There’s actually a word for that feeling we try to explain

Kaity Holtman

Have you ever had this feeling that you tried to explain to someone, but you just can’t come up with the right word?

I have wanted to explain how I wish I could be in two places at once – here at work, and home with my baby. Apparently there is a word for that feeling.

I have also said how I wish I could explain to three-years-ago me how life would look right now. Apparently there is a word for that feeling too.

A man by the name of John Koenig created the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, where he took prefixes, suffixes, and root words, combined them based on their meanings, to create the words that explain the feelings to which many of us can relate.

Here are some examples. If you’re like me, you read them and pull a specific time you felt that way to mind, quite easily.

Sonder: The realization that each passerby has a life as vivid and complex as your own.

Opia: The ambiguous intensity of looking someone in the eye, which can feel simultaneously invasive and vulnerable.

Monachopsis: The subtle but persistent feeling of being out of place.

Énouement: The bittersweetness of having arrived in the future, seeing how things turned out, but not being able to tell your past self.

Vellichor: The strange wistfulness of bookshops.

Nodus Tollens: The realization that the plot of your life doesn’t make sense to you anymore.

Onism: The frustration of being stuck in just one body that inhabits only one place at a time.

Liberosis: The desire to care less about things.

Altschmerz: Weariness with the same old issues that you’ve always had – the same boring flaws and anxieties you’ve been gnawing on for years.

Occhiolism: The awareness of the smallness of your perspective.

Anechdoche: A conversation in which everyone is talking, but nobody is listening.

Ellipsism: A sadness that you’ll never be able to know how history will turn out.

Kuebiko: A state of exhaustion inspired by acts of senseless violence.

Lachesism: The desire to be struck by a disaster – to survive a plane crash, or to lose everything in a fire.

Exulansis: The tendency to give up trying to talk about an experience because people are unable to relate to it.

Adronitis: Frustration with how long it takes to get to know someone.

Rückkerhrunruhe: The feeling of returning home after an immersive trip only to find it fading rapidly from your awareness.

Rubatosis: The unsettling awareness of your own heartbeat.

Kenopsia: The eerie, forlorn atmosphere of a place that is usually bustling with people but is now abandoned and quiet.

Mauerbauertraurigkeit: The inexplicable urge to push people away, even close friends who you really like.

Jouska: A hypothetical conversation that you compulsively play out in your head.

Chrysalism: The amniotic tranquility of being indoors during a thunderstorm.

Vemödalen: The frustration of photographing something amazing when thousands of identical photos already exist.

Even working with words daily, I sometimes feel like there isn’t the right word to explain how I feel. Now, I’ll admit, many of these words are so complex, I’ll probably never actually use them.

Sure, I have had the feeling of altschmerz, but will I use that in my everyday conversation? Probably not.

If anything, it’s nice to know that other people have that same feeling, enough so that there is an actual word for it.

It makes me find hope that I’m not crazy (keep your jokes to yourself) for feeling a certain way, other people have exulansis when they’re struggling with something, or a jouska when they’re overthinking a situation.

Words are a funny thing, aren’t they? We rely on with every thought and every word we think and say, but we often don’t give them a second thought.

I’ve been thinking about that lately, with Sam, who is now five months old.

He jabbers all the time, and I swear he’s saying “mama,” or “moo,” but he probably isn’t, really.

But I constantly wonder what he’s thinking or dreaming about when he squeals happy noises, cries, or even stares at the fan.

We take these words for granted, but our little ones learn language one word at a time and have to process the words as they come.

That’s kind of how I felt with these words. Some look like they’re from another language, many I wonder the best pronunciation. Now I can imagine what Sam will start going through soon.

And just as Sam will try to figure out what words go with different feelings he experiences, I’m learning how different situations can cause feelings that now have words to go along with them.