Sensitivity

Thanks for joining in, as I share a piece of my heart! You can catch snippets of my daily life (and sneak peeks) on Instagram or follow along on Pinterest.

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Yesterday I was having a bit of a panic attack.

It seems to happen every once in a while. Not that I’ve had a history with that, (or been diagnosed) but sometimes when lots of things pile up at once, I feel it in my body, it starts to react, and tells me I need to slow down…take a breather…try to not let things get to me that I can’t control.

When I spent my birthday in Tennessee a few weeks ago, my husband, brother, sister in law, and kids made this awesome sign for me that listed 36 (my age) qualities they love about me. Two that stick out to me that relate to this topic are:

• She can multi task like a symphony director. If there was an Olympic event for multi-tasking: Gold Medal, baby!
• She has a high tolerance for choas.

It’s true! My life is chaotic (because of the mult-tasking, probably) and I love it! I thrive on it! But sometimes, those plates I juggle tend to come crashing down, and I get to a point that it becomes too much. Usually it’s just for one really bad day, then I can sleep it off and I’m fine. But it’s been a CRAZY past week, and yesterday (Wednesday) was the culmination of it all. I’ve cried, I’ve vented to my husband, I’ve tried being patient, I’ve prayed. I know things will get better, and I’m grateful that I have that perspective. I can just push through it, and I’ll come out ok, just like the last time.

I like to share what’s on my mind here on my site, because I feel like you care. Those of you that check in every day, or who get my daily newsletters, you care enough to be here. I don’t like to promote these posts on social media, because I just want the select few who care, to really know, to see what goes on behind the scenes.

I also want you all out there to know that I’m a real person, too. I’m not just capturing joy, I’m feeling sad sometimes, too. I think we all benefit from knowing that everyone out there struggles, and it helps us all feel a little better about our own personal demons.  It reminds us not to compare our bad days to someone else’s good days. Despite the crap I’ve dealt with, I still believe in looking for the joy in life, in focusing on the positive, because that’s all we can do to come through from a bad day, week, or month.  If we were all a little more open about our bad days, I think we’d find we can relate better to people each other, and be more sympathetic.  Behind every smile is a sad story, too.

Even typing this up, I’m getting all emotional. I tend to get emotional easily though. I also tend to be overly sensitive and let things affect me more than others. But I think the things that have been weighing me down would affect anyone. Just maybe not to the degree that I’ve had.  So here are my junk for the week:

• Computer got a virus, and it’s taken a week of back and forth with a guy fixing it, and it’s still infected!
• I write a weekly post for e-how, and I have a Tuesday night deadline each week, my computer was struggling so much, I couldn’t even upload a picture, and I didn’t get it in til Wednesday afternoon. It was so stressful that I appeared un-reliable (and unprofessional) and it happened last week, too.
• my weight. oh, the dreaded scale. I’m the highest that I’ve been in 2 years, and I’m so disappointed with myself. Granted, I’ve kinda given up this summer, ate whatever I wanted on my road trip, and got out of the exercise routine with my foot (minor) surgery. It’s only 5 pounds over (I know, it sounds lame that I’m upset about it) but I just need to be persistent and get it back down.
• I’m watching my 3 nephews this week. It’s always a challenge to have extra kids around that have a different set of family rules, just trying to be patient with that.
• Got my feelings hurt by a friend, and still don’t feel a resolution.
• Expected more from a few close friends in another situation, felt let down.

Those are my combined stressors, but really the friend issue is what weighs me down the most, and puts me over the edge. I care so much about my friends, and when I have conflict, it hurts my heart until it’s resolved. I’m not one of those types of people that can just let it go without talking, I have to talk it through to feel good about it, to be understood, and understand their perspective as well.  But not everyone feels that way, and that is difficult for me.  I’m also generally the one to bring it up because it sure beats ignoring each other! It’s not worth it to me to lose a friend over a conflict, and I’m usually the one to initiate that. But sometimes, when I’m the one that was hurt, I’d like the other party to initiate a resolution.  To care enough about me to initiate a possible awkward moment, because our friendship means something to them. When that doesn’t happen, it tells me that maybe they don’t care about our friendship as much as I do, and it stings…bad.

I was so worn down with all of this STUFF (and a really late night with no sleep from it) that I got flu like symptoms one night and had to tuck myself into bed at 9pm (thought it should have been 7). 9 o’clock is unheard of for me!

I’ve found what is hardest for me in any type of relationship is recognizing that we all handle things differently.  I’m hyper sensitive. Which takes me to another discussion in defining that word.

Sensitive–It’s a good trait, right? We always say we want a spouse or a friend to be sensitive to our needs, to be aware, to be conscious, to reach out, to protect.  The dictionary says, ” aware of and responsive to the feelings  of others.”

But being “overly” sensitive, that’s a bad connotation. It means too much emotion, too much caring. Often times, a cry baby.

As in many traits in life, we all aim to find that balance, the fine line somewhere in the middle of being un-caring and overly sensitive.

But I define myself as being quite sensitive, even, overly sensitive.

Some very sweet friends told me recently that because I’m such an ultra sensitive person in being aware of others needs, that it may also be to my detriment that I’m ultra sensitive on the flip side of taking things so heavily when I’m hurt by others.

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 I’d never thought of it like that before, and it really got me thinking. Some can just brush it off, get over it, easily forget, but I carry it with me, shed tears, feel sick for days, and wallow in my own self pity.

Oh, that dreaded pity party! I hate it, I really do. I really don’t like myself when I dwell on the negative, when I’m surrounded by so much good! What’s my problem?!?

As adults, we tend to develop thicker skin as we age. It comes with life experience, where we are taught to toughen up. Is it because we grow up and realize some things just don’t matter?  Or is it because we’ve been hurt by others so many time that we have to harden our hearts in order to protect ourselves?

I don’t want to develop thick skin if it means I am less sensitive to the needs of others.

Maybe it’s worth it to me to take the brunt of the pain in my “over sensitive” category in order to still be in tune and care for others. I wish it didn’t have to be that way! I try to WILL myself to not care about those things…to get over it…but how can I teach myself such things? How do I train myself to not care so much, when I want to care in other ways?

I do feel that in my 30 something years, I’ve figured myself out more, been through the ringer in some areas, and changed my ways for the better. I am definitely not perfect, I’ve stuck my foot in my mouth a plenty, but I’m also quick to apologize because it hurts too much to stay that way.

Clearly, I still have much to learn.

I’ve also found when I’m not getting proper spiritual nourishment, that I’m beaten down more.

Instead of that spiritual enlightenment recently, I’ve gone a different route to escape my reality by watching episode after episode of Keeping up with the Kardashians! (don’t judge!) It’s kinda vulgar, but it’s bleeped out (though I know what they are saying) but it makes me LAUGH! That’s what I need, is a good laugh, and that’s hard to come by for me and television/movies.

But I need to lift myself up with good things that I know will help me feel better, and dive into things that will lift me up.

Despite all of that junk, here are my “looking on the bright side of things”:

• My husband is a fabulous sounding board and support to me, hugs me when I cry, is a great listener
• My kids are AMAZING! They’ve been so helpful with their cousins, and taking up for my slack when I’m stressed and need to just put myself in time out.
• I’ve had 3 sets of friends take me out to dinner for my belated birthday. I’m so grateful for the kindness surrounding me.
• I have a clunky laptop that I can do some computer stuff on, and I’ve had to transfer files over to it while the computer is on the fritz, but I can get stuff done that I need to (deadlines, etc.)
• I’ve exercised three times this week, working on getting back down…

All of this typing is a just a release for me, and I don’t need any accolades, I just need you friends out there to know that my life isn’t always rosy, and I find solace in sharing my story if it helps others.  Now I’m going to quickly cover this up with another post, not look at it for a while, and hope this has resonated for someone out there. A little inspiration about your Happily Ever After, here.

So share something with me! What have you been beaten down by? Or what has pulled you out of a funk?