Yes. I was pretty chatty when I was young, but after constantly being told by multiple adults and teachers to stop talking and be quiet, I did. Add on top of that an absent father and an alcoholic mother who would berate me as a child, and I didn’t get my voice back until well into my 20s.

I’m just now learning how to ask and speak up for what I need and want. Decades of being ignored and being told to “roll with it” make it pretty difficult to communicate when it’s something you don’t like or want to do.

I’m almost 35 now and still regularly get told how quiet I am. Working remotely has been so nice because for the longest stretch of my life, I have not had a single person say that to me in nearly a year.