Bottling Up Emotions: Why Suppressing Feelings Doesn't Work

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Bottling up emotions means holding back your innermost feelings instead of expressing them. While it may feel like a useful coping strategy in the moment, suppressing emotions over time can lead to physical and behavioural symptoms — and eventually, the emotions will surface anyway. At Bayridge Counselling Centres, our therapists across Ontario help clients learn to identify, understand, and safely express what they’ve been holding inside.

Very commonly, people hold back from expressing their innermost, deepest feelings because people in their lives do not fully understand how they feel. Yes, only you hold truth to your challenges and the emotions associated with your struggles, but withdrawing from others and keeping your feelings trapped in a jar is not the best strategy.

What Happens When You Suppress Your Emotions?

Imagine a jar filled with cookies. Each cookie represents an emotion that has been confined and stuck in the jar; tightly shut so no one can eat that cookie. Bottling up your emotions and suppressing your emotions can lead to physiological and behavioural symptoms such as: irritability, anxiety, headaches, nausea, and body aches.

Locking your emotions of sadness, anger, and resentment may be a useful coping strategy at the time, but the jar can only fill so much before it overflows. Very often, an overflow of emotions is the result of unresolved conflicts or situations and can only be tightly shut in a jar for so long. Eventually you will have to deal with the cookies.

How to Express Your Emotions Safely

How do you openly express yourself when you have been comfortable with keeping things bottled up? Here are three strategies to help you begin.

Understand Your Emotions

You must be self-aware with understanding exactly what is causing you to feel a certain way. You cannot expect someone to understand you if you do not understand the feelings that surround those problems. Try identifying your emotions and sitting with the experience of that emotion. Often times, if you do not tag a name to the emotion you are experiencing, you might think you feel angry when you are really feeling sad or unwanted.

Remember your feelings are never right or wrong; they are happening within you and need to be felt. It is human to feel and you are allowed to embrace these emotions for what they are.

Find a Safe Environment

Expressing your emotions can be a frightening experience because you don’t know if you will feel accepted. Seek people who are supportive and will provide a comforting place for you to express your needs openly with no judgment. Share with those who make you feel loved, secure, and respected.

Talking about the situation or problem in advance with someone before confronting the person will help with identifying triggers and will help you stay calm during the process. If you don’t have a safe person in your life, a regulated mental health professional — such as a Registered Psychotherapist or Registered Social Worker — can provide that space.

Be a Neutral Observer

You will never find people who agree with your opinions fully. People come from all different walks of life and hold strong belief systems based on their worldview. When faced with a difference of opinion, view the situation as a way to learn more from the other person. Ask open-ended questions to draw more information out of the person to gain better insight of their perceptions.

When to Seek Counselling Support

If you’ve been bottling up emotions for a long time, the process of opening up can feel overwhelming. Working with a therapist can help you build emotional awareness at your own pace. This is especially important if you notice that suppressed feelings are affecting your relationships, your work, or your physical health. Small changes in your behaviour can sometimes signal a bigger underlying issue worth exploring.

Aman Gahunia, MA, CCC — Therapist/Counsellor

Focus: Individual Issues, Domestic Violence Recovery, Self-Esteem, Anger & Aggression

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