When I was a senior in high school, I had been with one boy for almost four years. As you can imagine, a lot happened in four young years.
High ups, low downs, and becoming best friends along the way was our story. We fought our battles and loved our love until we understood what everyone meant by “you will not be the same person you are now in four years.”
So we broke up, as most do.
To say I was heartbroken would be like saying the grass is green. Of course I was sad. Most days, it took everything inside my little teenage body to put one foot in front of the other. It didn’t help that just hours later, my then best friend was numbing his pain by what seemed like finding any way he could to hurt me – basically attempting to get it into my head that the joke was on me. I was the only one hurt. This was obviously not true. I feel sad for him that he felt like he had to hide his hurt in order to be viewed as strong. Later in life, we reconciled our lack of communication and apologized for the hurt we caused one another, but I’m still fascinated by the way we were expected to act during this trial in our lives.
During this time, if I were to react to being hurt by these actions, I would be thought of by society as the “crazy ex-girlfriend.”
My question is, why? Another human caused me pain.
I felt that pain, but I wasn’t allowed to react to it? Why? Do tears make us so uncomfortable that we would rather the hurt walk around like robots, programmed to say, “I’m fine” when we don’t know if we can make it to lunch? If I were to cry into my locker, skip lunch, or withdraw socially I would be considered crazy. Weak. Fragile. If I hid my pain, brushed my hair, wore a nice pair of jeans, and smiled at my friends I would be considered strong; unbreakable. No one could mess with me, so don’t even try. It’s like if someone kicks you and you say “ouch,” then you should apologize for making such a scene.
In the spring of my freshman year of college, I landed a job that I’d always wanted to have. I was ecstatic to finally be able to have this job, and things were going well – until they weren’t. I was brought off of cloud nine pretty quickly after a few run-ins with a coworker who had a strong personality. I was timid, shy, and new, and she was experienced, blunt, and annoyed by my lack of ability to catch on as quickly as she could. One incident involved me being heavily scolded by my coworker several times in one day. Being a crier, I did just that; cried. I was sad that I loved this job and that things were not going the way I pictured. I just took it all in and cried. Of course, I was then known as the “softie” or “the girl who was too sensitive.” It is as though this is an excuse for the way we treat people. We think, “She’s way too sensitive” rather than, “Wow, I really hurt someone.” I see it as a situation made me sad, so I reacted. Why is it so bad that I felt negatively in a negative situation? Why are we not allowed to react to pain?
On the other hand, why are we not allowed to react to beauty or excitement? If something good happens to us and we tell someone about it, we are seen as bragging about our accomplishments. If we cry because that puppy was just so darn cute, we are seen as soft. Science tells us that tears form as a result of heavy emotion. When our bodies can’t handle the stress reaction, we cry to release some of the stress and emotion from our bodies. Humans are the only animals that are able to do this, and I think that that is pretty darn beautiful. How amazing is it to watch a sunset and be so taken away by God’s creation that your body can’t even handle it? Or how humbling is it to hear an “I love you” from a mentally disabled man because you helped him tie his shoes, and feel that love so much that it comes out of your eyes?
Sensitive people should not be looked down upon. We have the gift of being able to feel and let feel. I use my God-given emotion to express myself, and I don’t plan on stopping. It is both a blessing and a curse to feel everything so deeply, but I know that I am feeling all that this life has to offer me.
