You know those women full of mystery? The ones who move in silence with this calm air of composure that makes them at least seem like they have it all together? Yeah, that's not me. I am the woman who loses at Go Fish due to my inability to have a good poker face.
My heart has always, sometimes admittedly detrimentally, been on my sleeve. If I love you, I waste no time in telling you. If I am sad, my strategy is to let it all out, so I can move on and feel better. I feel big feelings, and have never been good at completely masking them.
Growing up, emotions in my house were … complicated.
No one in my family hid their emotions per se. Our hot-headed Italian family wasn't silent on emotions, but they certainly didn't follow outbursts up with any explanations. So to me, feeling those intense feelings was super normal, but how they were handled wasn't really healthy.
In my 20s I started processing this in therapy, and was particularly worried about it because I was pregnant with my first child. I didn't want to pass that onto my child, so I got it in my head that I couldn't convey anything that was too extreme.
Ironically, I become a mom fired up with emotions and thoughts I wasn't even fully conscious I had.
But for a year I did my best at doing what I thought was right. For my son, I fixated on putting up a really put-together front. When his eyes closed, that's when the real emotions came out, and they involved a lot of crying and worry.
My emotionally stoic era was short lived, as the 2020 pandemic gave me nowhere to hide. With my little family isolated and together 24/7, ducking in bathrooms for a good cry became impossible. And then one day, like most repressed emotions inevitably do, emotions erupted.
I couldn't tell you exactly what started it, but I do remember it being a dozen little things that just kept adding up.
The pressure to "mom" and work, with no breaks really happening for either, culminated into a snapping moment. Right there in front of my toddler, I completely lost it. Screaming, crying … I was haven't an adult-sized tantrum, and all my husband and child could do was look at me scared and mystified.
But then, something surprising happened.
"Mama, big feelings?" asked my son innocently.
As if the wind got knocked out of me, all I could do was nod as tears streamed down my face. My worst fears had been realized. My son was witnessing me absolutely lose it, and I assumed he'd look at me the way I'd look at my family when tempers rose.
I convinced myself I failed in that moment, and frantically tried to wipe away the tears that just refused to stop streaming. Instead of him cowering, he sat there looking rather unfazed.
"That's OK, my feelings are big too," he said matter-of-factly.
Despite the fact that I was bawling my eyes out, my son just sat there patiently and waited for me to get it together.
"You know mommy isn't mad at you, right?" I asked him, my voice thick with tears and embarrassment.
He nodded and turned back to his toy. I got down on his level and made sure he looked at me. "I love you so much, and mommy's big feelings have nothing to do with you."
He looked at me as if I was stating the most obvious thing and simply responded "OK, mama."
The last thing I want to do is make my child "responsible" for my emotional well-being. My letting myself feel my feelings in front of him isn't about him taking care of me.
It's about him seeing what happens next. How I take the deep breaths, I drink water, and I relax myself as much as possible. That aftercare shows him that it is always possible to feel both. And that even though it is hard, and you will get through it, it is OK to be swept up for a second so long as you are being safe.
Getting through those big feelings is something he needs to be able to do and he needs to know that it's OK to feel them. It's something I didn't get, and despite it being unintentional, I never learned that it was OK to be that upset and it's OK to apologize and recover from it.
My emotional breakdown didn't break him. In fact, I think it inspired him to be more empathetic. And while I'm not all about burdening him emotionally, I am all about being real with him in a way that makes him feel safe, loved, and validated.
