How to be less sensitive?

[Ohug]

I'm too sensitive, and need some strategies, tips, something/anything to be less sensitive. Anyone confronting me about anything = hurt feelings, being defensive, tears, and beating myself up. Even when it should be constructive, I'm just sensitive and hurt. I'm on antidepressants, I wanted them to turn off my feelings, but all I got was fat and still sensitive.

Any help is appreciated.

 

[Utufo]

I hope you get some answers. I feel the same way.

 

[Femili]

My therapist always says there's nothing wrong with being sensitive.

I am the same way. With time I am starting to use my sensitivity to my advantage. Instead of trying to beat yourself up or shut yourself down, try to live with it? Like if you did something or said something that you think makes you sensitive, so what? Just let it be. You and your sensitivity deserve to be in this world just as much as anyone else.

 

[Ena]

My therapist always says there's nothing wrong with being sensitive.

I am the same way. With time I am starting to use...

Oops, not sure what happened there.

How do you use your sensitivity to your advantage?

 

[Ogah]

It depends what you mean by too sensitive. Being sensitive to the moods of others is a survival skill. It gives us advance warning to threats, makes us team players and good leaders. Being sensitive means we read others well.

If you mean you are easily hurt by others that has more to do with lack of self esteem. As a long ago friend once said, "Its about who didn't love you the way you needed to be loved".

And I hear you on the antidepressants making you fat bit. I wanted to eat all the things.

 

[Fuce]

It depends what you mean by too sensitive. Being sensitive to the moods of others is a survival skill. It gives us advance warning to threats, makes us team players and good leaders. Being sensitive means we read others well.

I agree, it's definitely ONE advantage of having PTSD!!!

 

[Etij]

Well, I started on a low dose of what I take and I asked my psychiatrist to double it, and she did. ( I was just getting massive headaches and I knew one wasn't enough) You might need to talk to your psychiatrist about the anti-depressant you take. I work out for an hour every night and I wear a size 6. But, the main reason for my post is I think you need to think about your medication and also I feel a lot like you, but to get my momentum going ( like normal people) I have to build it first. Then I feel, what I need my body to feel, everyday. I have to engage my body to my brain first, it's not the other way around.

Take it a step at a time. It's not any different from anyone really. Put your your right foot out and see if your left foot doesn't follow. That's under the assumption that you can exercise. Now- exercising is like washing the dishes to me. It's part of my day.

 

[Obize]

You might find this thread an interesting read:

Criticism - Is It Them Or You?

 

[Aheje]

There is nothing "wrong" with being inordinately sensitive... provided there is a counterbalance so as not to skew off and unnecessarily disturb ourselves by taking on other people's stuff.

The way I figure it, I already have one foot in a hole. It's easier to get out of a hole if I don't pile up weight of people and situations on my own shoulders.

 

[Abufes]

I feel all the feels, of me and everyone else, so incredibly deeply it can easily overwhelm me at times. Learning what was mine and what was rooted elsewhere was a bit tricky for a while, as it all seems so tightly woven, especially while immersed and trying to stay afloat.

I like the taking the body to meet the brain concept mentioned above. If I wait around for my brain to initiate the momentum for the day, I'll likely be waiting a while, then I'll have a hell of a thought ditch to dig out of. If I encourage and make myself tend to my daily exercise motions first thing upon waking, I seem to get a much healthier groove going overall.

My body has total say over what the pains-of-the-day will allow it to do, however, so I must remain super mindful of what I choose to fuel it with and how I go about moving it, trying not to create more issues than what I am helping. Still in search of the ability to find and maintain that healthy balance I keep hearing so much about.

 

[Adubut]

Perhaps you aren't too sensitive. There could be a rhyme and reason to why you respond the way you do when confronted with criticism, even if constructive. Maybe try listening to what your mind is saying when you feel hurt, to see if you can work out why -- and from there you might be able to determine whether it is a hurt from something you picked up that the other communicating party wasn't intending/was not aware of, or whether it brought up a hurt from the past, or whether you are simply feeling more feelings on that particular day & overwhelmed with processing them already.
Take really good care. Sending gentleness. :)

 

[Gijopo]

Hi all,

Thanks for your replies. To answer some questions, I am sensitive to the moods and emotions of others, but that's not the sensitive I'm asking about. It's more that I'm so quickly and easily upset by others. I know my kneejerk reaction is to be upset, so I don't act on it, but it's there regardless and I want it gone. I just don't know how to minimize or eliminate it. I really expected the antidepressants to help numb or regulate it, but I just gained 35 pounds and am still overly sensitive. And yes, I exercise. A lot. And I'm still 35 pounds heavier than I was before I started the meds. Ugh! So back to my original question, how do I tame the oversensitivity?

OP