Although the mobility of our facial muscles allow us to reflect a wide range of emotions, some people are incapable of showing any expressiveness. Their faces, more than faces full of life and passion, resemble rigid, emotionless masks.
Of course, some people are more expressive than others. There is nothing pathological or strange about this, in fact, we have already talked in this blog about the normalization of introversion as a personality trait. However, in certain cases, this lack of expressiveness, when it does not manifest suddenly or for health reasons, does It can denote serious emotional problems.
In today’s article we will talk about those extreme cases in which the repression of emotions has been so deep that it has ended up being reflected in the face of the person as a mask. So impenetrable is the face of these people that it is impossible for others to know what is happening inside.
Our face says it all
Throughout my experience in consultation I have known several cases of this type. The rigidity of his faces showed the traumas of a deeply painful childhood. In fact, I have verified that the more hieratic their faces were, the more emotional wounds had suffered this person in his past. Some even had stories of serious mistreatment or sexual abuse.
Curiously, most of the people who have come to my office showing this casuistry, they have been men These, from a very young age, had developed this emotional repression as a survival strategy before a family and a violent and aggressive society.
These people, being very young, they try hard to hide their emotions and for pretending a normality that does not exist. This is reflected in his face (rigid and without expression), but also in her attitude. Tend to be neutral facing any situation, trying not to expose their opinion on controversial issues, They never argue or disagree. In general, avoid all controversy and they try to go as unnoticed as possible.
trouble expressing feelings
One of these people was Javier, an educated and correct man who was approaching 60 years of age. He came to therapy to work on self-esteem problems, but associated with it, he also He recognized that it was very difficult for him to express what he felt.
Indeed, Cicero’s phrase that “the face is the mirror of the soul” could not be applied to him. He did not show the slightest gesture of emotion, not even when he told me about traumatic events in his life, such as the death of his mother when he was 14 years old.
Javier was kind, but he hardly smiled, and when he did, you could tell it was a forced smile, unnatural, perhaps, more like a grimace than the expression of a smile.
He told me that he had spent his life trying to adapt to what he thought others wanted from him.
The extreme rigidity of the face Javier, reflected a terrible story. He was homosexual and had lived his entire childhood in a town in the most traditional and conservative Spain. In this environment, from a very young age, Javier received the daily message that homosexuality was one of the worst sins that could exist and a disgrace for his family.
Thus, to camouflage and defend against any aggression (His father used to beat him with a belt almost daily), he learned not to show any preferences and to repress any sign of emotion.
As if this were not enough, He was also sexually abused as a child. by a trusted friend of the family, a middle-aged neighbor who had a “normal” life and family for the time, but who began to harass and grope Javier when he was 9 or 10 years old.
The abuser forced him to keep the secret by threatening to tell him everything. Since he also had no one he trusted to talk to, the boy, silenced the nightmare that was living and learned to put on a poker face in front of others.
Neither in the joys, nor in the sorrows, he let anyone know how he felt.
Even in town, because of how well he had handled his mother’s death, he was set as an example to follow. Everyone saw his neutral face, but no one could appreciate the pain he felt inside.
Over the years, his friends and co-workers, they thought of him as a kind of robot that did not express his emotions and that he avoided any situation that could be conflictive to avoid arguing or taking a position.
Recover expressiveness by healing wounds
Faced with such a complicated situation and maintained for so long, changes occur slowly. It is necessary to deprogram years and years of repression to reconnect with expressiveness and to be able to communicate all the wealth that is housed inside.
Throughout his months of therapy, Javier he released all the emotions he had repressed in his childhood. His sessions were cathartic. He screamed and cried all that he had suffered as a child.
Little by little, her eyes and her face began to convey more movement, more life. He regained his self-confidence and he stopped seeing himself as a monster that had to be hidden. His friends were surprised when Javier began to disagree on some issues, but obviously the change was very positive and those who really loved him were happy for him.
Behind the impenetrable mask of his face, a broken, shattered person was hiding. With a lot of patience and work, Javier faced his healing and was able to rebuild himself inside and out. Free expression of your emotions.