Growing up HSP
When I first heard about the book, "The Highly Sensitive Person", by Elaine Aaron, PhD, I was seriously turned off by the word "sensitive". I think it took me at least a year to be willing to read the book. This is because growing up I had that word hurled at me far too many times to count.
I understand now that non-HSP's have a perspective that has value as well - I'll save that for another blog post. As a child, being told I was "too sensitive" sent the message that there was something fundamentally wrong with me and that the way I was made was a problem. This led to feeling a lot of shame and so I built walls around me and tried to act tough. I also kept to myself a lot so I didn't have to get into situations where my sensitivity might show. I was teased a lot by other kids and adults just rolled their eyes at me or told me I needed to learn to "let things roll off [my] back".
Add to that I had the trauma of my mother passing away from breast cancer when I was 16. Trauma, according to Dr. Aaron, serves to exaggerate sensitivity.
It wasn't until I was about 40 that I read the book and attended a workshop led by Dr. Aaron at Kripalu that I learned that being HSP is also a blessing. The best thing for me was going home from that workshop and telling my then 8(ish) year old son that he was an HSP and when he asked what that meant I told him it stands for "Has Super Powers". I can't even imagine what a difference it would have made for me if my HSP trait had been celebrated. It is a joy to celebrate it with my son. His father is not an HSP and so it's like a special secret we share just between the two of us. My husband is terrific about it - also another blog post.
