If you’ve ever been labeled as too emotional or too sensitive, you know the sting of questioning your own reality. For many of us, the world often responds to our deepest feelings with judgment instead of compassion, especially for women, femmes, and anyone socialized to believe that their emotionality is a flaw. But what if those intense feelings weren’t something to shrink from, but something to reclaim?
We recently sat down with Jordyn Russo, a licensed clinical social worker and co-owner of Moving Mountains Counseling Center in Littleton, Colorado, to talk about what it means to reclaim your emotional truth in a world that’s quick to belittle it.
Jordyn shared her journey into social work, her passion for helping female-identifying clients navigate anxiety, trauma, and life transitions, and why understanding your body and emotions is crucial to healing.
Finding Her Path in Social Work
Jordyn’s path to becoming a social worker wasn’t a straight line. “I didn’t know what the hell I wanted to do,” she admits. It wasn’t until she took an intro to social work class in college that she found her calling. “I loved it. School was not my strong suit, but social work just clicked for me.”
From there, she dove into community mental health, residential care, and eventually private practice, specializing in mind-body experiences, somatic work, and EMDR therapy.
Through it all, one constant remained: the belief that emotions matter, and that healing isn’t just possible. It’s necessary.
When “Chill Out” Feels Like Dismissal
One of the most impactful moments in our conversation was when Jordyn talked about the way society responds to female-identifying people who express strong emotions. “There’s this implicit, sometimes explicit messaging of, ‘You’re too much, you need to chill out,’” she explains. For her clients, especially those working through trauma, anxiety, or panic, even the phrase take a breath can feel triggering, like a demand to stifle their emotions rather than express them.
This isn’t just frustrating. It’s dangerous.
Dismissing someone’s emotional experience can lead to internalized beliefs that their feelings are invalid or excessive. It’s why Jordyn is so passionate about helping her clients reclaim their emotional truth, learn to recognize belittlement when it happens, and set boundaries with people who try to minimize their lived experiences.
Understanding Your Cycle & Emotional Awareness
Jordyn is a huge proponent of understanding the body’s role in emotional regulation. She explains how different phases of the menstrual cycle can drastically affect mood, cognition, and physical well-being. “I track mine because it’s anchoring,” she shares. By understanding her own cycle, she’s able to be proactive about self-care instead of reactive. And she teaches her clients to do the same.
“Instead of just saying, ‘You’re being this way because of your period,’ let’s lead with curiosity,” she says. It’s about understanding, not shaming. In fact, Jordyn encourages people to use tools like trackers or journals to reflect on how their bodies feel throughout the month. An act of self-compassion that turns judgment into understanding.
Self-Trust as the Antidote to Belittlement
When asked what the opposite of belittlement looks like, Jordyn didn’t hesitate: self-trust. “It’s not about never being triggered or never feeling dismissed,” she says. “It’s about knowing that you can trust your own experience enough to hold your ground.”
Self-trust is built through understanding, compassion, and the willingness to challenge the narratives that tell us we are too much. It’s about holding space for our own experiences without apology and choosing to honor our emotions instead of shrinking from them.
If you’ve ever been made to feel like your emotions were too big for the room, consider this your permission slip to take up space. To ask for what you need. To reclaim your emotional truth. And to know that you are not, and never have been, too much.
About Jordyn Russo
Jordyn Russo, LCSW, AAI, EMDR-T (she/her/hers) is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker who supports teens and adults navigating anxiety, trauma, and life transitions. She is the co-owner of Moving Mountains Counseling Center, where she offers a trauma-informed, somatic, and strengths-based approach to foster self-connection and self-trust. Jordyn is also the founder of Wildflower Collective, a women’s mental health initiative dedicated to community, training, and resources.
Follow @mmcc303 on Instagram or visit www.movingmountainscounselingcenter.org and www.wildflowercollectivellc.com for more.
