Against the descriptor "oversensitive"

Beginning to celebrate sensitivity

Have you ever heard of a Highly Sensitive Person (a so-called “HSP”)? I hadn’t until just a couple years ago, when I was already in my early thirties. This surprises me, given that I myself am such a textbook example, such a pristine specimen, such an archetype of the species. I found out about the term because it was mentioned as an aside in a women’s health book I was reading. As I read the brief description of HSPs I felt a cold shock of recognition, like I was a cat reading about cats for the first time. I rushed to Google where I quickly found a self-test:

Are you easily overwhelmed by such things as bright lights, strong smells, coarse fabrics, or sirens nearby?

Do you make a point of avoiding violent movies and TV shows?

Are you particularly sensitive to the affects of caffeine?

Do you try hard to avoid making mistakes or forgetting things?

The list went on, each item bringing to mind a montage of life events: all the times I watched something too violent and felt like someone had raked over my nervous system with a metal rake, the times I drank coffee at noon and couldn’t fall asleep that night, my constant readjusting of lights in my home, my aversion to wool directly on my skin, my high school reputation for having a back that was so sensitive that even a normal pat on the back would hurt me, and so on. (If you are reading this and feeling interested or familiar, head over to the self-test here.)

The website described HSPs as people whose nervous systems are more sensitive to all stimuli. We take in more information and process it more deeply. The result is that we both notice more about the world around us, and also become overwhelmed more quickly from stimuli that others would find completely tolerable. With even just this small window into the workings of myself, I felt transformed from something broken into something interesting.