(8 min. read)

There are days when everything seems to land at once. You are paying bills, answering a teacher’s email, juggling work, and trying to cook dinner while your child asks you a question you can barely hear over your own racing thoughts. You feel stretched thin, irritated, worried, and a little numb. If someone asked you how you feel, you might say, “Overwhelmed.”

But overwhelmed is not a feeling. It is the signal that many feelings are happening at the same time. And if you cannot name what is inside you, it is very hard to ask for what you need, or to move through what is hard.

This piece speaks to two real pain points solo parents face:

1. Not knowing where to start with emotions when everything feels like too much.
2. Getting stuck in survival mode because you cannot tell whether you are afraid, sad, angry, ashamed, or simply exhausted.

Dr. Chip Dodd, counselor and author of The Voice of the Heart, offers a clear, compassionate framework: eight core feelings that act like primary colors for your inner life. Just like red, blue, and yellow combine to create infinite shades, these eight feelings combine to describe the full complexity of a human heart.

“We are feeling creatures who develop the ability to think,” Dr. Dodd says. “We are not thinking creatures who just have to mess with feelings.”

That single reframe changes everything. If you are built to feel, then feelings are not your enemy. They are tools that help you live fully in a world that is both beautiful and tragic.

Here are the eight, in Dr. Dodd’s language: fear, anger, sadness, loneliness, hurt, shame, guilt, and gladness.

At first glance, seven sound uncomfortable and only one sounds good. It might even feel unfair. But these feelings are not punishments. They are capacities. They point you toward connection, healing, and wisdom.

1. Fear alerts you to danger or need, and invites you to ask for help.
2. Hurt reveals wounds and directs you toward healing.
3. Sadness tells the truth about loss, and opens the door to comfort and grief.
4. Loneliness reminds you that you are made for relationship, not isolation.
5. Anger exposes what you care about, what you long for, what you are willing to risk for.
6. Shame in its healthy form is humility. It acknowledges you are human and need other people.
7. Guilt tells you when you have done wrong, so you can seek forgiveness and restore relationship.
8. Gladness grows as you practice the other seven. It is joy that comes from living honestly, connected, and brave.

“Gladness is the feeling we all want,” Dr. Dodd notes. “But it comes as we get good at the other seven.”

If that sounds counterintuitive, consider how attachment works. You cannot love without risking loss. Which means sadness is not a sign you failed. It is evidence that you cared. “If you cannot do sadness, you cannot do grief,” Dr. Dodd says. “And if you cannot do grief, you will avoid attachment. Sadness is part of life. If you cannot learn sadness, you cannot live life.”

If feelings are tools, impairments are what happen when we refuse to pick up the tool. We get defensive, we minimize, we distract, we numb. Over time, those defenses twist into patterns that hurt us and the people we love.

Dr. Dodd names several:

1. Hurt unowned turns to resentment. Resentful people start to wound others.
2. Sadness unowned becomes self pity. You feel defeated before you begin.
3. Fear unowned becomes anxiety, then control, then bullying or rage when control fails.
4. Loneliness unowned turns to apathy. You stop caring, and you stop being reachable.
5. Anger unowned becomes pride or depression. Desire is pressed down until life feels flat.
6. Guilt unowned morphs into toxic shame. You are not a person who made a mistake. You start to believe you are the mistake.
7. Shame rejected becomes self contempt. You despise your own human neediness.
8. Gladness cannot grow where the others are denied. So you chase happiness through happenstance and stimulation. Food. Work. Fantasy. Substances. Sex. Anything that promises relief without vulnerability.

“Either we deal with our feelings or we get sick,” Dr. Dodd says. “And if we do not get sick, people get sick of us.”

That is not a shaming statement. It is a wake up call for connection. Isolation makes us vulnerable and keeps us unwell. Relationship brings us back to life.

“Overwhelmed” is what you feel when fear, hurt, sadness, loneliness, desire, shame, and guilt all show up at once. The temptation is to make life smaller. To clamp down. To cope alone.

Dr. Dodd suggests the opposite. Make your life shared. “A friend doubles your joy and cuts your sorrows in half,” he says.

Here is a simple, concrete practice you can start today:

Make a small “help list.” Write down three to five names of people you can call for different needs. Someone practical. Someone empathetic. Someone wise. Include numbers for basics, too, like your child’s pediatric office, your insurance, a counselor, your faith community, a hotline you trust. Keep the list in your phone and on paper in your wallet.

One day, you will need it. Not if, but when. In a stressful moment after a car accident, Dr. Dodd said his list turned a chaotic hour into a solvable problem. He was not alone. He had a path forward.

When you feel overwhelmed, do not aim for control. Aim for connection. A tiny list can be the bridge between panic and practical help.

If the eight feelings are tools, you need to know which tool to pick up. That means saying the feeling out loud.

Try this sequence when you sense your chest tighten, your jaw clench, or your mind go blank:

1. Find it. Use the eight as a menu. Say, “I feel afraid.” Or, “I feel sad.” Or, “I feel lonely.” If you need a doorway into the feeling, use metaphor. “This feels like a weight.” Then translate the metaphor: weight often points to sadness or shame. If you get stuck, imagine what a close friend would feel in your shoes.
2. Face it. Acknowledge, “This is happening in me.” Do not minimize it.
3. Feel it. Let your body tell the truth. Sit. Breathe. If tears come, you are not failing. You are processing.
4. Ask, where is this coming from. Not “Why am I like this,” which often spirals into judgment. Ask, “What happened. What is impacting me today. What loss. What fear. What need.”
5. Tell the truth to a person. Feelings hidden keep us stuck. Feelings shared set us free. Share with someone who can listen.
6. Give it to the process. Healing takes time. Like rehab after an injury, it involves honest rest, motion, and support.
7. Stay open and brave. Dr. Dodd calls this “staying angry,” but he does not mean raging. He means staying hungry for life. Thirsty for growth. Teachable. Willing to keep reaching.
8. Seek and offer forgiveness. When guilt is real, ask for forgiveness and make amends. When shame rises, return to healthy humility. You are human. You need others. That is not a flaw. That is design.

Naming a feeling is not weakness. It is ownership. What you name, you can navigate. What you hide, rules you.

Here is a quick, compassionate reframe you can practice with your child and with yourself:

1. Fear: “Something matters and I need help.” Text a friend. Make one call.
2. Hurt: “Something wounded me.” Book an appointment. Start gentle routines that heal.
3. Sadness: “I lost something.” Create a simple grief ritual. Light a candle. Journal for ten minutes. Share one memory.
4. Loneliness: “I am made for connection.” Invite a friend for a short walk. Join a weekly group that welcomes single parents.
5. Anger: “I care deeply about something.” Name what you want. Choose one next step that is honest and kind.
6. Shame: “I am human and I need.” Ask for help with one task. Let someone bring dinner. Accept it.
7. Guilt: “I did wrong.” Apologize without excuses. Ask, “How can I make this right.”
8. Gladness: “I am experiencing joy.” Notice it. Savor it for fifteen seconds. Tell your child what you are thankful for.

These are not big, sweeping changes. They are small acts of alignment. Each one nudges your life toward honesty and connection.

Your children are also watching how you handle your feelings. They are learning what to do with their own. When you name your sadness, they learn that tears are safe. When you ask for help, they learn that vulnerability is strength. When you repair, they learn that relationships can handle the truth.

Try this language the next time your child is struggling:

1. “I wonder what you are feeling right now.”
2. “I can tell this matters to you. I am here.”
3. “You are not alone. We can figure this out together.”

That tone communicates presence, curiosity, and care. It invites trust. Over time, that trust becomes security. Secure kids grow into brave adults who can name needs, build healthy bonds, and launch into the world with courage.

If faith is part of your life, Dr. Dodd’s language will resonate: cry out, reach out, knock. Ask, seek, and keep knocking. No one heals in isolation. You were made to live connected. Casting anxiety on God can be inseparable from calling a friend, seeing a counselor, and letting your community carry you for a while.

You do not need to master eight feelings by Friday. Choose one place to begin. Make your tiny help list. Name one feeling today. Tell one safe person the truth. Accept one offer of help.

You are not behind. You are not too much. You are not alone. You are a human who feels, who thinks, and who is learning to live from a heart that is honest and connected.

Gladness will grow here.