Not Broken, Just Feeling It All

Living with a heart that feels too much.......

It comes without warning.

A sudden, suffocating sadness.

No trigger, no reason, just a wave that crashes over me and pulls me under.

I can be laughing with my kids. Chatting with friends. Sitting in a meeting.

And suddenly, it’s there - A heaviness in my chest, and I feel like I’m drowning in the middle of an ordinary day.

I could be surrounded by people, and still feel alone, so alone!

Most days, I don’t stop long enough to feel it. I fill my time with tasks, with people, with noise.

Chores. Work. Walks. Calls. Distraction helps. Routine helps. Life, in its relentless rhythm, carries me forward and keeps me from falling apart. It gives me the illusion of control.

But then there are days when it all breaks through — when the sadness becomes too loud to ignore.

And I find myself wondering:

What is wrong with me?

Why am I not okay?

I’ve even tried saying it out loud — just once or twice, to the people I trust most.

“I don’t know why, but sometimes my heart suddenly feels so sad and heavy.”

And they looked at me — not unkindly, but almost hunted. Bewildered. Unsure what to say, unsure how to hold this truth.

So I stopped.

And I folded that part of me away again.

I try to explain it — to myself, mostly - I think it’s the mix of things I carry quietly.

Maybe it’s the hormones. Perimenopause — this cruel, silent transformation that no one warns us about.

The loss of my dad — three years now, and still it aches; a constant ache. A grief that’s woven into every day, sometimes loud, sometimes just a dull hum in the background.

And then there’s motherhood — this beautiful, heartbreaking journey of loving so deeply that the thought of your children leaving feels like losing a part of your own body. They’re growing up. As they should. Soon, they’ll fly. And I’ll be left with more silence than I know what to do with.

At work, there's a simmering restlessness — a whisper that I’m meant for more, capable of more — but the path ahead feels clouded, undefined. The desire to break free of monotony is real, but so is the fatigue that keeps me tethered. It's like I'm forever oscillating between wanting to run and needing to lie down.

There’s a loneliness in all of it — even when I’m not alone.

A longing for peace I can’t always find.

A search for meaning that often ends in more questions.

And yet — in the middle of all this, I find moments. Tiny, perfect moments.

Placing fresh flowers in a vase.

A beautiful old, gnarled tree – standing alone but strong.

The way the light falls into my room, just right.

A warm cup of tea.

A hug. A kind word. A deep breath.

These moments don’t fix everything. But they remind me that I can feel joy, even in sadness.

I’m learning not to fight these waves, but to sit with them. To let them pass through me. To speak about them, even if my voice trembles. Because I know I’m not the only one!

So if you’re feeling this too —

The unexplained sadness, the loneliness in a crowd, the weight you can’t name —

You are not alone.

You are not weak.

You are just human.

And it’s okay to feel all of it. 

Note: This isn’t sadness asking for sympathy – it’s a quiet call for empathy. It is my honest attempt to reach out to all of you who feel too much, who carry invisible weight, and still walk around making others smile. It is simply human to feel all of this, but it is important to acknowledge and talk about these feelings, and to find the little joys that carry us through