♡ what IS alexithymia? alexithymia is a personality trait characterized by the inability to identify and describe emotions experienced by oneself.
the core characteristic of alexithymia is marked dysfunction in emotional awareness, social attachment, and interpersonal relation.
✩furthermore, people with high levels of alexithymia can have difficulty distinguishing and appreciating the emotions of others, which is thought to lead to unempathic and ineffective emotional responses.Traditionally, alexithymia has been conceptually defined by four components:
→difficulty identifying feelings (DIF)
→difficulty describing feelings to other people (DDF)
→a stimulus-bound, externally oriented thinking style (EOT)
→constricted imaginal processes (IMP)✧Baaasically!!!✧
alexithymia is the inability to recognize or describe one's own emotions.

♡ how alexithymia affects me: i struggle with mainly identifying my emotions. i can feel a void of emptiness, and i can tell when i'm supposed to be feeling an emotion, but i normally can never feel it, or identify it.
i can express myself just fine, but a lot of the time what i express doesn't match what i feel. it's confusing for you and me.a lot of the time, i don't feel. i don't feel anything. i don't feel happy, i don't feel sad, i don't feel mad, i literally don't feel anything. and i'm not talking edgy 12 year old "i feel nothing! im so emo im so empty" im fucking serious. i can't feel. i don't feel a thing.i'm lucky enough to have tiny little moments where i can feel, but they're overwhelmingly rare that it's hard to describe them. i usually only feel during panic attacks(sad), and when in call with friends(happy). i'm glad to have good friends that help me feel, whether they realize they're helping or not.

♡ how can you help?: just be understanding. i don't need you to try to point out emotions i have, that's my job. i just need you to know that i don't know what i'm doing when i express myself. i don't know how to properly express emotions. i overreact a lot of the time, and i don't mean to do that.i just need you to understand that i'm learning how to feel again. i don't know how to express anger, i don't know how to express happiness, i don't know how to express sadness. i WILL make mistakes, and i WILL fuck things up. i WILL make you think i'm crazy. i WILL overreact. i don't know what's right, i don't know what's wrong, and i just need your patience. i need you to know that mistakes are going to happen. i am going to get upset at small things you won't understand. i will be upset at something you can't correct. i will cry at something you can't help me with.please keep in mind, asking questions like "are you okay", "what's wrong", "how are you", "how are you feeling", "why are you sad", 99% of the time, you will not get a proper response. not because i'm mad at you, i just... cannot answer it. i can't.. i can't. i don't know.there will be times i need help, i can receive help, my mind is open and able to listen. but other times, its closed, i cannot listen to you, every word you say will not reach me. i will shut down you down. if i say i don't need help, or i dodge your questions, that's a sign my brain cannot receive help in this scenario. i appreciate you wanting to help, but my brain cannot receive help. i don't know what im feeling. i only see colors in black and white: good and bad. i can't tell you what's wrong. i only see black or white. the colors are dull, bland, i can barely read them.oooh,,, it also helps a lot for you to point out your own emotions sometimes to certain situations. i tend to latch onto others' feelings because it's a lot easier for me to try to understand why others may be feeling something rather than what im feeling. sooo!! yeah :3Alexithymia isn't like depression. I don't need you to tell me that I'm not alone and that things will get better, because in all honesty I am alone, and things will not get better. I know nobody in my life that has alexithymia other than me. Things may get better but I know they wont any time soon. I understand wanting to be positive, but I am alone. And I don't think that's something all that bad.

BTW!! This is an optional read!! I just wanted to ramble!
ALSO! SPOILER WARNING FOR GIVEN!

♡ Who is Mafuyu Sato?: Mafuyu Sato (佐藤 真冬 Satō Mafuyu) is one of the main protagonists alongside Ritsuka Uenoyama in the Given anime.I am speaking for anime Mafuyu, I haven't read the manga so this is just anime Mafuyu.
♡ on to clips + discussion : On multiple occasions, he has admitted to struggling with expressing himself. clip here, episode 3 .
"If you're in a band.. you have to express yourself in front of people, right? People always tell me that I look like I'm not thinking about anything. And sometimes... I think they might be right. I think.. I'm really bad at expressing myself compared to everyone else."Then, Uenoyama's reaction is a brief pause followed by him yelling "You idiot! Are you bullshitting me? You're not good at expressing yourself? The whole reason I invited you into our band is because your song shook me to my core!" .
This could yes, be an overreaction from Uenoyama not understanding what Mafuyu means and only taking off of his observations, but to me, it really feels similar to what I experience. Other people struggle to grasp the whole alexithymia thing when I say it because "I don't act like I have alexithymia". Everyone with alexithymia experiences it differently. Alexithymia can be expressing, discussing, feeling, anything to do with emotion. In this clip, Mafuyu explains that he feels he is very bad at expressing himself. And.. and he is. Don't tell him I said that.Adding onto this clip... Uenoyama could be being truthful when he yells at Mafuyu. Mafuyu can be able to express himself, and from his eyes be bad at it, and from others eyes, be so emotion filled that it's beautiful. For me, I tend to express emotion pretty naturally, but in my brain the expression and feeling are not linked, it's more of a thing I do to blend in. Him singing with emotion could just be instinctive, and he could feel fuzzy when it comes to emotion, even if it did shake Ueno to his core. Idk! Felt like adding on.... He could be okay with expressing in certain scenarios, but he likely struggles to express his thoughts and emotions properly.Clip 2, episode 8 . This clip has a lot of meaning to me, every time I see it it's like a stab to the heart. In the clip, Hiiragi Kashima calls Mafuyu down to talk.. blah blah they talk but it's these specific quotes.
"Hey, I get how you feel, bu-"
"You have no idea how I feel!"Mafuyu says that line quick, with a lot of energy and emotion packed into it which is something he never really did at any other time in the anime. He'd run from Hiiragi, sure, but this seemed to be an outburst of some sort from him. It's a common result of bottling up emotions until they... POP!
That happens when you struggle to express yourself, and that seems to be the main part of alexithymia he struggles with(expression). ... Because he misses Yuki, he loves Ueno, he loves being in this band, he's grateful to be able to move on, he shows excitement with learning the guitar, he clearly doesn't want to bring down the band, in clip 1, he is seen worrying about how his expression would be involved in the band. He clearly feels things, he just can't express them properly, or at least, not the way he wants to.This scene is like a breaking point. He's spent the entire series so far, and before the series started, keeping the loss of Yuki inside. He didn't talk to Hiiragi or any of his friends, he went to a different school. He seemed to just disappear. He had nobody to talk to. And meeting him that day, seeing his face and hearing those words must've triggered a similar feeling that I get when people say they understand me and my alexithymia.♡ discussing quotes from the fandom/wikipedia page!:
"Just like how everyone laughs and cries... I just can’t do it well. I think I’m really bad at expressing myself compared to everyone else. But… But in reality, even if I really wanted to… I can’t cry properly, and it hurts so bad... It hurts so much that I just want to scream. I always wanted someone to understand that. Even just a little bit... "->Ummmm.. okay mr alexithymia I see you. Literally this quote is something I would say. Wanting to scream and cry but not being able to, wanting anyone to understand, even just a little bit. This quote in particular screams alexithymia. Him struggling to express himself.... I don't need to elaborate any further.{To Haruki} "If suddenly the person you love completely disappeared from the world...What would you say? Would you say you're sad? Lonely? Melancholic?"-> Woww.. I see. Asking others how they would feel, asking for their feelings in their words. Me too Mafuyu me too. Explaining the situation devoid of emotion, asking others to fill in the blank spaces with emotion... I see you. I see you Mafuyu. We are similar beings. .. One could argue this is him telling Haruki about his past without directly saying it... but also He's so alexithymia.(To Uenoyama, Haruki, & Akihiko) "It was really hot. Much hotter than I'd imagined. The lights on the stage were so hot. I don't really remember anything else."-> Huh! Not remembering how you were feeling, the expressions on the audiences faces, THE FACT YOU GOT FUCKING KISSED BACKSTAGE?? REALLY?? The only thing he mentions is the stage lights. I bet the fact he was feeling emotion never crossed his mind. Or maybe it did in the moment, but he seems to have prevented himself from saying anything or expressing himself. It's very clear that he was thinking about Yuki on stage as he sang, the flashbacks proved that, but he said nothing about those. Only the lights... avoiding emotions, I see. I see you Mafuyu I seee you.....

In summary/TLDR
mafuyu is literally so alexithymia nobody can convince me he isnt because he is literally so alexithymia certified by me literally so extremely alexithymia like alexithymia is so him he is so