Super Sensitive

I was at work the other day and there happened to be this speaker that came to talk about distracted driving.  Now I didn't happen to make it to the presentation myself, but I was talking with a male co-worker, father of three, after the presentation and he was telling me all about it.  The speaker went on and told some great stories to our student about the dangers of driving while distracted, gave statistics, etc.  But then came the whammy.  Her son was killed in a car accident where the driver was being pressured to drive quickly, he wasn't wearing a seat belt, and his story came to a tragic end.  The teacher and I both agreed that the story was heart breaking, but what we most agreed on was the fact that when you become a parent something gets turned on inside you that makes you highly sensitive to hearing stories where there are kids involved. 

I've always had a great imagination.  Heck, I'm an only child who had more imaginary friends than I care to admit.  Of course I have a good imagination.  When I read a story, I start channeling Picasso and get busy painting that picture.  I also tend to be a little on the passionate side. When I read a story about injustice or the like I tend to get a little excited.  Can you tell I'm downplaying that a bit.  Yeah I get really excited.  This combination was problematic enough and led me to turn off the nightly news before going to bed.  Then eight years ago we threw in the cherry on top by becoming a Mother.  If you couldn't tell from my other posts, my family is my life.  So when I read a story in the paper or hear a story on the news about a child being hurt or killed, my heart hurts. But it's not just a sympathetic 'ah that's too bad kind of hurt'.  It's a pain that is indescribable.  It's the same pain you feel when you look at your child and know you can't make them feel better.  Or the pain you feel when they are crying out your name and even if you're choosing to ignore it, the ache is still there.  As my co-worker so perfectly stated, "something just happens the second you have a child, you just feel more." 

I'll be perfectly honest there are some days I would love to turn this "feel feature" off.  I love that my heart is bursting each time I set eyes on or even think about my three little people.  But balancing all that love with all the scary stuff going on in the world can just turn a persons heart inside out.  I think that heightened "feel feature" might just be one of those perks of being a parent that no one mentions because it's kind of not a perk.  It's just something that you take along with the job because the rest of the gig is so awesome.