‘NEGATIVE THINGS WILL INEVITABLY COME MY WAY BUT I’M RESPONSIBLE FOR MY REACTIONS’

Ever since I was young, I’ve felt responsible for cheering people up when they’re down. I was a self-appointed comedian – constantly making jokes and doing impressions. I was a fat kid, and quickly worked out it was best to laugh at myself before anyone else could. Putting a smile on people’s faces became my ‘thing’. However, I came to find I would feel a huge sense of despondency if I couldn’t improve their mood.

I have always been especially aware of how people are feeling. As a child, I was close to my deaf great-grandmother. She couldn’t join in conversations, so I started watching her to read what she might be thinking. This practice then extended to everyone, and I began noticing what was being left unsaid. There is a way people say they are fine that means the opposite, and I can tell when people are being rude to hide their vulnerability of being shy.

Like many things in childhood, this behaviour became formulative. As a young woman I continued to let other people dictate what sort of day I’d have, because not only did I feel responsible for cheering them up if they were doleful, hostile or depressed, but that obligation solidified into a belief that I was to blame.

During my 20s I worked in advertising, where my boss was going through a divorce and was often difficult. My colleagues kept out of her way but I thought I could change her mood and started working 12-hour days to make her world better. But it didn’t matter how many reports I handed in – her husband had still had an affair. I wasn’t the problem, so I couldn’t be the solution.

If a boyfriend was being a misery on a date, I never considered that he might have had a bad day – instead, I assumed I’d done something wrong. Many evenings were ruined because I tried harder and harder to cheer up a date who was probably thinking about something else.

On some occasions, I’d even ruin my own mood to match other people’s. I remember excitedly meeting a friend when I got engaged. Before I spilt my news, she announced she was having a ‘fat day’, was unemployed and depressed. I didn’t mention the engagement. The evening was awful; we spent it talking about diets and redrafting her CV. She went home happier, but I left drained and sad that my announcement had been stolen. I wonder now