I remember my 20s. I was constantly adrenalized, looking for the slightest physical or emotional danger. Reacting to every glance, lack of glance, body language of everyone around me and brooding over what their problem with me is. Once the adrenal response kicks in, the only thing my brain can do is look for what external person is causing it.

Naturally I was not an easy person to be around. It's not like I could communicate to people that I was nervous, or on edge, or depressed, or angry. I couldnt even identify those in myself much less speak to them. If I was to comminicate a boundary with someone, it would be after I was already enraged and positive that the person was intentionally crossing it, so I knew I had to be firm in my boundary setting. To normal people my firm boundary enforcement felt like outright hostility. One person in a moment of honesty told me she thought I might be a serial killer because my demeanor was so cold and silently hostile. It's true I was full or silent rage and resentment, that sometimes manifested in minor violence but mostly I was just trying to keep my fight or flight under control. But normal healthy people can see right through it.

Healthy people don't feel like they might be attacked or abandoned or ridiculed at any moment for any reason. They don't spend their energy suppressing those thoughts. They simply don't have them. Their brain isn't constantly adrenalizing them into fight or flight mode. They think about what next fun thing they might want to do or some real tangible issue they want to solve at work or in a relationship.

We think we can hide our emotions because we don't have the ability to detect them ourselves, how could others? Many normal people are in touch with their emotions and can detect people whose emotions are either hidden, there is an attempt to hide them, are panicking, or angry. They can tell if a person is angry even if that person can't. I used to sit and brood with my emotions until they had built up so much pressure that trying to vent any steam led to an explosion. I would rant ragefully, even though on my end I felt only mildly irritated.

Now that I'm more regulated, watching people like me they to communicate does make me uncomfortable. I like being relaxed and not adrenalized or brooding. When I interact with family or others who are reactive or broody or have suppressed emotion it makes me less relaxed, and I do not like it, so I avoid those people. If I feel like they are projecting their issues with others onto me, I feel unfairly judges and have little interest in helping. From my experience of when I was adrenalized, there is nothing that can be done for them in that moment.