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My son called me last week.
Thirty-two years old, successful, married, good job.
But he was crying on the phone about something that happened at work.
Twenty years ago, I would’ve told him to toughen up. Stop being so sensitive. Get over it.
Instead, I just listened.
Took me sixty-four years to learn how to do that.
You know what’s funny? My old man would’ve called my son soft.
Hell, he called me soft plenty of times.
But sitting here now, I’m starting to think maybe my kid isn’t too sensitive.
Maybe he’s just brave enough to feel things my generation never could.
The generation that couldn’t feel anything
Growing up in my house, men had three emotional settings: fine, angry, and drunk. That was it.
My father came home tired every night from the pipe-fitting job, coached CYO basketball on weekends, and never once talked about how he felt about anything.
We thought that was strength.
Turns out it was just silence dressed up as strength.
Research shows that children’s perceptions of parental emotional neglect are associated with future psychopathology.
In plain English? All that “tough it out” parenting messes kids up.
But we didn’t know that.
We just knew that feelings were for women and kids.
Real men pushed through. Real men didn’t cry. Real men sure as hell didn’t need therapy.
So when our kids came along and started talking about their feelings, asking for help, going to counseling—we didn’t know what to make of it.
Were we raising a generation of softies? Or were they onto something we missed?
What “too sensitive” really means
Here’s what hit me like a brick last year.
When I complain that my kids are too sensitive, what I’m really saying is they feel things I never let myself feel.
They cry when they’re sad.
I learned to swallow it.
They ask for help when they’re overwhelmed.
I learned to tough it out alone.
They talk about anxiety and depression like it’s normal.
I learned to pretend those things didn’t exist.
Jean Van’t Hul puts it perfectly: “You’re too sensitive” is probably the most damaging phrase of all, and it’s the one I heard constantly growing up.”
Think about that.
Every time we tell our kids they’re too sensitive, we’re basically telling them their feelings are wrong.
That the way they experience the world is broken.
That they should stuff it down like we did.
The cost of emotional suppression
You want to know what keeping everything bottled up gets you? I’ll tell you.
My buddy Mike, tough as nails, never talked about anything real.
Had a heart attack at fifty-eight.
Doctor asked him about stress.
Mike said he didn’t have any.
His wife laughed out loud in the exam room.
My neighbor Frank, another tough guy from the old neighborhood.
His kids barely talk to him now.
Not because he was mean.
Because he was absent.
Physically there, emotionally checked out.
Studies show that parental emotional suppression can negatively affect both parents’ and children’s physiological responses and interaction quality, potentially compromising children’s emotional development.
You know what that means?
When we shut down our feelings, we’re not just hurting ourselves.
We’re messing up our kids too.
I spent years believing my sons didn’t need a dad who asked how they were feeling.
They needed a drill sergeant.
Someone to toughen them up for the real world.
Turns out I had it backwards.
When sensitivity is actually strength
My youngest son works in tech now.
Makes good money, has a nice apartment.
But what impresses me most?
He knows when he needs a break.
He talks to a therapist.
He tells his girlfriend when something’s bothering him.
Is he sensitive? Yeah, probably.
Is he also healthier than I was at his age? Absolutely.
Authentic Living Therapy explains: “When parents have low emotional tolerance, they may frequently dismiss or invalidate their child’s feelings.
Statements like ‘You’re being too sensitive’ or ‘You shouldn’t feel that way’ can make the child feel unsupported and misunderstood, which can hinder their ability to express and process their emotions healthily.”
That’s exactly what happened in my generation.
We got told to stop feeling so much, so we stopped feeling at all.
Then we wondered why we couldn’t connect with our kids, our wives, ourselves.
Learning to feel at sixty-four
Unlearning a lifetime of emotional shutdown is the hardest project I’ve ever taken on.
Harder than starting my business.
Harder than any job site I ever worked.
Started with small things.
Telling my wife when something bothered me instead of just getting quiet.
Calling my sons to talk, not just to check if they needed anything fixed.
Writing in this journal instead of keeping everything locked up in my head.
Research from Stanford shows that parental emotional neglect during childhood can lead to difficulties in emotional regulation in adulthood, affecting both personal well-being and parenting styles.
That’s three generations right there.
My old man couldn’t feel, so I couldn’t feel, so I almost passed it on to my kids.
Thank God they were brave enough to break the pattern.
What safe looks like
Know how I know my kids feel safe with me now?
They call when things go wrong.
Not just when they need money or help moving.
When they’re scared. When they’re sad. When they don’t know what to do.
My father never got those calls from me.
I never felt safe enough to make them.
Francesca Lionetti, a developmental psychologist, found that highly sensitive children are at greater risk to develop behavioural problems than less sensitive children when experiencing harsh or permissive parenting.
But here’s the flip side—when those sensitive kids feel safe and supported, they thrive.
They become the adults who can navigate emotions, build real relationships, ask for help when they need it.
Bottom line
If your kids seem too sensitive, maybe ask yourself this: what am I not letting myself feel?
What emotions did I have to shut down to survive my childhood?
What would it look like if I felt safe enough to feel those things now?
Because maybe, just maybe, your kids aren’t too sensitive.
Maybe they’re showing you what it looks like when someone feels safe enough to be human.
When someone trusts that their feelings matter.
When someone believes they won’t be shamed for having emotions.
That’s not weakness.
That’s what healing looks like.
And if a sixty-four-year-old retired electrician can figure that out, anyone can.
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