The Lump in My Throat

When I have something important to me that I want to share, I have a hard time talking when I feel I'm not being listened to. I used to keep trying with a person, no matter how evasive or distracted they seemed to be.  This lead to frustration, and even hurt, on both sides. Eventually, I started attempting two or three times in a single conversation. If after that I still didn't feel heard (when I was truly hoping to share something that matters to me), I'd just accept that the other person wasn't presently in a listening kind of place, and keep my thoughts to myself, saving them for a different situation.

Occasionally, one subject arises which I have a deep need to talk about, so I'll try with multiple people, multiple times, to bring it up. And often, I'll be able find someone who is ready to listen for a little while or a long while, and the words get spoken.

But there are these other times. These times when I try and try and can't find the right ears, the right heart, to actually listen. Or the words are slippery and I have no idea what it is I need to say, and I feel guilty to just keep talking without a direction I'm headed in, while someone sits by. Sometimes I am not willing to speak because my emotions are too untidy for me to look at, or too heavy to share. Or I don't want to make the effort to put myself out there a little, or whatever. I just don't always find the ears.

I have made the choice, on multiple occasions, to hold inside what would probably would have been better said aloud, even if it just helped me. I'll be honest here: I've cut off ties of communication with pretty much any possible important category of person by judging them for not being willing or able to listen, whether temporarily or permanently. You know--family. Friends. Ecclesiastical leaders. Roommates. Boyfriends. Co-workers. What are the other categories? Whatever they are, they probably have at least one representative that I could think of. And oh yeah, God too. I've avoided talking to Him on anything more than a superficial level hundreds more times than I care to admit.

When this happens, a lump forms in my throat, a lump which can last from hours, to days, to weeks, months, or years. It's an actual physical sensation: a tightness, an unpleasant tingle. A throat-constricted, stomach-churning, hard-to-breathe, bile-tasting pressure in my mouth. Those are the worst times, of course. There are all kinds of degrees, and being frank, sometimes it builds up for a while before I notice it because I so automatically hold in what I want to say. And I hold it in out of anger, out of a twisted sense of revenge or punishment for those who aren't listening the way I wanted, when I wanted.

It's kind of a ridiculous internal temper-tantrum, actually. The one thing I get most offended about, most often, most easily.


I want to let this pattern go. I want to take it less personally, for one, because it usually isn't. We just get busy with our own stuff--as evidenced with this very preoccupation, haha!

I want to have a different knee-jerk reaction when I'm not feeling heard. Maybe instead of clamming up and feeling superior or hurt or hateful, I could learn to say something like, "Hey, I have something I wanted to share with you. Do you have a few minutes for me to do that?" Often, we just don't know that the other person has a item they want to discuss.

And definitely, I want to be more forgiving, not only toward others who unintentionally don't hear, (because I could use a whole heaping helping of that!!) but towards myself, too. To recognize and be forgiving of this weakness that has developed in me. To acknowledge that there are reasons I've learned to hold it in, and to acknowledge that it will take me a little time and practice to learn a better way. To say to myself, "Hey, we're all still learning. It's ok to start from here--it's not where you're going to end up."


"The ears are the door to the heart." -Voltaire