When the Taut String Snaps: The Reasonless Tears That Overwhelm Me When I'm Alone

Lately, in unexpected moments, tears start falling for no reason.
When I'm sitting alone on a park bench.
During a break at work.
When I'm lying alone on the sofa at home.
In the passenger seat of a car, when I feel no one's gaze upon me.
Above all, at the end of the day.
The moment I turn off the lights before bed and am left alone in the dark room.

In that space where no one can see me, the moment I am alone,
as if the string of my heart that I had been straining to keep taut until then has suddenly
snapped, tears come gushing out.
After that, I just let the tears flow, quietly, so quietly.
Until now, due to autonomic nervous system imbalances, I've struggled to keep a job for long.
When my physical or mental health was at its worst, there were many times I would quit within a few days or weeks.
I had been working as a part-timer for a while, but I decided to "properly shift my mindset and do my best," and started working as a full-time employee.
To do my best properly.
To stabilize my life.
To avoid taking time off easily or quitting right away,
to force myself to be determined.
It has been one month since I changed jobs.

Although I've had to be absent twice due to poor health,
I was still able to pull myself together and head back to work.
Compared to the me of the past, I think that is truly amazing.
Every day, I am doing my best.
Desperately. Truly, desperately.
And yet.

Even though I'm finally looking forward and doing my best like this, why can't I stop these tears?
There is no definitive reason that immediately comes to mind as "this is what's painful."
However, there is a trait of mine that I suspect.
I am an HSP (Highly Sensitive Person).
I have never been able to honestly speak my mind since I was young,
even if something unpleasant happens at work,
or if someone says something hurtful to me,
I just "grit my teeth" and endure it.
Because I unconsciously keep the strings of my heart pulled to the limit, the moment I am alone, those strings can no longer hold, and my emotions collapse all at once.
And even when my body stopped moving like that,
or when I couldn't go to work, I always thought this:

"This isn't depression. It's just me being spoiled."
Why can't I be normal like everyone else?
What a useless person I am. I'm just weak, just spoiled. That is how I, who should have been the closest person to my own wounded self, kept blaming myself and hurting myself even more.
But, when the tears came gushing out in a place where no one could see me
and wouldn't stop,

I suddenly acknowledged that pain within myself, saying, "I have depression."
I accepted my own heart, saying, "It's not just being spoiled; I was working until my heart was in tatters, to the point of illness."
In that moment, I felt as if the depths of my chest, which had been so taut, became just a little bit lighter.
Admitting the word "depression" might have been scary. But I think it wasn't a word to give up on myself as useless, but an "amulet" to stop blaming the me who had been enduring so desperately until now.
The desire to do my best, and the heart and body that can't keep up.

While holding onto the strings that snap the moment I am alone,

I am still living today, desperately, while staying close to my own heart.