MGEL Mini: Dysregulation In Real Time
I’m incredibly emotionally dysregulated today.
When I first learned the term “emotional dysregulation” last year, everything started clicking in my brain. I finally had a name for my everyday experience. I finally knew what was wrong with me: I had a nervous system that never felt safe. It was always on alert, always scanning for danger, always stretched too thin to handle day-to-day stressors. It reminds me of that line from The Lord of the Rings:
“I feel thin, sort of stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread.”
Emotional dysregulation is an inability to manage emotions in a way that feels appropriate or proportional. It might show up as crying over something small (like toilets, for example), or mood swings that feel out of sync with the moment. It makes everyday stress feel catastrophic, and big stress feel like the end of the world.
Once I learned to spot it, I started noticing how often I slide in and out of dysregulation throughout the day—depending on how overwhelmed or emotionally loaded I already am.
Today, something at work hit a nerve deep enough to rattle the old emotional blueprints stored in my amygdala. Blueprints like powerlessness, invisibility, and responsibility without power.
When I was younger, it felt like the game was rigged, and no one cared what it did to me. It didn’t matter if I cried myself to sleep, if I screamed and threw a fit, if I wore my anguish like a coat. My distress didn’t matter. And over time, I learned that I didn’t matter. That what I said wouldn’t be heard.
That same feeling is echoing today.
I’m watching a slow-motion train wreck. I’ve tried warning the conductor, the passengers, even the town we’re barreling toward—but they all say the brakes are fine. Nothing to worry about here.
I try to access the control room myself—only to be told I don’t belong there.
I try to appeal to the passengers—maybe we can disconnect the cars and slow the momentum? But they’re focused on the onboard movie. No one wants to hear it.
And yet, I know what’s coming.
Not because I’m special. Not because I’m clairvoyant.
But because I’ve lived this before—in too many different forms. I can feel it in my bones when something’s about to break.
It’s not just that no one’s listening. It’s that the not listening is familiar.
Painfully familiar.
Sometimes, when things don’t fall apart—because I’ve quietly rerouted the damage, cleaned up the mess, patched the gaps—I start to wonder if I’m the boy who cried wolf.
But maybe I’m not crying wolf.
Maybe I’m the unpaid fire lookout.
Ringing the bell before the flames reach the trees.
Over and over.
Until no one hears it anymore.
Because the town never burns down—not because there was no fire—
but because someone like me put it out.
Quietly.
Desperately.
Repeatedly.
And that kind of survival doesn’t look heroic.
It just looks like things going “fine.”
But inside me? I’m screaming.
This is what dysregulation in real time looks like:
Fury rising from helplessness I can’t control
Rage ignited by silence that feels like dismissal
A body demanding justice in a place built for denial
I know I’ll get through today, and next week, and next month.
And I know the train won’t wreck, because I’ll find a way to slow it down.
But I’m tired of doing it in the shadows.
I’m tired of no one knowing the toll it takes.
If I have to keep carrying this weight, the people who made it heavier are going to hear about it.
-A
If this resonated, you might also like:
The Body Never Lies: You can override your emotions for a while, but your nervous system keeps the score — and eventually, it calls your bluff.
Is It Still Trauma If They Meant Well?: Exploring the harm that hides behind good intentions — and why intent doesn’t cancel impact when your nervous system’s still living in the past.
The Crushing Kind of Loneliness: Not the kind you solve with company, but the kind that comes from being surrounded by people who don’t see what you’re holding.
