Empathy

I’ve struggled this week to wrap my head around my own reality in the context of the reality of those around me and I’ve tried all too hard to force myself to find gratitude in what my situation isn’t instead of allowing myself to feel the feelings.

Examples.

I’m stressed about virtual teaching, yet so many para-educators got furloughed this week and my heart feels heavy for their situation. So I try to balance my stress with the need to be thankful for a secure job.

I’m anxious about keeping up with my kids’ Zoom meetings and schoolwork, yet we have help. So I try to balance my anxiety with the need to be thankful for my in-laws that have graciously offered to take our kids four mornings a week to help them log in to Zoom and stay on top of school while Sean and I are working.

I’m worried about friends that are close to the fires and in various stages of evacuation, yet we are not having to pack our own cars. So I try to balance my worry with the need to be thankful for our distance from the fires.

I’m fed up with the hazardous air quality and not being able to go for a run to relieve all this stress, worry, and anxiety. So I try to balance that with the need to be thankful that our house is not on fire.

This balancing act sent me spinning yesterday because I wasn’t able to live in the reality of what I was feeling while I kept trying to squash my feelings for the sake of trying to relate them to something that could be way worse. Then, as I was scrolling through Facebook, I came across this quote from a friend of a friend. A fellow mom who knew the words that the world needed to hear at that very moment.

“I want to encourage folks to recognize that it is ok to grieve the ‘small things’ for yourself even when others are experiencing serious loss. Empathy is expansive, you don’t just have a limited quantity. In fact, you may have more empathy for others and be of greater service to others, if you mourn your own losses of any size and tend to yourself, too” - Liz Vollmer-Buhl

Finally. Permission to feel the feelings. Virtual teaching is hard. Being a simultaneous mom and teacher every day is hard too. Watching the evacuation maps cover areas where I have friends is hard. And not being able to go for a run is hard too.

Reading this quote brought me back to a moment in therapy five years ago when I was trying to understand why the unexplained cysts on Jenna’s kidneys (who was a one-year-old at the time) were bothering me so much. I couldn’t talk about it without crying, even after having a friend point out, “Well, at least it’s not cancer.” Why couldn’t I find relief in what it wasn’t? The therapist had looked at me from across the room, surprised that I was beating myself up about this, and validated my feelings. “You’re going through a lot,” she had said. “And someone else’s reality doesn’t make your reality less difficult.” Getting permission to feel the pain of what I was dealing with was exactly what I needed in that moment. So stumbling across Vollmer-Buhl’s words yesterday, giving me the same permission, was the lift of the enormous burden of trying to diminish my feelings while lifting up other realities.

But the second half of her quote rings true as well. As I feel the struggle of virtual teaching for my own self, I feel an abundance of empathy for the families I work with, reaching out with grace when I don’t hear from someone for a couple of days, and embracing them with understanding when they share their situation. As I watch the fires spread, my empathy causes me to reach out to our friends and old neighbors and offer guest rooms and refuge in case the situation worsens. Trying to ignore my feelings for the sake of others sends me spinning. Giving myself permission to experience the reality of my own feelings gives me the space to look outward and support the people around me.

In “Fostering Resilient Learners: Strategies for Creating a Trauma-Sensitive Classroom,” Kristen Souers writes “It’s OK to be not-OK.” In fact, it’s the title of an entire chapter in the book.

It’s OK. Your feelings are your feelings. Look inward and give yourself permission to feel. It’s the best way to take care of yourself and the only way to manage the emotions of what you’re dealing with.