This Space Does Not Need Red Ink

On Voice, Vulnerability, and the Weight of Constant Correction

Note: This is a longer post. But if you have ever struggled with feeling picked apart, I hope you find something here that sits with you.

Nothing I say ever seems quite right.
Not growing up. Not now, either.

You would think that once you are grown, it would change. That being an adult would give you more freedom in your words, your thoughts, your choices.

But when you have spent your life being closely critiqued by a parent, the pattern does not just disappear.
The corrections keep coming.
You just get used to them.
You start limiting what you share.
You trim down conversations to safe, surface-level topics. You filter your thoughts, not because you want to, but because you know what is waiting on the other side if you do not.

And that is a hard way to live.

To constantly edit yourself just to avoid criticism.
To feel like no matter how old you are, your words still get held up to someone else’s standards — and usually do not measure up.

Over time, that kind of dynamic takes a toll.
I believe it may even be at the root of some of my self-diagnosed depression.
And I say self-diagnosed because I have never talked to a therapist about it.
Not because I do not believe in therapy — but because I do not trust that I would be completely forthcoming.
I have spent too much of my life being told what I should have said, should have done, should have felt.
I do not want to sit across from someone — even a professional — and brace myself for more of the same.
Will they judge me?
Will they correct me?
Will they tell me how I should fix it, when all I want is for someone to understand why it hurts in the first place?

Because when you have been told repeatedly, directly or indirectly, that your way of thinking, feeling, or reacting is wrong, it affects you.
You start to believe it.
You question yourself constantly. Not because you are unsure, but because you are so used to being made to feel that way.

You want to express yourself, but you hold back.
You want to open up, but you tighten the reins.
You feel something deeply, but you keep it to yourself because you already know what the response will be.

And it is not just the big conversations that get interrupted.
Sometimes, it is something as simple as trying to tell a story.
And before I can even finish the thought, I am being told what I should have done, what I could have said, how I handled it wrong.
It gets so aggravating that I just stop talking.
I do not finish the story. I lose interest in sharing.
Because if the only outcome is critique, what is the point of continuing?

What makes it even harder is that sometimes, I am told I did not say what I should have — only to then be told I should have said what I actually did say… just with different words.
It is like she cannot help but find fault in the specific way I say things, even when the meaning is exactly what she wanted to hear.
That has been especially difficult over the past couple of years.

You see, I had a stroke.
And one of the lingering effects has been language — specifically finding words.
I know what I want to say. I can feel the right word sitting just out of reach in the back of my mind, but sometimes it will not come. So, I choose a simpler word. A more basic version. Just to keep the sentence moving forward.

I have always had an extensive vocabulary — or at least, I used to. Before the stroke.
So when I get corrected now, not for the meaning of what I said, but for not choosing the “right” word… it hits differently.
It makes me feel like I am not as intelligent as I used to be.
Like what I can say is constantly measured against what I used to say — and found lacking.
But the truth is, even before the stroke, I would not have said it "right."
The words may have been more polished back then, but they still would not have been good enough.
The critique was always there — it just has a new angle now.

That dynamic has shaped more than just how I speak out loud.
It has shaped how I speak to myself.

The reason I had such an extensive vocabulary in the first place was because I was always reaching — reaching for the right word, the right tone, the version of the sentence that might get less pushback.
Even now, after the stroke, I still find myself reaching.
Not just to communicate clearly, but to communicate in a way that will not be picked apart.

And when the criticism feels inevitable, it makes me doubt my ability to communicate at all.
It makes me feel like maybe I am not as effective as I once believed I was — or hoped I could be.
It makes me question myself before the words even leave my mouth.

I used to have a safe space.
My grandmother.

It did not matter what I needed to say — if I was angry, frustrated, confused, or even wrong — she let me talk.
She listened.
She did not try to fix it, reword it, or tell me all the things I should have done differently.
She did not treat my feelings like flaws that needed correcting.

She just let me be human.

That kind of space is rare.
And losing it left a void.

Now that she is gone, there is no one who fills that role.
Because the only two people I have ever really opened up to were my mother and my grandmother.

And when I was married, there was my ex-husband.
But what I learned from him — and from the way that relationship ended — was to close off even more.
Because can you ever truly trust anyone with the softest parts of you?
That is another story for another day.

So now, this blog is where I go.
This is the one place where I do not have to worry about being picked apart —
or at least not by someone I know and care about.
Being picked apart by strangers does not bother me. It is the judgment from people close to you — the ones who are supposed to be your soft place to land — that hits different.

Here, I do not have to rewrite my truth for someone else’s comfort.
I do not have to brace myself for “You should have said…” or “You should have done…”

Because honestly, what is the point?
The past already happened.
You cannot rewind it.
Telling someone what they should have done after the fact does not change anything. It just keeps the conversation stuck in rewind.

Sometimes I find myself wondering how that personality formed in the first place.
Because it feels strange and unsettling that this is the way things are with her.

I think about the way I experienced her parents, my grandparents. They were nothing like that.
Gentle. Patient. Supportive.
I know people say that parents treat their grandchildren differently, and maybe that is true.
But if constant correction had been part of their personality, I believe I would have seen it.

So, I wonder what it was like in that household when she was a child.
What shaped her into someone who cannot help but point out every flaw?
Was it something she learned? Or something she never unlearned?

I do not know the answers.
But I know how it feels to be on the receiving end of it now. And I know I do not want to repeat it.

And if I am being completely honest, I catch myself doing it sometimes.

That same urge.
Wanting to tell someone what I would have done.
What I think they should have said.

It sneaks up on me, even when I mean well.
I feel the words forming — the suggestion, the correction — and I have to stop myself.
Take a breath. Smile. Nod. Let it go.

Because I know how it feels to be corrected when you are just trying to be heard.
I know how heavy it gets when everything you say is filtered through someone else’s idea of what is better.
And I do not want to pass that weight on to anyone else.

It is a fight sometimes.
To break habits that were handed to you like inheritance.
But I am trying.
Because someone must decide that the cycle ends here.

What am I writing here?
This is still a performance in some ways.
Because the truth is, I always feel like I am performing.
There is a version of me that exists only in my head — the unfiltered one. The version that never made it to the surface because it never felt safe to bring her out.

I think I have been editing myself my entire life.
Even now, I play out conversations in my head and rehearse what to say — not to express myself better, but to reduce the chances of being criticized.
And when it comes to vulnerability, my default assumption is that people judge.
So I just do not share it.

Does writing help?
Maybe.
But I do not know that it loosens the hold.
Because I am still there — in that space.
This may be an outlet, but when it comes to real communication, I am still guarded.
I still hold back more than I share.
There is always a part of me measuring my words, rehearsing, reconsidering, retreating.

As I write all of this, I realize how it might come across.
I do not want it to sound like I am bashing or disrespecting my mother.
That is not what this is. That is not who I am.

This topic — the experience of having an overly critical parent — came to mind, and once I started writing, the words just flowed.
Because this has lived in me for a long time. Quietly. Heavily.

I respect her.
That is actually part of why I have kept so many of these thoughts to myself.
Out of love. Out of loyalty. Out of not wanting to seem ungrateful or make her the villain in my story.

But today, I needed to purge.
Not to blame — but to breathe.
Not to accuse — but to acknowledge.

Writing this does not mean I do not love her.
It means I am learning to love myself, too — enough to name the things that shaped me, even the ones that still ache.

One of those things I am still working my way up to is writing about my father.
I do not talk about him much. For a while, when I was a child, I almost forgot he existed.
My parents divorced when I was very young, and he chose to keep his distance until I was a teenager.
That absence shaped more than I have ever said out loud.
And when I am ready, there will be a post about that too.

Because yes, I want to be honest.
Yes, I want to let more of it out.
But I also want to protect the parts of me that are still healing.
And right now, that means holding some of it close.

I will work up to the rest in my own time.
And for now, that is enough.

Maybe there is still more I need to say.
More I have not fully faced.
Maybe this is just the first layer being peeled back.
But even if I never write the rest out loud, today I said this.
And that is a start.

If you made it to the end, thank you. I hope something in these words helped you feel a little less alone.