I think I'm beginning to remember.
What I was like when I was in high school.

Through recent reading and watching ventures, it's starting to come back to me.

I would call myself pretty emotionally stable, but even so, I used to feel things all over the place when I was younger.  Emotions felt so big and overwhelming and so, so heavy. 
But this is the thing: they weren't emotions caused by me.  That is to say, they were not directly linked from me and how I felt.

I get caught up so easily with other people.  Not drama or gossip, nothing like that.  Just...how do I put this?
If people are feeling things...actually...if people are going through things, I feel like I'm right there with them.  The burdens they carry, the heaviness they feel...I subconsciously take it upon myself to be there, right alongside with them, to carry those burdens with them, to feel the heaviness of their emotions, just the same as them.

And it's not healthy.

Maybe that's one (of the many) of the reasons why I have become more isolated over the years.  Not because I dislike people (although we know all too well that as a whole, I greatly dislike humans), but as a mode of self preservation.  I didn't know how to NOT take on these burdens, how to NOT feel what others feel.  So...I stopped being around people so much.  I already had issues with my own mental health, and that took a huge toll on me as well.

And now, here I am, back to reading books or watching shows on netflix, and these characters - these people who are NOT REAL - are affecting me.

I can feel it.
I see the change happening in my mood and my mentality.
I start to relate to them, and it changes me.
I may be having a good day, but then I watch a show with a character who struggles with crippling depression, and I start to feel that way, too.
I read a book, and can relate to the main character in some way, and while I'm reading the book and for a short duration after, I take on some of their personality traits (in a subtle manner) and it changes who I am.


Is this how it is for everyone?
Or is this just yet another example of how fucked up I am?  How broken I am?

I used to think that I couldn't feel.  That I was an emotionless being, and I was okay with that.  But I think it's the opposite.  I think I feel deeply, and I think I feel largely.  To the point that the struggles and emotions of those around me are things I take upon myself.  And I guess I just finally shut down, because it became too much for me, and I couldn't handle it anymore.


But I have met the love of my life.  And in meeting him, I began to feel again.  Which is good.  Mostly.  Because he deserves to have someone who isn't a heartless bastard. 
But at the same time, it's bringing up old ways I thought I had gotten away from.

Am I too emotional?
Am I too sensitive?
Is that what it is?  What's causing me to relate and take on burdens and emotions and traits of people, both fictional and real?

Or is it something else?
Just one more psychological problem I have, knowing I have it, but having no idea how to live with it or overcome it or heal from it.



I'm tired of feeling.
The weight I carry suffocates me more every day.  I don't need weight from others on top of that.  I don't need to feel even more, and feel like I'm going mad, because I don't know how to handle any of what I'm feeling.


I'm just...I don't know.

I don't know.