Labile emotions, extreme and inconsistent with circumstances, can be caused by physical brain damage or emotional disturbance. Triggers include tiredness, overstimulation, anxiety, and excessive demands. Strategies for managing include relaxed activities, one-on-one venting, time-outs, deep breathing, and building a personal library. Affirming the behavior can exacerbate the condition. Over one million people are diagnosed with emotional lability each year.
Medical professionals use the psychiatric term labile to refer to emotions that are extreme, exaggerated, and inconsistent with immediate circumstances. A labile person may laugh at someone’s death or serious injury, even if he loves them. Alternatively, he might cry when someone tells a joke. Whether an emotionally extreme person laughs at something funny or cries at something sad, the display of affection can be melodramatic and beyond what is typical. Anger often manifests as a symptom of lability, also known as pseudobulbar affect.
Emotional lability arises for two main reasons: physical damage to the brain or an emotional disturbance. Physical damage to the brain and neurological system from head injury or aging can result in a labile effect. The resulting physical damage or degeneration could hinder a person’s ability to understand, filter, suppress, or be aware of their emotions. A person who has emotional disturbance due to tragic childhood events or loss of family, job or relationship may experience the same obstacles. The results in both situations can be temporary or long-term.
An emotionally unstable person, however, will not always be unstable. Certain circumstances can trigger hectic moments and cause rapid changes of disposition. Triggers include extreme tiredness, overstimulation through sights and sounds in the environment, constant anxiety, and being subjected to excessive demands from others. One way to manage triggers is to talk to a psychologist or psychiatrist. There are, however, strategies for managing triggers without professional help.
Activities planned in a relaxed atmosphere with a small family group tend to be beneficial. These activities should be something that the emotionally labile person can do easily so that they can experience success. Providing one-on-one venting sessions where the frustrated person can talk about fears and losses without judgment can also be soothing.
An emotionally labile person might help themselves by using time-outs when they are unable to process feelings. He or she can also use deep breathing techniques, soft music, and relaxation. A person struggling with lability often feels empowered to gather information about the condition; building a personal library with treatment books could be helpful.
Anyone around a person experiencing a labile moment should generally ignore it and not affirm the behavior. The embarrassment of being recognized could exacerbate the condition. More than one million people are diagnosed with emotional lability each year.
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