What do you avoid showing to people?

I hide when I'm sad.

I'm comfortable and eloquent at expressing all of my emotions (frustration, pride, happiness, love etc) but usually stop short of mentioning my hurt to anyone.

I know sometimes they'd want to hear it. And my smarter friends will, of course, noticevwhen I'm more guarded than usual. Sometimes with my SO I'd make wounded-puppy eyes when he knows i'm being affected by something (like a pet who died), but I always feel I have to keep it light-hearted and be tough and "move on." Sometimes I'd pick more insignificant details to be sad about (like roadkill we saw earlier that day) just to make it easier for me to rationalize away my own feelings before they leak out.

I know it's because I was intensely picked on by my family members during my entire childhood for crying easily and "showing weakness" while still being expected to be a raw loving caring person. So now when things hurt -- when a friend makes an off-color remark, when my boss is an enormous jerk, when there's miscommunication with my SO, when my sibling does assholey things - I will share my frustration or my indignance or my solutions or my complaints -- but it's all very cerebral processes, very filtered for outside viewing.

Hey, at least I don't lack perspective about my problems...

/r/AskWomen Thread