Big Girls DO Cry - And They Don't Have To Apologize For It!

After years—a lifetime, really—of being told I am “too sensitive,” I have finally come up with a thoughtful and well-articulated response: So sue me. 
 
I’ve tried other reactions, including apologies, rationalizations and psychological explanations. Those never work, because in addition to being judged as sensitive, I also come across as defensive or desperate. Maybe I used to be both, but now I’m just who I am: a middle-aged, highly sensitive woman who can live with herself.
 
I was in my thirties before I found out there is a designation, other than crybaby, for people who can become overwhelmed by the noisiness and tenderness of life at a quicker rate and with deeper repercussions than most folks. Finding The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You by Elaine N. Aron, Ph.D., opened up all sorts of discovery and insight for me. Acceptance has been hard, but it has come.
 
“Having a sensitive nervous system is normal. It occurs in about 15-20 percent of the population,” says Aron. “It means you are aware of subtleties in your surroundings, a great advantage in many situations. It also means you are more easily overwhelmed when you have been out in a highly stimulating environment for too long, bombarded by sights and sounds until you are exhausted in a nervous-system sort of way. Thus, being sensitive has both advantages and disadvantages.”
 
During my teenage years, I was often tagged as “too sensitive” when I took an offhand comment to heart or clung to a seemingly minor problem. “Worrywart” was tossed my way more than once, and “killjoy” rings a bell. My friends were able to let things go more easily than I could. I envied their carefree approach to life, but it was a faculty I did not share. 
 
As a young adult, my sensitivity remained, and my self-consciousness about it increased. Instead of seeing this as a mere difference in personality, I came to view my responses as improper. In my mind, I was “wrong” to be so affected by the world around me. It didn’t have to be something “bad” to send me straight into rumination mode—it might have been a warm exchange between strangers, an appeal for help from a charity, or a television show about growing old in the Amish Country. Even though those same triggers remain active for me today, I no longer consider myself defective for how I respond.
 
The same hyper-awareness that caused me to be labeled “too sensitive” as a child has led me to volunteer with a hospice and return to school to study religion as an adult. On more than one occasion it has nudged my heart open, making room for experiences, opportunities and relationships I might have otherwise missed if I hadn’t been so susceptible. Like my green eyes and my wide hips, or my tendency toward impatience and my preference for carbohydrates, my sensitivity is part of who I am. For better or for worse.
 
Aron encourages the highly sensitive person (that’s me!) to gain self-knowledge about your personality, reframe how you see yourself, heal from your past association of being labeled “too sensitive” and learn when to say “no” to the outside world. Those four steps have changed my life for the better, and when I feel myself slipping back into apologies or defenses, I revisit the steps and start over. Most important, my opinion of myself has changed, as I’ve come to consider such sensitivity as a vital tool for making my own way in the world. At age 49, I have moved the descriptor “overly emotional” from the deficit column to the positive side of the ledger.
 
In the end, I like to consider myself a reasonable woman possessed of a respectable amount of decorum. But I no longer berate myself for crying in public or needing quiet time to decompress. I’m not sure how sensitivity is judged, anyway—who determines what is too sensitive or not enough? So go ahead and label me “thin-skinned,” “spoilsport,” or even “party pooper.” I can take it. I’m tougher than I look.