Let Him Be Human

I’ve been sitting with something lately.

It’s the weight young men carry—the kind most people don’t see.
The pressure to hold it together. To be strong. To be “chill.” To be okay, even when they’re not.

I meet them in therapy. I raise one in my home. I watch them in the world.

And what I keep noticing is how early the shutting down starts.

Not because they don’t feel deeply. They do.
But because somewhere along the line, they learn that feeling too much, needing too much, showing too much—makes them “too much.”

So they tighten.
They go quiet.
They laugh it off.
They turn pain into anger or withdrawal or humour.
Because what else have they been shown?

I see young men who are grieving but can’t name it.
Who feel lost but don’t know how to say it out loud.
Who are trying—so hard—to keep it together, even when the inside feels like it’s fraying.

They’ve been told to be good, to be strong, to not make a scene.
To be respectful, responsible, rational.
And some of them are barely holding on.

Not because they’re broken.
Because they were never given permission to be fully human.

Mental health isn’t something that shows up when everything falls apart.
It’s the quiet in-between moments.
The masking. The numbing. The shutdown. The moments they say “I’m fine” when they mean “I don’t know how to talk about this.”

And still, they’re trying.
They’re learning the language.
They’re asking questions that their fathers and grandfathers may never have had the space to ask.

What if I don’t have it all figured out?
What if I don’t feel strong today?
What if I need help?

These aren’t signs of weakness.
They’re signs of awakening.

We don’t need to teach young men how to be more stoic.
We need to show them they can be soft.
That they can feel deeply and still belong.
That they can ask for help and still be respected.
That their mental health matters—not because something is wrong with them, but because they’re alive in a world that makes it hard to be whole.

Let him cry.
Let him talk.
Let him not talk and still feel safe.

Let him be unsure, disappointed, hopeful, overwhelmed.
Let him be messy.

Let him be human.