{"id":61,"date":"2026-01-16T18:23:17","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T18:23:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/?p=61"},"modified":"2026-01-16T18:23:17","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T18:23:17","slug":"self-reflections-emotional-overload","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/?p=61","title":{"rendered":"Self-Reflections: Emotional Overload"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>I know I&#8217;m a highly sensitive person when it comes to my emotions; I feel emotion much more strongly than others do. I don&#8217;t generally have a huge problem being overwhelmed by positive emotions because joy and laughter feel good. The trouble comes from depression, sadness, loneliness, and feeling worthless. When these feelings come, it feels like I&#8217;m downing and it takes time for them to pass. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I need to practice not judging my emotions and letting them pass. I need to acknowledge them and remind myself it is okay to feel that way. This is difficult for me to do because I feel like I&#8217;m drowning. The emotions consume every part of my body and soul. I get mental tunnel vision and the negativity is all I can see. I begin to think about why bad things always seem to happen and I ask myself why can&#8217;t something good happen to me. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I have plenty of good things in my life: my family, my husband, my close friends, my job, etc. I try to remember those things, but I also know they&#8217;re temporary; I can lose them at any moment. I begin to panic wondering what there is to hold on to. I look into the possibility that I will end up alone. I don&#8217;t have a relationship with any of my cousins. I don&#8217;t have a relationship with any aunts and uncles. I barely have a relationship with friends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I know that&#8217;s normal when getting older. Life happens. People and circumstances change. Deep, deep down, I know it will be okay, but I&#8217;m clutching the memories so tightly trying to hold on to that feeling of safety I once knew. My heart wants authentic social connection; a sense that I belong to something bigger than just myself. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There&#8217;s frustration that connections don&#8217;t pan out. There&#8217;s despair at the realization I&#8217;m not fitting in. There&#8217;s desperation at trying to find SOMETHING I have in common with others. There&#8217;s realization that I&#8217;m a group of one. I like the books I like. I like the movies and music that I like. There&#8217;s the tech things I like. Hobbies, on the other hand, seem too hard to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think I need to try just writing on here more often. It helps me to get the thoughts and feels out of my head where I can see them and analyze them. Not everything is a well thought out essay. Sometimes I just need to let it all out like barf on a page because it seems to quiet the emotional beast. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I know I&#8217;m a highly sensitive person when it comes to my emotions; I feel emotion much more strongly than others do. I don&#8217;t generally have a huge problem being overwhelmed by positive emotions because joy and laughter feel good. The trouble comes from depression, sadness, loneliness, and feeling worthless. When these feelings come, it&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-61","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-brain-barf","category-stream-of-consciousness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=61"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62,"href":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61\/revisions\/62"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=61"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=61"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaymcooper.me\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=61"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}