I stopped describing myself as “too much” when I was really just under-held

Dear Delyara, That change in language did something enormous to me this week. I have spent years interpreting certain emotional states as personal excess. Too sensitive. Too needy. Too affected. Too tired. Too complicated. But if I’m honest, many of those states came not from being “too much” in some innate way, but from carrying too much without enough support, rest, or soft places to land. When I thought that sentence — maybe I am not too much, maybe I am under-held — I actually had to sit down. It felt like someone had opened a window in a room I’d been breathing in for years. I don’t think I’m going to forget it.