When sadness just rises up : the mystery of emotion : today’s reflections

Sometimes a sadness will just cover me like a wave, it rises up a little less lately following so much of the grieving I have done in past years since Mum and Judy died, those losses triggering other deeper ones. But when I spend time trying to connect with my sister on the phone the sadness is just so deep. I wonder at those times if it is her sadness I am feeling, as as soon as I get off the phone I feel less sad and there are often very very long silences, since I know she is alone a lot and I just want to be with her and making an effort to connect in some small way during this latest lock down.

I know that still waters often run deep and that a lot can go on inside of a person that remains a mystery to them and to us and we can often also be a mystery to ourselves where emotions are concerned. My father did not talk about a lot of his experiences and he would walk away when Mum was in a storm, my living sister is a lot like that, she does not show much emotion at all and so maybe I compensate, I do not know.

From my own psychological work and research I do know that as young ones we were flooded with sensations, feelings and needs and we needed, for our survival to be responded to by someone in tune and caring, someone who knew what to do to soothe us and meet those, but I guess, sadly when that cannot happen then our emotional range or windows of tolerance and expression either narrow widen in places and we may not be able to relate to certain emotions at all, in both ourselves and others..People with very narcissistic parents, for example may shut down feeling or they may use substances to cope and have feelings flood them in a sometimes confusing way such as I do. For those of us with existing injuries then the trigger of that kind of behavior can be huge and the hurt touched on may run very very deep reaching back even across generations.

That is why, when it comes to relationships I often think of something an earlier therapist of mine used to say, that the capacity to wonder about another person and their experience : what they have gone through or found too hard to tolerate can be helpful, it may also stop us personalizing some of their behaviors. It is something I have been thinking about a lot since listening to another of psychologist Dr Ramani’s talks on what makes some people not as vulnerable to mean or harsh things a shut down or low empathy person can do.

For myself I am noticing more and more lately when I get triggered my first response is just to cut off, I feel like I want to run or get away. Lately these reactions are surrounding all of this help I gave to Scott , my window of tolerance is now a narrow slit, I just do not want to hear another single thing about money, about how he is struggling to get out of his deployment and another lie about how he will not continue to burden me when all he does is go over and over it every single time we connect.. I know my trust issues played a part in this but its very painful to me that due to my own unmet needs I ended up in this situation The other day when he was texting me I was bursting with rage, all I could do was express anger and even hatred about it, the truth is that these days I am just getting far beyond being able to lie to myself about the way I feel any more and after I expressed all of that quite vehemently to him I just had to cut contact, I cannot explain here the state it put me into in my body.. It was so bad I just had to get into bed and try to breathe and be quiet and stop all my angry thoughts.

With the emotional neglect in my childhood it also seemed to me that all I could do to survive was adapt. I do my best to take an interest in others, because i genuinely want to be connected but at times it has felt like too much self sacrifice goes on.. If the care is not coming back lately I am questioning why it is I tried so hard but the truth is that none of us is an island and we do need others, but the point is we do not need to be connected at the expense of our own feelings. The trick for some of us neglected as kids though lies in understanding what these are as well as allowing ourselves permission to feel them and coming to understand where we may give ourselves away..

Lately I am beginning to be more aware of the people it hurts to be around.. Sadly when I connected with Daniel I did not feel this kind of pain but I broke the contact due to pressure being put on me and due to wanting to the ‘right’ thing by Scott.. But if i am being honestly lately I am really pissed off about it.. Each contact with Scott hurts now and I am scared of the anger I feel.

Yesterday I did all I could to put my focus on something happy and light, I listened to my favorite songs, I danced, I visualixed the pulling energy coming from him being disconnected as I connected to my own source, I went for a walk and I made cup of tea and something nice to eat, then I watched one of my favorite shows. It did help. It took an active focus of my will, but today on the phone with my sister where we have both ended up just seemed to be so so sad to me.. That said we are alive and safe. It is just that lately in this current state of lock down there seems to be so much isolation everywhere..

For me, I am lucky, I have my blog and Jasper but most days my sister sees no one and she only hears from family once a week. That said I cannot always take on my sister’s burden, but loving her I do care. My heart is so soft around her lately I think now all the past anger got released. But it still feels overwhelmingly sad sometimes when I connect with her and I feel sad for in many ways too… its just the impact of his problems and trying to fix them truly wore me out.. To the point now its getting difficult for me to even think of finding the will to help another person apart from myself for some time.

(Post script : after posting this I just read an article on taking care of ourselves as people with high levels of sensitivity..it seemed to run true so I am sharing the quote and link here 🙂 I hope the link works..

Rather than going along with what other people want, it’s important to think about what you need. So, if someone asks you to do something that doesn’t feel right to your HSP soul, you can explain you’re better suited to a different approach.

Avoid Doing These 9 Things to a Highly Sensitive Person