A Love Letter to the Sensitive Ones, and the Child Within Me

There was a time I thought something was wrong with me.

Because I cried too easily.

Because I felt too deeply.

Because I noticed too much.

While the world seemed to move forward with logic, strength, and noise, I lived in the quiet. In the softness. In the space between the words, where no one else seemed to look.

I could sense what people were really feeling, even when they smiled. I could hear the sadness in someone’s voice, even when they laughed. I carried the weight of unspoken things, of invisible pain, of questions I didn’t know how to ask. And I didn’t understand why it felt so heavy, even as a child.

So I began to believe the lie:

That I was too much.

Too emotional.

Too sensitive.

Too delicate for this world.

But now, I see it differently.

Now I know that I wasn’t too much.

I was just attuned.

I wasn’t fragile—I was awake.

I was the girl who noticed the lonely ones. The quiet ones. The sad ones. The broken things and the beautiful ones, both. I was the one who looked out the car window and felt stories in the trees, who cried for strangers I’d never meet, who gave more love than she received—simply because she could.

That little girl? She was never wrong.

She was sacred.

So today, I write this as a love letter to her.

To the girl I once was.

To the girl still living quietly inside me.

The one who still flinches when people speak too sharply.

The one who still loves too deeply, even when she’s afraid.

The one who dreams not of being the loudest, but of being felt.

You are not too much, my love.

You are the soul of this body, the heart of this journey.

You are the one who kept believing in magic, even when the world tried to strip it away.

You are the reason I still write with tenderness.

The reason I still speak with care.

The reason I still believe in slow, sacred, deep love.

To the Women Who Feel Too Much—You’re Not Alone

If you’ve ever been told to “toughen up,”

If you’ve ever been made to feel small for crying, or soft for caring too much—

Please know this:

Your feelings are not flaws.

Your empathy is not a burden.

Your sensitivity is not your weakness—it’s your superpower.

In a world that glorifies performance, your presence is a gift.

In a culture obsessed with competition, your compassion is a quiet rebellion.

In a time of noise, your gentleness is your strength.

You are the space where others feel safe to fall apart.

You are the one who sees beyond the surface.

You are the softness this world desperately needs.

And to the Inner Girl Still Waiting to Be Seen—You’re Home Now

I know you still whisper in my heart sometimes.

You still ask, “Am I enough?”

You still long to be held. To be chosen. To be understood without needing to explain.

And I want you to know—I see you now.

I choose you now.

I will not abandon you for the sake of fitting in.

I will not silence you to appear strong.

I will not harden just to be accepted.

You are allowed to take up space in my life.

Your softness is safe here.

You can keep dreaming.

You can keep hoping.

You can keep loving like you always have.

Because this time, I will protect you.

With love for the inner girl and every woman like her,

Seraphine Duong

To every woman who feels too much—

You are the soul that writes poetry in silence.

You are the heart that heals in whispers.

You are not broken, strange, or weak.

You are wild and wise and full of wonder.

You are the little girl who made it through.

And the woman she’s becoming is everything you promised her she could be.

So cry. Feel. Love.

Not less—but more.

Because the world doesn’t need you to harden.

It needs you to come home to your softness.