Cosmos of Kate

Growing up with an ER nurse for a mom definitely has its perks, let me tell you. Any time my brother or I got injured or sick, she knew exactly what to do and was a rockstar at making things better. That being said, there were SO MANY times I tried to milk situations to get more attention.. what kid doesn’t? However, she knew when we needed actual love and tenderness and when we needed tough love and to suck it up. While she was always, ALWAYS there with us through thick and thin, and going through her own ups and downs in life, I don’t really recall ever seeing my mom cry, or at least not much. Me… I was just a living ball of tears for a good number of years and reasons.

I always wondered how my mom could keep herself so composed, especially when I knew what she did for a living and the things that she saw in her job. How could someone live through those experiences and not just want to cry all the time? I could barely make it through a day of high school without breaking down in tears. Not only would I cry about my own angsty tribulations, but the emotions of others would also weigh heavily on me, especially strong emotions. I knew I wanted a job where I helped people, but how could I do that effectively if I was an emotional mess all the time?

Once I graduated high school I did decide to go into the field of nursing, following in my mother’s footsteps. I didn’t know what was in store for me, but I hoped that I would be able to handle the emotional aspect of the work with as much grace as she did. Turns out, one of the things they don’t tell you in nursing school (though you’ll likely learn it from a seasoned preceptor), is just how hardened, jaded and cynical the profession can make you. There is a reason nurses (and other medical professionals) can deal with the horrors they see on a daily basis. They develop a secret superpower of being able to dull their emotions.

Now, I’m not at all saying that nurses are uncaring and don’t feel. There is a reason people go into the profession, generally a desire to help their fellow humans through hard times. That desire sticks with them, but the part of themselves that allows the FEELS to happen while helping others slowly dies… or at least goes dormant. I like to think of it as slowly building up a wall, a fortress. The most tender, caring, loving, emotional part of myself needed protection from the horrors that I would endure during my years as a bedside nurse, and I had to build those walls up one brick at a time.

My second job as a bedside nurse was in a burn unit. Whenever I tell people this, the reaction I get is “oh, I don’t know how you could do that, it must have been so hard.” Yes, yes it was. I can’t begin to describe the things I saw, the wounds I dressed, the pain I had to inflict just by doing my job, the people I helped put back together. It was enough to make most people want to run as far away as possible, but I loved what I did. I loved HELPING people get better. However, I never brought my work home with me. I never had nightmares about the things I saw or experienced, never cried about anything related to the emotional aspects of my job. Why? I asked myself this often. It literally felt as though a part of my heart had been switched off. I still cared about people and wanted to make them better, but I just did it.. without FEELING it. It was the only way to get through each day.. to keep the walls I had built as tall and reinforced as possible.

It has now been 9 years since I left bedside nursing for jobs of a more desk related nature. I still have thick skin and can take an emotional beating, but the walls around that precious, vulnerable, empathetic, FEELING place in my heart are crumbling, or have maybe already completely crumbled, leaving it wholly unprotected, God forbid. I’m no longer just feeling my own emotions, but am feeling those of others around me, those close to me, and even those not as close to me. I feel the pain and anguish others are feeling, and IT HURTS! Good lord it hurts. My therapist tells me this is a good thing… perhaps she’s a masochist. Or would that be a sadist? Sadist by proxy? Other peoples’ pain causing you pain. Hmm.

Anyway! The feels have returned, and it’s hard to know what to do with them. It’s like I have unlocked a secret part of my soul that I had intentionally kept hidden for many years. It feels wonderful and horrible at the same time. I cry during movies now, I cry while reading books. And it’s not just the waterworks, but I physically feel the emotions in my body. When someone else is in pain or enduring emotional trauma, my chest HURTS! My heart hurts. It’s visceral. It’s a part of me that I have never fully experienced as an adult and it’s exciting and terrifying at the same time.

There is a lot happening in the world right now, a lot of people experiencing hardships and traumas that are unprecedented. It’s hard to navigate this world as an empath, hard to know where to focus those feelings and that energy that is so new to me. These days I have been focusing a lot of it into my writing (hence this post), but a lot of it I still hold on to. I have found, at least for myself, that my feelings often get expressed through art. Living life with deep empathy for others can pull you down quickly if there no way to release that extra energy. To all my fellow empaths out there, please find ways to express yourselves, to let it go, to offload. Feeling things with others is a good, healthy trait to have, but don’t let it deter you from giving yourself some grace and space when you need it. Take care of yourselves along with taking care of others. We could all use a little.. or a lot.. of TLC right now.