Too Everything: Reclaiming the Parts They Tried to Tame

By Michelle Labine May 4, 2025

For so many late-diagnosed or self-identified Autistic women, the story doesn’t begin with understanding. It begins with being misunderstood.

We weren’t seen clearly, not in the way we needed. Instead, we were labeled.
Too sensitive. Too emotional. Too intense. Too reactive. Too much.

Sometimes it was said out loud. Sometimes it was implied.
Sometimes it came in the form of eye rolls, sighs, comments that stuck.
Sometimes it came in silence. In the way people slowly withdrew.

And so, we learned to doubt ourselves. We learned to perform ease.
We learned to carry ourselves more carefully—less visibly. We adapted.

And we did it for years without realizing what it was costing us.

When “Too Much” Was All They Could See

I was labeled moody from a young age. Not necessarily in harsh words—but in the way my fluctuations were met. I’d be full of energy, engaged and expressive one moment, and then quiet, withdrawn, shut down the next.

What no one saw was the build-up—the sensory and emotional saturation underneath.

After a full school day, socializing, bright lights, shifting expectations, I’d come home and crash. I needed silence. I needed space. But what I received was confusion or criticism. I was told I needed to “watch my tone,” to “lighten up,” to “stop overreacting.” And in those moments, I internalized the idea that I was wrong for feeling what I felt.

That pattern followed me.

Later in life, I’d give 100%—at work, in relationships, in caregiving, in every space I occupied. I’d push and perform and hold it all together, until I hit a wall. Then I’d retreat—emotionally, physically, mentally. I’d burn out, crash, disappear for a while, and then start all over again.

I thought this was a flaw in my personality. That I wasn’t resilient enough. That I just couldn’t “keep up.”
Now I know it was burnout.
Now I know it was self-abandonment.

The Cost of Carrying the “Too Much” Story

When you’re told you’re too emotional or too reactive long enough, you learn to suppress.

You scan your expressions. You hold back your opinions. You walk around with a filter running in the background: Is this okay? Am I too much right now? Do I need to tone it down?

Even joy gets muted—because joy, too, is often “too big.”

We learn to abandon ourselves in real time.
We learn to make ourselves easier to be around.
And we often burn out—not just from external demands, but from the chronic effort of managing ourselves for the comfort of others.

What I Know Now

What I’ve come to understand—through my own late discovery, and through sitting across from other women on this path—is this:

What the world labeled as too much was actually attunement.
What was called moodiness was often the body’s cry for rest.
What was seen as emotional overreaction was deep sensitivity meeting a world that moved too fast, too loud, too carelessly.

I wasn’t unstable. I wasn’t fragile. I was deeply responsive.
And I had no language to explain that. No permission to honour it.

Now, I give myself that permission.

Reclaiming Our Emotional World

There is so much power in unlearning the shame around our emotional life.

We get to reclaim our sensitivity as wisdom.
We get to honour our intensity as presence.
We get to soften the edges that hardened from years of correction.

Late diagnosis doesn’t erase the labels we’ve carried—but it offers something else:
A chance to see ourselves clearly.
A chance to respond with compassion instead of critique.
A chance to say, Of course I felt that way. That makes sense now.

Because what we’ve been told was too much was often just… real.

You’re Not Too Much. You’re Just Uncontained.

And uncontained is not the same as chaotic. It’s not wrong. It’s not something to fix.

You feel deeply because you notice deeply.
You care deeply because you connect deeply.
You need space because your system is asking for recovery—not because you’re unreliable.

You are not too much. You were never too much.
You were simply never met with enough understanding.

And now, you get to meet yourself differently.

• What emotional labels did I internalize growing up?
• Where have I learned to suppress or edit myself emotionally?
• What do I feel ready to reclaim?
• What does emotional permission mean to me now?