Unable to express wants...

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I have a problem that comes off to others as indecisiveness, but today I realized that's actually not what it is; it's not being able to express my wants. I'm talking about simple things here: what I want for dinner, where I want to go for the day, what dress I want to buy. I can usually (not always) make an impulse decision and be satisfied with it if I'm alone and don't think about it much, but as soon as somebody else is involved in the equation, things get rough.

Sometimes I might actually know what I want for dinner or where I'd like to go out to eat, but something inside of me makes it so incredibly difficult to just communicate that. Other times, though, it just comes down to the fact that there are so many choices that I'm overwhelmed and need somebody else to make the decision entirely. These are things I had issues with as a child and quite honestly it makes me feel pathetic to still be struggling with it as a young adult .

Recently, with my mother's help, I've begun to do things on a precise written schedule so I don't have to deal with these situations on the spot. It works, but sometimes I just feel like why do I have to go through this just to be able to do things that I should be able to do without prompting or effort. I usually don't get myself down over these things, but sometimes it's hard not to.

Same here. I never know how to express my wants or needs. They're like inchoate. I can't get them from thoughts to words. It's probably related to alexithymia, the inability to express how you feel.

Everyone has problems. The most we can do is plan our lives so that they don't ruin things for us, which a schedule should help with.

I can be indecisive about some things, but it helps to have a decision-settling factor. If there are several nearby restaurants I like, I can default to the cheapest option if I mentally find myself going over the menus too many times. I'm kind of a penny-pincher and I've never been the type to regret not trying one dish when the one I ordered was perfectly tasty, anyway.

I also have trouble expressing what I want. Sometimes I'll know that I want something, and so I stand in my mom's doorway until she asks me what I want. Then I usually shrug and she tells me to use my words and I say "I don't know." Then I usually walk away.

Very much so - my wife even calls me on it. She'll tell me "why don't you tell me you like/want something? We've been married for so many years".

All I can tell her is that I know when I like things but its hard to verbally express the things I like.

Yes very much the same, except I'm even worse with decision making. I agree with ER that it may be part of alexithymia.

I was walking with my friend in heavy rain not so long ago. I was so so frustrated i wanted to explode, I just wanted to stop and get out of it for a second, but just couldn't turn those feelings into words. Eventually I managed to say something tangential about shelter that my friend realised what I wanted.


I also use downbutnotout's decision method, however that usually means it takes ages because I then have to analyse which is the most cost-effective option...

This topic stood out to me because I have this issue too, and I just got home from something that became a nightmare for me because of my inability to express what I needed. Someone really loud and pushy kept me talking for so long that I genuinely began to feel faint, I started not being able to get my words out without stuttering, but I don't know WHY I didn't just leave, say I'm not feeling well -- because I truly was not feeling well both physically and mentally. She was overwhelming me and I was in complete overload. I got home and cried and literally said out loud into the mirror "WHY DID I LET THAT HAPPEN?"

It was exactly like frodz with the walking in the heavy rain that wasn't able to be expressed, the need to get out of it and to shelter. The same happened to me with getting away from this person who was keeping me and keeping me. I'm beating myself up about it.

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>>>Stroking your pretty plumage.......

I definitely get some of this, and a lot of the problem is that I don't truly know what I want either.

I sometimes have the same thing, only sometimes i am decisive too.
I once saw this thing that stupid one hing to the effect of " you know what you want but you weild the power of veto like a boss" and I felt this fit me to a t.