I am not good with big emotions; either my own or other peoples. In childhood I suppose I learned that to be acceptable to my family and friends I had to hide my sensitive side and get on with being 'okay'. That made everyone else happy so that is what I did.

Currently I am surrounded by big emotions and struggling to let myself and others feel them - my anxiety and need to be in control are sky rocketing.

I have a new baby and a three year old who feels everything big (as toddlers do). I worry about passing my anxieties on to them and am being forced to learn to let them feel things no matter how hard I find it - it is really not about me after all. I will admit to being bad at this, often I am trying to parent from an emotional place and, big surprise, finding that no one gets what they need. I want to parent from a place of peace and confidence - I wish I knew how to find that place.

Also, my mum is currently in a hospice, she is not likely to return home and I know we do not have much time left. Along with my siblings, I am trying to find a balance between being strong, reassuring, loving and sad. Again, giving other people the space to feel their big feelings without trying to 'help' is a challenge. I would rather bare misery myself than to ever see my sister cry but that would not help her (or me) so I have to be okay seeing her pain - it is hers and I have no right to minimise it even with the best of intentions. We have to figure out how to help each other, I have to learn to ask for and accept help or the emotional crash when all the 'doing' is done and real life resumes will be huge.

I know I have to find a new approach to my feelings, I have developed some very unhealthy practices in recent years as coping mechanisms which are now under the microscope and are also no longer effective. I hide, I withdraw and I say 'I'm fine' when I am not.

I find change hard but change is the only option now. Life is changing whether I go with it or fight it - I'd rather go gently but it's not really my nature.

How can you change a habit which has become part of your identity?

Fran

A moodscope member.