Why Suppressing Emotions Does Not Work for Autistic and ADHD Mums

Suppressing emotions and why it doesn't work

When I tell you not to think about elephants.... what did you do? You thought about elephants right? Yeah this is another way our brains sometimes mess with us. When something is said or thought, it is hard to focus on something else. When you try to suppress a thought or feeling it can get bigger and bigger and it can feel like the only thing we can focus on, just like the elephants.

A good way to visualise this, is to think of yourself holding a ball while you are in the water. As you try to push it down the force of the water keeps trying to push it back up. The harder the push, the more it wants to push up. Eventually your arms will get tired and when you let the ball go, it won't just rise gently to the surface - it will most likely fly up with force and break through the surface of the water and shoot up or away from you with great force. When we try to suppress feelings the same thing will happen. You can only hold them down for so long and the longer you hold them down the more force they will gather.

When we are neurodivergent our brains work a bit differently. If you are autistic - we can find thoughts to be a bit more sticky and hard to shake off - these thoughts can feel big, all consuming and really detailed and we can feel lost in them. In ADHD brains we tend to have a lot of thoughts and feelings that are rapidly moving - it means we can sometimes move on fast but when we have a sticky thought, it means we can spiral - fast with difficult thoughts piling on and making things feels bigger and more complicated fast.

Thoughts Spiralling into Overwhelm

It might start out with a fairly small thought, a missed appointment, a forgotten birthday and comment taken the wrong way, but it can grow fast. Our nervous system senses threat and suddenly there is the uncomfortable feeling in our stomachs, the guilt, sadness, shame, anger, worry.... we try to shove the thoughts away but the thinking parts of our brain are offline - we are purely in react mode. So instead we try to shove them down and avoid them. Sometimes we put a chocolate bar, a cheese platter, a few glasses of wine or even an amazon shopping cart on top. We get some dopamine, maybe a little serotonin but the next time we encounter a similar thought - the original thought comes out and joins the party making these thoughts and feelings bigger than before and this cycle keeps perpetuating.

Don't believe me - see how suppression works in practice

As a neurodivergent person reading this, I hear you - I am guessing you want some proof or facts, so the best way to understand this concept is to see it in practice and be your own judge.

I want you to try this little activity. I want you to think of a thought or feeling which has been troubling you or bugging you over the past week. Now I want you to set a timer for 60 seconds. During this time I want you to actively try and suppress it. Count how many times you thought about it. It was not zero, right?

An alternate strategy to help feelings pass

Now I want you to set the timer again and allow yourself freedom to think about anything you want. If you find your mind drifting to that thought or feeling, just acknowledge it and let it move on, no judgement - just like waving at a passing car. It is there - but it will pass, you aren't going to flag it down. At the end of the minute, count how many times did you think about it this time? It was less right? So next time you have an unpleasant thought or feeling, don't jump into the car and go for a ride - just let it pass on by.

Avoiding emotions also does not work....

Another favourite technique we all use when faced with unwanted thoughts and feelings is avoidance. Avoidance is when we put other thoughts, feelings or activities in the way to distract our brains to focus on something else. It can work more effectively than suppression but at the end of the day they are still lurking there and will often come out to greet us, often in disturbed sleep in the middle of the night or when we least expect it. An unrelated situation might come up and then that emotion comes out to play (like a puppy that has been cooped up inside all day and finally getting a chance at freedom).

When us counsellors talk about avoidance, we sometimes use a technique called join the DOTS: Distractions (doing something else or being somewhere else), Opting Out (hiding from it or removing yourself), Thoughts (thinking about something else, anything else) and Substances (food, alcohol, drugs, shopping even gambling). These are all things which help us feel better in the short term, but don't actually have any long term benefits on the thought, feeling or problem that you are faced with. In fact, often when we employ them, the long term impacts actually prove to be negative and have an inverse reaction to what we hoped. Let's take drinking for an example, the first glass might take the edge off the thoughts a bit but then you have a second glass and a third. You need more to drink to keep the thoughts down. In the middle of the night, the thoughts come back and you not only have to deal with them but also the guilt about drinking and any physical effects of alcohol.

Joining the DOTS between suppression, avoidance and acceptance - a practical exercise to reflect on techniques

If you want to find out what you are doing, think about the problematic thought or feeling. Then think about the different aspects of your life where this thought or feeling presents itself then think about the distractions, opt outs, thoughts and substances you are using to avoid it.

Give them a score between 0 (not at all effective) to 10 (completely effective) of how effective they are in the short term. This score will often be quite high, there is a reason you are using them. That is OK. Now take a moment to think about the long term impacts and effectiveness of those techniques. Write down what some of the implications, impacts and efficacy are. Then score them again using the same scale, but in the long term (this might be a week, a month or a year out). Reflect on the difference in those scores and question if this is really helping you. Interesting right? Maybe there is a better alternative?

Waving at cars versus getting in and going for a ride

So thinking back to that car analogy and thinking of that thought or feeling as a passing car. How much easier was this second example? When you started to think about your thoughts and feelings as passing cars that you can wave at (or not), rather than something you need to get in and drive it feel a bit different right? This is a really good way to think of our thoughts and feelings. They are something that goes past us, we do not own them, they do not take up space in our garage, we do not need to get them serviced and maintained. They are just a thing that is there that will come and go.

Realising that we are not our thoughts and feelings - that we are more than this. We are more than a job, more than a role or a relationship, it can be quite empowering. When we realise we are not these things, we then have the ability to choose whether or not we react to them. Whether we wave at them, whether we let them pass or whether we flag the car down, jump in and go for a ride unsure of where they will take us. This is one of the awesome techniques I teach in my 21 day Overwhelm Reset Course that focuses on reducing overwhelm in small simple steps and less than 10 minutes a day

Acceptance as an alternate strategy for managing Autistic and ADHD Overwhelm

This process is called emotional acceptance and is a core pillar of one of my favourite therapy modalities - Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT Therapy). It is about allowing yourself to sit with your thoughts and feelings without suppressing or avoiding them.

Acceptance is a practice which can be learned by anyone, pretty much from the age of 8. As it is a practice, it is never something we can be 100% perfect at, however the more we do it, the easier it becomes. Think of it like running, you start out and might only be able to do 50 meters but over time you can go further and then faster, then you can work on hills and your technique. You continue to improve, you don't just think "I nailed it and now I never have to run again". Practice with therapeutic techniques is really similar. You need to start small, maybe a couple of minutes a day and then build from there. Over time you will be able to do it more easily and for longer periods of time.

When talking about acceptance, the technique we use is called expansion practice. This is time where you sit with the thought or feeling and just allow it to be, like a car going past. Sit with the thought or feeling and observe it from a distance, remind yourself you are safe, play some quiet music if you need to and breath it out, allowing the thought to come and go. It can start out feeling quite intense and unpleasant, but at the end of the time you will realise that you are OK, that you survived. It was unpleasant, but it passed. You got through it. When you try again it will be easier and easier again and then you will find you can sit and think with these thoughts for a longer period of time.

So if you find your current strategies aren't working for you, maybe try acceptance instead. Try sitting with them and not reacting to them. Try letting them come and go.

If you are having trouble with persistent thoughts and feelings that are impacting you, maybe consider speaking with a counsellor who is trained to help you work through these things and share different tools and techniques. At Mumshine I support neurodivergent mums with online counselling sessions across Australia. I would be happy to chat to you (zero cost or obligation) to see how I can help you.