Hi! I’m Eric and recently I’ve been crying a lot. I had been told my whole life that guys do not cry and emotions are stupid, and honestly, until recently I wholeheartedly believed that. My emotions took a backseat because it made my day-to-day easier.
I have always been one to keep busy. In college, I worked multiple jobs (out of necessity), took classes, and did my extra-curriculars. It was really convenient because there was no time to deal with the feelings and emotions that were building up inside of me.
When I left college, I stuck to the formula because it suited me. I started a biking fundraiser, a YouTube Channel, a second masters degree, and of course I still had my full-time job.
When the pandemic hit, while I was blessed to keep my job, just about everything else got canceled, put on hold, or kind of fizzled away. With all this free time those pesky suppressed emotions started coming out. I started questioning who I was, why I do the things I do and how did my childhood shape the person I had become. I wrestled with these thoughts and for the first time in my life, I was honestly attempting to process the emotions that had been tucked away until now. It became clear pretty quickly that I needed help, I was not going to be able to process my emotions on my own.
Thankfully, a small group of friends recently shared they went to therapy and normalized the idea of going to therapy for me (interestingly enough the friends who were open about their experiences with therapy were all women). I was afraid and I was skeptical. I thought, ‘who needs therapy when it was easier to suppress those emotions. Men do not go to therapy.’
Of course, that was all crap.
I had a screener interview with a therapist who I liked and we began to delve into my psyche. I learned about how I was using activities to hide from my emotions and how I grew up to always think of others before myself to the point where I did not value myself.
The tears flowed. Every week I had more questions and we took a deeper dive into different parts of my life. I was becoming honest with myself and the barriers I had put up were starting to come down. I felt and still feel vulnerable. But I am learning, not only how to identify what I feel and why, but also how to articulate those feelings to others.
Although I was initially afraid others might judge me for being ‘sensitive’ or ‘emotional’, once I began sharing my feelings with others, despite what I had previously internalized, it became clear that my friends had feelings too and felt just as relieved sharing!
Instead of hiding how we felt we began sharing with one another and our emotional connections became stronger. By being vulnerable with one another we were also being honest with each other.
Make no mistake, I am still in therapy and sometimes I feel like I’m taking steps backwards instead of forward. As someone who is so used to getting results quickly patience is not a strong suit. I’ve just started to scratch the surface of processing all the pent up emotions from my experiences and traumas. I am not writing this article is not because I am some guru. I’m just a guy who decided to take the first step towards learning more about myself.
Therapy is hard. Being honest and vulnerable is hard. Learning about oneself is hard and deconstructing internalized beliefs about how I should and shouldn’t act or feel, felt…impossible. But Mister Rogers once said, “the greatest gift you ever give is your honest self.” By being vulnerable I have started sharing my greatest gift with myself and others.
So let the tears keep rolling, because emotions are good and I’m worth it.
