Lillian Strom, AMFT
The weight of carrying burdens.
We all have challenging times in our lives, times that are more difficult than others. For many people, the difficult times are more often than not. We act strong and don’t say anything or tell everyone and ourselves that it’s okay and deny ourselves the right to feel
like crying or being angry, feeling hopeless and drained. Carrying all of these feelings are hard on us, add the heavy burdens of the situation and these moments weigh us down and takes its toll. All this weight from pushing down our feelings can develop into depression, anxiety, anger, irritability, headaches, insomnia, many different psychosomatic reactions and pain in our body. All the emotional and psychological discomfort you can imagine can result from our unacknowledged and unprocessed emotions. From our trying to “handle it”, when what is really happening is we are pushing it down rather than accepting it and processing it. Those suppressed emotions negatively affect our outlook on life, decisions and actions; it negatively affects our immune systems and adds even more stress and hardship to our lives and our relationships. Some of my favorite tool’s during stressful times are journaling, deep breathing, art, yoga and exercise. Anything that you enjoy and find relaxing. Next time you are going thru hard times or if you are always going through hard times, you might try going to see a therapist. Try 5 appointments to really get a feel for it. It’s an amazing forum for you to be you, excepted completely, without judgment while being validated and getting the support you need. You might find you really like it.
