Originally published on Medium. Featured in illuminate vol. 2.
“I don’t know how you do it.”
“Your strength amazes me.”
“Wow, you’ve been through a lot.”
“I don’t think I could handle all of that.”
I am so tired of hearing these things. They are all well meaning efforts at empathy, but every one of them grates on me like nails on a chalkboard. It’s not that I don’t understand what the person uttering these words is trying to say. It’s that they don’t understand my pain, yet they feel compelled to say something because no reaction would be taken as heartless and uncaring. Read the full article.