Have you ever experienced a sense of dread or frustration but couldn’t figure out why?
I have been experiencing this lately. There is something really bugging me, but I couldn’t figure it out. I was wracking my brain trying to think of things that I might of messed up, sins I needed to confess, things I had left undone…anything that might be causing that pressure on my soul. I thought it might be that I wasn’t getting enough recharge time, which being is difficult for an introvert in a full house. That didn’t seem to do it though because my time alone wasn’t recharging, it was isolating. I couldn’t figure it out.
Then, I had a conversation with my buddy at work. She has been my friend for many years and I don’t feel any need to appear as anything different than I am with her. For that reason, she has helped me many times over the past 15 years.
She asked me about a vacation that I had coming up, where we are leaving the kids with the grandparents. I told her about the interesting situation we get to enjoy, where my friend is covering everything except for travel. She then asked about the kids and it struck me like a hammer to the head. I told her how the girls have had some moments of fear and sadness of us not being there. In telling her about that I realized that I was also having some moments of fear and sadness of not being with them. I hadn’t said that out loud (and I was chatting with her in IM, so technically still hadn’t said it outload, but you get the point). As the father in the family, man of the house, I shoulder the fears and concerns of everyone else so they can move forward with courage. I don’t give myself the the opportunity to feel things as well. In all honesty, if I have to manage my feelings along with everyone else in the house, that’s just too much. So, I tend to just not feel things. When it comes to my girls though, I don’t have the ability to push those aside. Those are deep rooted in me. I can’t just push feelings for them aside. That is what was causing me to all the strife. I was worried about them but not allowing myself to acknowledge it.
Conversations are funny that way. They allow us to take thoughts and put them out into reality. Once they are out in reality, we can look at them objectively. We can analyze them. We can analyze the response of our friend we are talking with. We can use those thoughts as a mirror to reflect on ourselves and see parts of ourselves that we cannot normally view.
If you are struggling with something that you just cannot put your finger on, I recommend sitting down and talking with someone about it. We are communal creatures and meant to work through things in community. Our current culture pushes all of us into isolation, which makes anxiety worse. Break the mold and be honest, genuine with a friend.
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