I don’t really know what my first memory of sadness is. Not in a clear, defined image anyway. But I do know that sadness was present… often. I remember the feeling of not being accepted, not being seen. The shame that wrapped around me when others laughed at me. It wasn’t just one moment, it was many. Sometimes I think fear swallowed the sadness whole, like it took over so strongly that I didn’t even have space to acknowledge how sad I actually was.

In my childhood, sadness wasn’t something that was met with comfort. If I cried, it was usually behind closed doors, alone. There wasn’t really much soothing or holding space in my environment. My mom had her own struggles, and my brother was not the easiest child to raise, so I didn’t want to add to her burdens. I kept it in. I stayed quiet. I cried when no one was looking. I swallowed the lump in my throat and carried on. Tears weren’t welcome in my house, they were often met with anger, raised voices, or being told I was just seeking attention. And I think that belief, that my sadness is a problem, stayed with me for a long time.

Even my childhood friendships, though they had sweetness, couldn’t always hold my heaviness and I get it. Who wants to hang out with someone who’s always sad? Even if that sadness is quietly sitting in the corner, trying not to spill out.

Sadness, for a long time, felt like weakness. It was the wrong answer to everything happening inside or around me. But I was emotional. I always have been. I wanted to cry often. And for many years, I did, alone. Eventually, I made the decision to re-learn my relationship with sadness. I told myself that crying is not only okay, it’s healing. I started to dismantle that old belief that tears are shameful. That expressing my truth is somehow offensive. I don’t know where I got that idea from, but it was deeply rooted, that my reactions, my feelings, would somehow hurt or inconvenience others.

I still feel that sometimes in my relationship. My partner isn’t the most emotionally expressive person, and sometimes I wonder if I’m too much. But I’ve been slowly learning to speak my sadness out loud. To simply say: “I feel sad today.” And to allow myself to feel it without fixing it immediately. I’ve realized that holding it in only makes it worse. So now, when sadness comes, I lie down and let myself feel it. I let myself spiral a little, if I need to. I let myself imagine worst-case scenarios, cry it out, and then… I slowly return. I talk to myself gently. I remind myself that not everything is as hopeless as it seems. That I’ve survived sadness before.

My body reacts strongly to sadness. I get tired. My limbs feel heavy. I don’t want to talk to anyone. I get irritated quickly and cry even quicker. In my darkest moments, I’ve spent days in bed, getting up only to eat or go to the bathroom. It feels like drowning in thick fog.

Sometimes I still feel sadness about how much I missed out on because of depression and social anxiety. I wonder who I could’ve become if I didn’t have those weights dragging me down for so long. I think about all the things I want from life, acting, creating, maybe even being more public online and then fear creeps in. Fear that I’m not good enough, that people are cruel, that I’m too sensitive for this world. That fear is heavy, and it wraps itself around my sadness like a blanket I didn’t ask for.

But maybe this fear, and this sadness, are teaching me something too. To believe in myself. To keep going. To hold my head up, even when it shakes. That even through sadness, and fear, and pain, I can create something beautiful. Something meaningful. Something that someone else might read and whisper: me too.

I’ve learned to sit with my sadness now. To name it. To not justify it or explain it away. Sometimes I don’t even know why I feel sad, but I let myself feel it anyway. I scroll, I write, I cry. I scream into a pillow. And then, something soft happens, I feel lighter. My chest opens. My breath deepens. My body whispers, “Thank you for letting me be.”

Right now, I’m okay. Not sad in a crushing way. Just floating in a neutral space, building my little online sanctuary. Sometimes I do feel a little sad when I post something and the likes or views don’t match the effort I put in. But I gently remind myself: this is part of the process. It will come. My job is to keep creating, keep showing up, keep nurturing this space like a garden. The flowers will bloom in their own time.

I think sadness shaped me more than I’d like to admit. It carved out a deep empathy in me. Even if I sometimes come off cold or distant (hello, Capricorn rising), I feel so much. I sense others’ sadness in a way that goes beyond words. I think being submerged in the depths of my own emotions has taught me how to hold space for others, how to be a lighthouse when someone else is drifting.

I no longer see sadness as a burden. I see it as part of being human. A companion in the ocean of feelings. Sometimes painful, sometimes sacred. Sometimes both. But always real.