28. Don’t Be Afraid, Just Feel The Pain

Sometimes, enduring the painful thing is the thing we need … even if we don’t want to feel it.

Transcripts may not appear in their final version and are subject to change.

I’m Nora McInerny and it’s going to be okay.

We take a great risk, falling in love. We turn to a person and hand over our raw, beating heart and say “hold onto this for me, will you? Just…hold onto it and please, whatever you do, don’t drop it on the ground and then step on it.”

“why would I step on it?” they might answer, “who would do that?”

“oh, never mind,” we might say out loud, feeling silly for a moment.

I listened to a lot of sad songs as a child, songs about heartbreak and loss, songs that made my heart ache for the way my heart might ache someday. Songs that gave me a sense of what it might feel like to be betrayed, to have someone promise me one thing and do another. Because even people who make their promises with the best of intentions don’t always keep them.

This year, so many people I know have been going through it romantically, and not in the good way. Several people I love woke up one day to the news that the person they loved no longer loved them back. The life they thought they had was not real, and the life they had planned on had just — poof! — evaporated.

Each time, tt was every heartbreaking song ever written all rolled into one, their life seemingly reduced to a series of cliches, every following moment dedicated to picking the scab, pressing the bruise, trying to find reason in the unreasonable, trying to find an answer to the question “What is wrong with ME? Why don’t they want ME?”

When it comes to the people I love, the answer to that question is always going to be “because they have terrible taste, that’s why!” And I do say that and I do mean it but that other question…what is wrong with me?

There is nothing wrong with you. I mean, there is nothing so wrong with you that would make another person stepping on your heart reasonable or excusable.

There is nothing wrong with you for feeling scared when something scary happens, for being hurt when someone hurts you.

There is nothing wrong with you for being wrecked by the wrecking ball.

If it hurts, let it hurt.

A child I know who has also heard a lot of sad love songs wrote one themselves, and while I do not know the tune, the lyrics are worth hearing and remembering, and telling to ourselves as many times as we need to hear them.

Don’t be afraid,

just feel the pain.

If love drains from your body and blood washes from your veins,

don’t be afraid,

just feel the pain.

Don’t be afraid,

just feel the pain.

If someone you loved left you,

and someone closed the door,

don’t walk away,

just feel the pain.

Don’t walk away,

just feel the pain.”

This episode feels sadder than I want it to be, and I don’t want to make you sad, that’s the opposite of what this show is supposed to do! But these words from a little kid remind me that sometimes, even when it’s the hardest thing in the world to believe… the thing that is going to be okay…is YOU.

CREDITS

It’s Going to Be Okay was written and recorded by me, Nora McInerny, in my office. We are a production of feelings & co, an independent podcast production company that also brought you terrible, thanks for asking.

What’s going to be okay? I don’t know, it changes every day. But I want to know what YOU think it is. Call us at 612.568.4441 or email me at [email protected]

Our team is Marcel Malekebu, Jordan Turgeon, Megan Palmer, Claire Mcinerny, Eugene Kidd and Larissa Witcher.

You can find this and all our other work online at feelingsand.co