Some wounds don’t come from cuts or cruel words—they come from silence. It’s the kind of pain that lingers in the spaces where you once expected warmth and understanding but found only emptiness. It’s what happens when you finally let someone in, muster the courage to share even a piece of what weighs on your heart, only to be met with indifference. Dismissal. Deflection. Gaslighting. A casual shrug, a change of topic, a comparison, or worst of all—the realization that you were never truly heard.

And suddenly, you regret everything.

You regret opening up. You regret thinking that maybe, just maybe, someone would understand. You regret giving them access to a part of you that you usually keep hidden behind walls you spent years building. And the worst part? You start blaming yourself, wondering if you were too much, if you misread the moment, if you should’ve just swallowed the words and kept them locked away where they were safe.

But the truth is, the mistake wasn’t in speaking. It wasn’t in being vulnerable. It wasn’t in trusting. The mistake, if there even was one, was in believing that every person is capable of holding space for you the way you would for them. Because not everyone is.

So what do you do when this happens?

Don’t rush to dismiss it, don’t gaslight yourself into thinking it’s not a big deal. It is a big deal. Vulnerability takes courage, and when that courage is met with indifference, it hurts. You don’t have to pretend it doesn’t. Sit with it, acknowledge it, name it. Healing begins with honesty, even with yourself.

It’s easy to take dismissal personally, to think, “Maybe my feelings aren’t important. Maybe I’m overreacting. Maybe I’m just hard to love.” But that’s not the truth. Some people lack the emotional depth to handle real conversations, and others are too absorbed in their own world to notice when someone else is struggling. Their inability to show up for you doesn’t mean you were wrong to reach out. It means they weren’t the right person to reach toward.

I know how tempting it is to retreat, to promise yourself that you’ll never open up again, that you’ll just deal with everything alone like you always have. But isolation isn’t the answer. The world is full of people; real, deep, compassionate people who will listen, who will care, who will remind you that your feelings are valid. You just haven’t met all of them yet.

If the world fails to hold your emotions, then you must hold them yourself. Write them down, speak them aloud, give them the attention they deserve. Just because someone dismissed your pain doesn’t mean it’s not real. You don’t need their validation to know that what you feel matters.

I wish I could say this won’t happen again, that every person you open up to from now on will listen and understand. But life doesn’t work that way. Some people will disappoint you. Some will make you feel invisible. But some, some will surprise you in the best possible way.

So don’t shut down. Don’t let one painful experience define all future ones. Your voice is worth hearing. Your feelings are worth holding. And you are worth understanding, even if, right now, it feels like no one does.