Am I Allowed to Feel This Way?
I ask myself this question more often than I should.
Why do I hesitate to feel things that are already there? Why do I feel the need to explain my sadness before I allow myself to be sad? Why does every emotion come with a little voice telling me that maybe I am overreacting?
Maybe it is because I have been dismissed too many times.
I learned to keep things to myself.
To swallow the words I wanted to say.
To laugh when something hurt.
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To say “it’s okay” even when it wasn’t.
Eventually, I became so used to hiding what I felt that I started hiding it from myself.
And now, when something hurts, my first instinct isn’t to acknowledge it — it’s to question whether I have the right to feel hurt at all.
The truth is, I don’t think I am afraid of my feelings.
I am afraid that if I let myself feel them, they might become too real to ignore.
Maybe that’s why silence became easier.
But I am slowly learning that my feelings don’t need to be justified to be real. I don’t have to prove that something hurt me before I am allowed to hurt.
Maybe I can stop apologizing for having emotions.
Maybe I can finally let myself feel —
without asking permission.
