I carry a sadness that does not belong to just one moment or reason. It has no single source. It is a sadness that slowly closes me off, separating me from myself and from others, one quiet inch at a time. It is as though I feel the world in its rawest form, every small tremor of emotion around me. This sadness has lived with me for as long as I can remember. Choosing sadness became something I learned early—less a choice than a survival strategy that once made sense.

Some children are taught, quietly and early, to absorb the sadness around them. After my mother died when I was nine, I was moved into a household shaped by different intentions.

Suddenly, we were a household of seven—five children and two adults.

I was softer than Al and Dotti were accustomed to. And when Kathy left to live with her grandmother in Florida, I became the oldest, the only girl, and the one silently chosen to carry what no one else would touch.

I was an intuitive, deeply empathetic, highly sensitive child.

Yet Al and Dotti often dismissed me as too dreamy, too emotional, too much.

As I entered my teenage years and the household grew heavier with unspoken strain, I became the one who absorbed what others could not bear to feel.

I was never truly seen or valued. Instead, I carried the family’s sorrow alongside my own.

With time, I have learned that there is a profound difference between sitting with someone’s pain and being asked to bear it. Al and Dotti leaned on my sensitivity to absorb the feelings they could not face within themselves. I became the vessel for their grief, worn down by the weight of emotions that were never mine to carry. They wanted me to hold their sorrow rather than look inward to understand their own hurt.

So when I finally stepped into my own life, I found my feelings tangled with those I had carried for others. I had been conditioned to believe the harmony of every room depended on me.

Learning to discern what belonged to me and what did not has been delicate, ongoing work. I became codependent in my relationships, believing I had to steady everyone’s emotions to find peace within myself.

It wasn’t always compassion—it was survival, a way to quiet the sadness I had long held.

And when the burden grew too heavy, I withdrew, isolating myself to numb the overwhelm.

But I understand now that sadness does not have to be my default.

Change is the one constant—within me, within my relationships, and within my circumstances.

Even what appears fixed eventually shifts. There is comfort in knowing that change can soften the edges of sadness, making it temporary, opening space for hope.

The one heart I was given was built to endure.

It whispers to me still—softly, steadily—reminding me to loosen my grip, to release what I have held so tightly, to trust that the world will carry me when I let go.