The Sensitive Soul’s Guide to Doing the Dishes: How to Thrive When the World Feels Like Too Damn Much

Content in this chapter may be triggering for individuals struggling with depression or suicidal thoughts. Please make the best choice for your safety and comfort.

Before I started my most recent round of antidepressants — I had tried them in the past, and besides the weight gain and loss of libido, hadn’t noticed much difference — I had slipped into a place of feeling irritable, avoidant, and so sensitive that I would end most days in my darkened bedroom, lit up only by the Himalayan salt lamp that every 20-something-year-old woman has in the corner of their room, blasting brown noise on my portable and taking deep breaths. By the way, have you ever listened to brown noise before?? It has to be my favorite thing ever, the mumbled whooshing sounds acting like a blur to the sounds of the world. If you struggle with noise sensitivity, I would highly recommend it, though be careful, once you experience it, you may not want to go back!

This was not my normal way of being. I was historically a quite anxious, bubbly, energetic, nervous, upbeat person, who loved working on new projects, meeting friends for coffee, and chronically worried if my loved ones were mad at me. I hadn’t known what had changed exactly, but I slowly began to feel more and more overwhelmed, the smallest tasks of everyday feeling like huge and taxing demands. The nightly pile of dishes felt less like an everyday chore that was the mundane consequence of making dinner, but more like a sinister amorphous blob, staring at me, mocking me, reminding me that no matter how many times I did those fucking dishes, they would return, day after day, the reminder that this existential dread I called life would drudge on and on. If this sounds grim and more than just a little dramatic, I understand. But, when you are in the throes of depression, or sensory overwhelm, as I now recognize I was, these seemingly small and ordinary tasks can feel inordinately huge and daunting.

I lived like this for months, spending most of 2022 feeling like a body with no skin, every sound, every touch amplified. While I normally have a lower social battery, needing time to recharge in solitude and preferring smaller, more intimate gatherings with close ones over larger and louder parties, during this time, any interaction with another person left me feeling completely and utterly drained, taking more than just a quiet few hours to recharge, but sometimes needing days to recover. I worked a good, not too demanding job from home, and lived with my sweet and relatively quiet partner and our dog, Norah. I was able to work in my sweatpants and oversized T-shirts, was able to make myself a home-cooked meal instead of stressing over meal prepping, and got to take Norah out for a walk whenever I pleased. On paper, I had an amazing life, lovely and supportive friends, a kind partner, and a wonderful family. So, why did I feel so miserable? Why did just the basic act of living feel so hard?

So, I told Iris that I felt like I was too sensitive. Not in the gaslight-y way that a toxic boyfriend would accuse his partner (you know the type), but in the sense that I was suffering, daily, in a big way because of that physical sensitivity. She would often remind me that my sensitivity was a strength. Because of my greater-than-average sensitivity, I was able to connect with others more deeply, was able to be empathetic to others’ emotions, I was able to intimately understand myself and my experiences, and I was able to access my spirituality more intensely. While this is true, my emotional and maybe even psychic sensitivity came with many perks, this almost crippling sensory sensitivity, didn’t really. I felt more like my anxious rescue dog that flinches at the sound of her nemesis, garbage trucks, driving by and crying when she had to get in the car than I felt like an adult human. And, to me, that is too sensitive.

This is one of my issues with New Age spirituality — and believe me, we will dive into that more later! Toxic positivity is, in short, the belief that positive thinking is the one, right way to approach any situation, even difficult, traumatic, or just plain not okay ones. There is nothing wrong with positive thinking, changing your mindset and focusing on gratitude can be life-changing. But, too much positivity, or the belief that “negative” emotions have no place in our human experience, can lead to invalidating and dismissing the emotions we need to feel in order to heal them and grow. One of the things I have learned from having a mindfulness practice is that no emotion is good or bad, and it certainly doesn’t have “high” or “low” frequency. As one of my favorite authors, Dr. Devon Price, says, “Your needs are value neutral, and your emotions are helpful signals to respond to that don’t merit any shame.” I use this mindset when thinking of emotions, too: your emotions are also value-neutral, pointing us to what we need.

I wish that I had honored this gut feeling that there was something wrong. I don’t mean that there was something wrong with me, but there was something that needed to be addressed. I had a value-neutral need to not be constantly overwhelmed and overstimulated. I had a need to savor my good relationships. I had a need to enjoy my great life. In the very cliché terms of a million self-help blogs: I had a need to transition from surviving to thriving.

I felt confused; I did all the “right” things to take care of myself: I set boundaries against the things that really drained me, didn’t spend too much time on my phone, and ate relatively healthy foods (although, food is another one of those value-neutral things, more on that to come!), went to therapy once a week, journaled every day, and even meditated as often as I could stomach it. I lived in a safe-ish environment — I only heard distant gunshots every couple of days, a safe haven in Albuquerque, New Mexico terms, something that deeply troubles my parents who still live in a rural New Mexican town where the only gunshots heard are ranch related, not crime related. I got up early after my eight-hour slumber and walked Norah or did a workout on the stationary bike we had in our living room, enduring the pain of having the too-small seat wedged in between my ass cheeks for the sake of endorphins that would hopefully cure my mental health. I didn’t make a lot of money, but I was making enough to live more comfortably than I ever had as a poor child in a single-family home (cheers to all the other Dual Income No Kids families out there!). So, why the fuck wasn’t I thriving yet?

Medication felt like the last ditch solution, the solution that you try when literally nothing else is working, and you are at your most rockiest of bottoms. I know I am not alone in that, I also hear many of my friends say some version of the same thing: “I am open to it, I guess, but I want to try everything else possible before I even consider taking medication!” The word medication has a hushed emphasis like it’s a dirty word to even whisper. To many of us, the idea of taking medication is synonymous with declaring to the world, “I am broken! There is something deeply and entirely wrong with me! I am desperate and have given up!”

Not only does the long-standing stigma around mental health contribute to this (how many times have you heard someone refer to psychiatric medicine as crazy pills?), but the spirituality, New Age, and holistic health movement does too. As a certified integrative nutrition health coach and practicing herbalist green witch, I obviously love holistic health. Viewing the body as a full system, using food as medicine, and finding ways to heal ourselves with the world around us is my jam! At the same time, I think these belief systems often perpetuate the narrative that medication and science cannot be trusted, even when it is needed. When I was going back to school to get my coaching certification, the prestigious school had a guest lecturer who shared the dangers of psychiatric medication and how it is one of the worst things you can do for your brain. In fact, as he told us, did you know that simply practicing intricate breathing techniques and walking for twenty minutes a day is as effective as 50 milligrams of Zoloft?

If you’re reading that and calling obvious bullshit, congratulations! To me, I became so frightened by this, by this promise made by one doctor (who had something to sell after this fearmongering, by the way) that I was inevitably fucking my brain up in an irreversible way, despite the innumerable doctors and scientific professionals who had real evidence to the contrary. I was so scared that I vowed to never go on medication unless I absolutely needed to. I told Iris this, and she, unsurprisingly, agreed. Just like toxic Christianity’s slogan is to reject modern medicine and science and turn towards prayer, the New Age philosophy is to appropriate sacred ancient Indian culture and decide to clear our chakras by paying a shaman on Instagram $111 dollars an hour to do the Japanese art of Reiki on us through Zoom after lighting endangered sage bushels they bought from Urban Outfitters.

So, this is what I tried. I hyperventilated with crystals over my belly and forehead, I took daily doses of reishi mushroom powder, I tried psilocybin mushroom capsules from a woman I didn’t know who sold them from her house, and I took Norah on as many walks as I possibly could. Besides this making Norah like me very much, I still wasn’t noticing any difference.

On the night of March 1st, 2023, my twenty-fifth birthday, I came back from my birthday dinner where I had been surrounded by amazing friends and great food (and a particularly stunning frozen margarita), and spent yet another night sobbing. Most nights, as I either curled up crying or zoned out in my dark room surrounded by brown noise, I wondered how long I could live like this. How many days could I possibly spend trying my hardest to just make it to the end of the day? It wasn’t that I wanted to kill myself or die necessarily, it was that I no longer wanted the burden of living.

It was the nightly return of these thoughts, paired with the despair of wondering how to survive the many birthdays I would have to endure still, and the absolutely affronting view of those goddamn fucking dishes staring at me from the sink, that made me realize I had done it: I had reached that rocky bottom that everyone says they will wait for. I wasn’t just an “empath” who needed a positive mindset, I was someone who was severely suffering and taking ashwagandha by the dropper-full, thinking that would be enough to make it go away. There was no denying it: I needed help, and I needed it soon. And what I had been doing was not enough.

On the morning of March 2, I called my primary care physician’s office, a clinic run by the University I worked for, only ten minutes away from me, and asked if I could please schedule an appointment to talk about getting on medication. I got an appointment for that day.

My doctor was a youngish woman, in her late twenties or early thirties, who was completing her residency at the University’s hospital. She was sweet and smart, if not a bit, or maybe a lot, stressed out, and kept her visits short and brief, running from room to room, to see as many patients as the front desk could possibly schedule. She briskly but kindly asked me, “So, you are struggling with your mental health and want to think about medication?”

Wow, so we are coming right out with it, I guess, I thought, shifting in my seat. There was no delicacy with which she said this, but also no hushed tones, or wary, barely veiled judgmental comments about how I was destined to permanently break my brain. This was both somewhat alarming and comforting to me. “Yes,” I answered simply.

She asked me to tell her about my symptoms, which I did, mainly saying that I was extremely irritable, sensitive to most sounds, and easily overwhelmed. She asked me why I was coming in now, as in, what was the catalyst for me wanting help now.

I thought back to my partner’s big, worried eyes as I had tearfully admitted to him last night that I often considered what a relief just not waking up one day would be. I thought of the way he quietly, fearfully, nervously said, “Do you promise you will never kill yourself?” As I promised, he did not look comforted, gnawing at his lower lip. I cleared my throat and said, “Well, I have a good life. I have some life stressors, sure, but overall, I have the life I always dreamed of. But despite that, I am miserable. That doesn’t seem normal.”

My doctor’s demeanor shifted then, her eyes darting to mine, the business-as-usual vibe she had softened. “That sounds very hard,” she simply reflected.

I could feel my eyes moistening. “Yes,” I said again.

Our visit didn’t last much longer after that. She prescribed me Lexapro, a medication I had not yet tried, but knew my best friend had great luck with, and that one of my other best friends had very back luck with. Ah, welcome to the world of medications. She told me about all the possible side effects, showing me a list that she had pulled up on Web MD. (Wait, if doctors get to use Web MD, why aren’t I?) Sitting in the worn chair, I could feel my stomach get nauseated and my head throb just hearing about the side effects. Ah, welcome to the world of anxiety and hypochondria. I called my pharmacy in the parking lot, asking them if they thought maybe the prescription would be filled by the end of the day. A caring and patient man’s voice on the other end told me they would certainly try.

I rewarded myself by visiting my favorite coffee shop and the bookstore next door as I waited for the call back from the pharmacy, eagerly awaiting the update that I could take my brain-destroying Big Pharma pills as soon as possible. I used my free birthday reward and got a free blueberry scone (this was before I quit gluten, sigh), and splurged on buying a book. I usually rent all my books through the library, so buying my own copy of a book feels indulgent and exciting. If anyone is asking, I purchased the queer romance novel, Delilah Green Doesn’t Care by Ashley Herring Blake, and it is fantastic. It had a little notecard by it that announced that it was a Staff Pick, with a handwritten note that said, “Love this!” When I took it to the counter, the girl looked at it and said, “Oh, I love this!” I asked if she had been the one to write the notecard. She was.

Eventually, I got tired of waiting, too nervous to start my new chapter as a medicated person with a new outlook on life to read my book or enjoy my free scone. I went out to the car, mentally made a note that I was promptly mentally lost in the clutter of my car and that I should clean out my car soon, and stared at my phone. As if I had manifested it with my positive, high vibes, as Iris and other white women on social media would say, the phone rang: the pills were ready!

On March 3, I started my Lexapro pills, stomach cramping from the side effects or maybe just from the placebo effect.

I am writing this on April 19, six and a half weeks after starting antidepressants. Despite the doctor saying this was the worst thing I could ever do for my brain, the ol’ brain seems to be chugging along quite nicely. Last night, I cooked dinner with the overhead lights on. The. Overhead. Lights!!! I simply turned off the lights and started cooking without a second thought. Any other neurodivergent, Sensitive Sally knows what a big deal this is. I still wear my noise-canceling headphones all around the house and flinch at abnormally loud trucks that zoom by (as any self-respecting person does, honestly, why do those truck drivers do that? If you are one of these truck people, can you please explain? I promise it doesn’t make you seem cooler if that is why), sound doesn’t cause me to enter a meltdown anymore. The night before last, I was out until 10:30 at night, celebrating my best friend’s birthday — yes, we are Lexapro twins now! That kind of outing, despite how much I loved her, would have caused me to need at least two days of quiet stillness to recover. Instead, I just woke up the next day and casually did the dishes in the sink, and went about my day like normal, like a fucking boss.

I am not saying medication is the cure-all to my mental health. Absolutely not! In fact, it seems like it has opened up the space for to process my feelings that I didn’t have the capacity to before. It’s almost like I went from surviving to… almost thriving?!

If you’re reading this, then I hope:

1. That this made you feel a little less alone. I would have loved to hear someone talk more openly about similar mental health struggles. I also would have loved to hear a spiritual, witchy woman who loves holistic health say that struggling was valid and that my vibes weren’t off, I just needed treatment in a way I wasn’t getting yet.
2. That if you feel emotionally attacked by the mundane to-dos that used to be reasonable for you to handle, like washing the dishes, brushing your teeth, folding your laundry, or going to the store, you take time to think about this. There is nothing wrong with you, and we all have different levels of ability. This may be an indicator that you are really overworked, need support from your community, or there is some self-soothing to do. It may not mean you need to seek medication as I did, but it could be trying to tell you that something needs tending to. For example, my other best friend that did not like Lexapro (I think of us as medication cousins), once told me that when she starts having negative thoughts and feelings about brushing her teeth being representative of how life will never get better, she knows she needs to reach out to her therapist, because “it’s getting bad again.”
3. That you kindly and courteously say “fuck you” to the bullshit surrounding New Age spirituality online or in person. No, you aren’t manifesting a negative life with your “negative” thoughts! No, you don’t need to buy that course on unlocking your divine feminine archetype to create the life you want through your orgasms! No, you don’t need to follow that perfectly curated and expertly crafted reel about routines! And as much as I love the full moon, it’s probably not why you’re having that breakdown, maybe you need to seek professional and qualified support.
4. That above all, you know that your emotions are just letting you know what your needs are, and that your needs are value-neutral. You deserve to meet your needs or reach out to those who can help. Thank you Dr. Devon for these kind of words that I kind of want to tattoo on my lower back. (PS, are tramp stamps still cool? Were they ever cool?)

Xoxo,

Your fellow sensitive soul