Until now.
Lately, I’ve been thinking about what it means to feel heard. Well, I say lately, but it’s been something I’ve been thinking about for a long time.
I’ve just finally gotten to the point that not feeling heard is a deal breaker for me.
Not agreed with. Not fixed. Not rescued.
Heard.
For most of my life, I thought if I could just explain myself better, be patient enough, or try one more time, eventually the people in my life would understand me. Eventually, they would hear what I was trying to say.
But I’m realizing that some people were never really listening at all.
I grew up feeling invisible. The things that happened to me, the things I felt, the pain I carried and still carry, none of it seemed to matter. When I spoke up, I was ignored. When I hurt, I was dismissed. When I needed protection, I was often left to fend for myself.
I spent years trying to earn the attention of people who should have been paying attention all along.
I spent years believing that if someone would just listen to me, hear me, and understand me, things would be different.
But now I know better.
What’s been the hardest thing to admit is that this pattern didn’t stay in my childhood.
Even now, I find myself repeating things over and over to my “partner” hoping this time he’ll hear me. Hoping this time he’ll understand what I’m trying to say.
He’s a good man in many ways. He helps around the house. He pays the rent. He does things that society often points to as proof of love. So I should be fine with that, right?
But he doesn’t really hear me, or doesn’t care enough to. I tell him something hurts me and he responds with silence. I’ll explain a feeling I’ve had a hundred times before, and it seems to disappear into the air between us.
Sometimes I feel like my words have to come from someone else to matter. Like they need a different voice, a different face, a different source before they’ll be taken seriously. Maybe that’s why it hurts. Because it really isn’t about one conversation, it’s about a lifetime of conversations. A lifetime of trying to convince people that my thoughts, feelings, experiences, and needs deserve space in the room too.
I’m realizing that being heard isn’t a luxury. It’s not asking too much. It’s one of the most basic human needs there is. And for the first time in my life, I’m asking myself a difficult question.
What if the problem was never that I wasn’t explaining myself well enough? What if some people are simply more comfortable not listening?
..Unless, of course, I were some podcast bro. Then he’d listen. I’ll write more about that next time.
For now, I feel like this is a good start to begin blogging again, and I’ll leave it at that.