Growing up, any emotion but anger was a sign of weakness. My mom was emotionally open and honest, but my dad was suppressed and closed off. I would only express my emotions when I was alone and I would close myself off to anyone else. Turns out, emotional suppression is actually unhealthy. While my body could tolerate it as a kid and young adult, as I got older I started experiencing the physical symptoms of stress and emotional repression like migraines and severe muscle pain in my neck and upper back. I finally began working through this in weekly therapy sessions with a psychologist, but if I had addressed this when I was younger, maybe I could have avoided all that pain in my adult years. I wish I could have used a platform like Quest Depot to talk to someone about my emotions and learn how to express them.
My parents only cared about my grades. I think they may have been depressed while I was growing up. Definitely, no one practiced self-help techniques or knew about them in my family.
