy when experiencing negative emotions

  • Relapses or excessive reactions to situations that caused emotional pain in the past

  • Self-destructive behaviours, such as self-harm, excessive alcohol or drug use

  • Repeating behavioural patterns from the past

  • Suicidal tendencies

 

Difficulties in emotion regulation, as well as the tendency towards self-destructive behaviours, often stem from deeper emotional causes:

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  • Insecurity and lack of self-esteem

  • Communication problems or emotional suppression

  • Past traumatic experiences

  • Learned avoidance strategies

Complex PTSD (C-PTSD)

Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD) is a mental health condition that results from prolonged or repeated exposure to traumatic experiences, often during childhood. It differs from simple Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in that it includes additional symptoms related to the effects of long-term trauma and focuses significantly on difficulties in managing emotions.

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Symptoms:

  • Difficulty regulating emotions, intense and frequent mood swings, difficulty controlling anger, feelings of emotional numbness

  • Negative self-perception

  • Feelings of guilt, shame, worthlessness, belief that one is defective or different from others

  • Problems in interpersonal relationships

  • Difficulty trusting, fear of abandonment, tendency to engage in abusive or exploitative relationships

  • Disconnection from reality, feeling that the world is unreal, dissociative experiences

  • Loss of faith, feelings of hopelessness, lack of hope for the future

  • Self-destructive tendencies, such as substance abuse

  • Self-harm or suicidal ideation

 

The term Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD) is used here instead of "Borderline Personality Disorder" for several reasons, as recent data highlight the following:

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  • Focus on trauma: C-PTSD recognises that symptoms arise from prolonged and repeated exposure to traumatic experiences, often in childhood. Borderline Personality Disorder, while associated with trauma, does not always consider it a central factor.

  • Reducing social stigma: Borderline Personality Disorder carries stigma as it is considered a personality disorder, implying inherent flaws. C-PTSD focuses on the effects of trauma, detaching symptoms from inherent characteristics.

  • Tailored treatments: C-PTSD leads to more appropriate and tailored therapeutic approaches, such as trauma-focused therapy, which addresses the roots of the symptoms rather than just managing them.

 

Borderline Personality Disorder remains a valid psychiatric diagnosis that can provide insight into a person’s behaviours and symptoms; however, the term Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is chosen here to focus on the psychological trauma.

How can psychotherapy help?

Psychotherapy can significantly help in managing emotions and preventing self-destructive behaviours, offering the appropriate strategies and support to find alternative and healthy ways of expressing and managing your emotions. In the therapeutic setting, you will:

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  • Learn to recognise and understand your emotions that arise in different situations.

  • Examine the causes that trigger emotional outbursts and learn to identify them in time.

  • Discover expression strategies that will allow you to communicate your emotions respectfully to yourself and others, without resorting to self-destructive or harmful behaviours.

  • Manage anger and anxiety.

  • Learn relaxation techniques and emotion regulation.

  • Process previous traumatic experiences and re-approach the feeling of safety.

  • Examine the causes that lead to self-harm or other dangerous behaviours.

  • Develop strategies to avoid self-destructive behaviours and manage intense emotional changes.

  • Understand your deeper emotional needs.

  • Build self-esteem and self-awareness to recognise your positive traits.

  • Improve your ability to self-regulate.

  • Focus on improving your interpersonal relationships and setting boundaries around your needs.

  • Understand the cycle of abuse and the reasons you may return to patterns of abusive relationships if you are or have been in one.

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