Too Sensitive

The religion of "toxic bootstraps" strikes again.

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I, too, am a delicate fucking flower, and I have the witty socks to prove it. Photo by Joanna Kosinska on Unsplash

I tiptoe into today’s post, treading upon the frailest of eggshells. I try to find the edge of the Venn diagram overlap where my story does not transgress the boundary of the territory occupied by my children’s stories. Dear goddess, how do we ever write about motherhood? How can we cast our “Help me” nets into the collective without violating all The Rules and opening ourselves up for even more criticism?

May the god of pop psychology help me as I stand bravely at the intersection of Gentle Parenting and FAFO, ready to pounce.

What a gift and curse it is to be so deeply connected to our children. How powerful and tragic to hold their eye contact and instantly receive a download of their most primal pain points. I am alone; I don’t belong; I am a failure.

It is torture, as though we are watching someone about to attack our beloved and we are being held back by our relentless captor—you know, boundaries, social norms, and the threat of helicopter propellers about to smack you with the label you’ve tried so hard to avoid. Why did we sign up for this?

I am not cut out to be a sports mom. Sports moms shrug impassively at bench-warming and aggression—it’s all part of the deal! Sports moms have athletes for children, kids who stay in their bodies and are not at the mercy of wildly fluctuating emotions and a waterfall of intrusive inner critic thoughts. (Shh, I know, I know. All athletes are human beings at the mercy of the human experience; this is just an exercise in self-deprecation, the only sport I ever excelled at.) Sports moms do not observe their athlete and energetically drown in their self-doubt and disappointment; they do not fervently mutter pseudo-prayers begging for one goddamn thing to come easy.

Sports moms are not supposed to have an internal conversation with at least three different (non-psychotic) voices in their head in the span of twenty seconds.

“It is important for children to experience pain and struggle and navigate hard feelings on their own.”

“If Mel Robbins were here whispering, “Let them” in my ear, I would throat punch that bitch.”

“We have been through too much. We deserve a break.”

“What makes you so special? The world is not here to do you any favors. The world doesn’t owe you anything.”

That last one? That’s the kicker. It’s the religion of toxic bootstraps that I wrote about last spring, when the concept was just a glimmer in my creative ovaries. It’s that blond bitch at the airport wearing the backpack reading, “Nobody owes you shit.”

Since I wrote that, I have gratefully welcomed several hundred new readers, so if you missed it, here is the aforementioned “toxic bootstraps” commentary from April:

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I was at the airport last week and a blond woman in front of me was wearing a backpack with a patch that read “Nobody owes you shit.” Her bleach-blond bun, expensive shoes, fit body, and classic beauty told me a story whose truth I’ll never know. Maybe she overcame adversity I’ll never understand and is here to preach resilience to the masses! But I find it a tad problematic that someone who has the privilege of:

• whiteness

• skinniness

• wealth

• beauty

should be telling folks that the world doesn’t owe them shit. One could argue that I fall into that camp, at least peripherally. As such, I would never walk around proclaiming that the world doesn’t owe you shit. And do you know why? Because that message is straight-up white/cis/hetero/not-poor/male/patriarchal BULLSHIT.

The Religion of Toxic Bootstraps

Who do you think invented the “pull yourself up by the bootstraps” mentality? Now listen, dear reader, I don’t actually know, but I suspect it was a man. A person who was born with at least a small stack of privileges already in place: a dick, cis/hetero gender identity and orientation, some money, and white skin. (I was right—just fact-checked and it was popularized by Horatio Alger, so that tracks.)

Everybody else who’s whining about how it isn’t fair? Pull yourself up by your bootstraps, bitch! Suck it up, buttercup! The world doesn’t owe any of us anything! Not sure what YOUR problem is, because I’m doing just fine over here.

Yes, of course you are, Frank. Probably because you’re a really thoughtful, enlightened, gifted, compassionate, equality-driven man. Bless.

If the world begins to offer favors (by “favors” I mean “giving any variety of shit”) about women, people of color, individuals with disabilities, the queer community, neurodivergent folks, or poor people, what on earth would happen to the Toxic Bootstraps Brigade? Well, that just wouldn’t be fair to them, would it?

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So back to that relentless voice in my head. The one who smacks back against the mother pleading for more fucking gentleness in this world. The voice that says, “You better start teaching your girls now that life isn’t fair, because Darwinism is still the global language around these parts.”

Well, fuck that voice.

Because its sole purpose is to mask the truth that lies beneath the surface:

I am too sensitive for this world. So are my daughters. I am too much. They are too much. We are too much.

Now, reader, I would never say that to you. I would unwaveringly urge you to let your Highly Sensitive Person neurodivergent freak flag fly. I would tell you to lie back and blissfully float in a sea of indulgent adverbs and parentheticals and navel-gazing insights and long-winded stories and pleas for curriculum that teaches kids how to be fucking kind to each other. I would tell you we need all the empathy and intuition and curiosity and creativity this world can hold, and don’t you dare tone yourself down for one goddamn second and don’t you dare harden your children.

Well, I guess that takes care of that, doesn’t it?

Sigh. As it stands currently, I teeter between:

1. Forcing some kind of telepathic message to my child: “Stay strong. Fake it til you make it. Don’t let the bastards grind you down. Pretend it doesn’t hurt. TRY TO BLEND IN, GODDAMMIT.” I grit my teeth and transmit it so hard I’m at risk of bursting blood vessels in my eyes like ladies do when they are pushing too hard during childbirth.

2. Begging the world for softness. Please—notice sensitive people, but in the right way. Stop using it against us to ridicule or harm and secure the upper hand, and instead consider how kindness and adaptation might help us get stronger and grow into our best selves.

Does the world owe sensitive, neurodivergent people shit? Well, no. No, it does not. Take a look around you to see how our country views the majority of people—we were build on a foundation of racism, misogyny, and ableist thinking. Why would anyone pause a moment to give a hand to someone on a rung beneath them? Keep climbing. Win the game. Come out on top. Dog eat dog—what a gross mentality, literally.

I want to toughen myself and my children up. No, I don’t. I want to apologize for our neurodivergence and sensitivity and too-muchness. No, I don’t. I want to ask people to please understand us better, and then I want to clench my jaw and hiss, “Just try to act normal so people won’t think we are asking for special treatment.

I suspect the answer lies in the middle, where most answers dwell: Learn that things aren’t always fair and we don’t always get what we want. Gain flexibility and resilience as you cope with mistakes, failure, and improving your skills. Don’t expect the world to revolve around you. Take yourself less seriously.

But, and, also:

Seek gentleness and understanding. Be curious about those around you and offer compassion. Ask for help. Advocate for grace, modification, extra time, extra help, extra understanding, when it is necessary. Foster a sense of inclusivity and diversity. Teach your children to consider how they can help people who aren’t like them.

Right after I imagined throat-punching Mel Robbins, I could practically hear the whisper, “You have to let her feel this pain. You have to show her she can navigate it.”

And immediately after, this: “None of this has anything to do with her. This is all your shit.”

In other words: It’s me, hi; I’m the problem, it’s me.

Protecting our babies makes us positively feral, doesn’t it?

In case you weren’t aware, the most brutal aspects of parenting usually have to do with our own issues. Our deepest core wounds, our most primal of fears. And sometimes they have to do with the panic that history will repeat itself.

My oldest was bullied in high school; her “people” turned on her. My youngest just began 9th grade. What if I have to watch my deepest fear unravel again and I’ll be powerless to change it? I can’t go through it again. I can’t even invite the memories in.

Another glaring reality materializes: I don’t have a partner. A dad would tell me to calm down and rein it in, to turn off the propellers, and he would be right. But I have to walk through this alone, and I want special treatment. There, I said it.

I recently had a conversation with a friend about Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD), a condition that is tightly interwoven with ADHD, especially inattentive type (which, not shockingly, is more pervasive in girls and women, although not exclusively. Boys and men who have inattentive type also find it extremely painful and alienating).

RSD isn’t necessarily about classic rejection, ie, you got dumped, didn’t get the job, didn’t make the team, got a bad review. It can also be extreme sensitivity to your own mistakes, catastrophizing, and jumping to conclusions about how other people view you. This phenomenon has characterized my entire life in so many ways, affecting everything from friendships to romantic choices to risks not taken. I watch my daughters struggle with it, and it feels like someone is stabbing Voodoo Doll Me right in the heart.

The day after my unfortunate psychological tableau danced before my eyes like a deranged, torturous puppet show, I talked to my real sports mom friend.

She said everything I hadn’t known I needed to hear with compassion, clarity, and wisdom. She didn’t talk down to me, and reminded me what I keep forgetting that I know: The most important thing is to exude confidence and demonstrate my unwavering belief in my child’s ability to handle anything that comes her way. This is a universal parenting truth that is so hard to remember—it applies not only to sports, but also grades, friendships, boyfriends, all of it. When Dr. Diana Barrett was a guest on my podcast, she gave me this brilliant mantra that she uses with her own daughter (they both have ADHD) when a meltdown is imminent or in progress:

There’s nothing we haven’t gotten through together.

I need to take that motto one step further: Daughter, there is nothing YOU can’t handle.

During our phone call, my sports mom friend reminded me not to “adult” at my daughter. She shared her own moments of bulldozing and fear, of sometimes crossing lines and learning to shut her mouth as kids sat on the sidelines. She told me this will bring up my own hangups about fitting in and being accepted. She was right about every single word. And I felt the anxiety and control begin to loosen, at least for now.

The day of my inner adolescent marionette show meltdown, I mean, the sporting event, I met a new sports mom friend. I apologized for my emotional untidiness and she brushed it off. We confided and overshared. I wasn’t too much for her.

Maybe this isn’t anyone’s “problem.” Maybe it’s just part of growing up—for my daughters, and for me.

XO,
Steph

P.S. I wrote this Substack Note a few days ago, and it went sort of viral. And it made me realize something. For all the things I have gotten wrong as a mother, I have done a few things right.

“I love having a single mom.” My 9th grader said those words to me as we left for school this morning. I just looked at her.

We pulled out of the driveway, and I commented, "Oh good, the neighbors are watering! I hope they get my lawn too!" And then she said it: "I love having a single mom. I know that sounded like I was joking but I really mean it. You're a total badass and you don't need another adult in the house and you still do more than most moms do."

It was one of those moments I wanted to imprint on my memory forever, to take into my cells for all the times I feel I'm not enough.

Lately I've noticed her just looking at me sometimes, when we are driving or watching TV or playing word games. And the expression on her face is contentment. Safety. Her needs are being met. She survived the divorce and she is okay. More than okay. She has what she needs; she loves our life together. I will continue to fuck things up; I know this. I will be late for school drop off and she will eat EZ Mac too much and I will forget to water the plants and sign permission slips. But this girl feels safe and loved, and that will always be enough for me.

Check out my upcoming shows and workshops here. CO locals, I have three shows in September, and I would LOVE to see you there!