Everybody goes though tough times in their lives. Everybody has different experiences. When we tell our stories to other people, do they really understand what we’ve been through and what it felt like to live through those times? Even if the situation is similar, can we still say to the other person, “I know how you feel?” Sometimes I feel like the feelings that someone feels during those tough times will never be fully understood by the person they tell their story to. Even if the person says “you won’t know until you go through it yourself.” I still feel like every person is different and would handle any situation differently. No two people are alike. Someone can say “I know how you feel” to a certain extent but in reality, there is more to it than that.

I am a person who feels things deeply and emotionally to the point of physicality, if you get what I mean. The things that I’ve been through have been nothing short of my version of hell. I mentally and physically felt every inch of pain that came along during those times. For example, I would walk into a home goods store and in the kitchen section, there would be knives on display. I could feel the knives cut through my skin as if it was actually cutting me that I had to run out of the store. I haven’t gone back into that store since then. Aside from all that, all the emotional and mental challenges that I had to go through at the same time didn’t help. I told people how I felt and let them know what I was going through in order to help figure out how to take care of me, or at least that’s what I thought I was doing. But I never expected anyone to fully understand what it was I was going through because I couldn’t understand it myself.

So with that being said, for someone to tell me “now I know how you felt,” it makes me question, what exactly do you think you were feeling that you think was the same as mine? These are two completely different situations that have nothing to do with each other. Sure you felt one type of emotion that I had mentioned before, but it still is not the same thing.

People need to understand their circumstances and situations before they start comparing it to others, especially to those related to mental illness. We may share our stories, but no one will ever fully understand what we have been through or what we are going through.