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I trust your a good summer: I did not. That day we were planning to go on holiday, I was sitting in A&E with my husband, waiting for him to have prompt but common surgery, which caused our travel plans needed to be cancelled.

From this episode I learned something valuable, all over again, about how difficult it is for me to acknowledge pain when things don't work out. I’m not talking about major catastrophes, but the more common, quietly devastating disappointments that – if we don't actually experience them – will significantly depress us.

When we were supposed to be on holiday but weren't, I kept feeling a tug towards seeking optimism: “I can {book a replacement trip|schedule another vacation|arrange a different getaway”; “At least we have {travel insurance|coverage for trips|protection for journeys”; “This’ll give me {something to write about|material for an article|content for a story”. But I remained low, just a bit down. And then I would confront the reality that this holiday really was gone: my husband’s surgery required frequent agonising dressing changes, and there is a short period for an relaxing trip on the Belgium's beaches. So, no getaway. Just letdown and irritation, pain and care.

I know graver situations can happen, it's merely a vacation, what a privileged problem to have – I know because I tried that line too. But what I wanted was to be honest with myself. In those times when I was able to halt battling the disappointment and we addressed it instead, it felt like we were going through something together. Instead of being down and trying to appear happy, I’ve given myself permission all sorts of unpleasant emotions, including but not limited to hostility and displeasure and aversion and wrath, which at least seemed authentic. At times, it even became possible to enjoy our time at home together.

This reminded me of a wish I sometimes observe in my therapy clients, and that I have also witnessed in myself as a client in therapy: that therapy could somehow reverse our unwanted experiences, like clicking “undo”. But that arrow only points backwards. Confronting the reality that this is impossible and embracing the sorrow and anger for things not turning out how we anticipated, rather than a dishonest kind of “reframing”, can promote a transformation: from rejection and low mood, to development and opportunity. Over time – and, of course, it requires patience – this can be profoundly impactful.

We think of depression as feeling bad – but to my mind it’s a kind of deadening of all emotions, a suppressing of rage and grief and frustration and delight and energy, and all the rest. The opposite of depression is not happiness, but acknowledging every sentiment, a kind of truthful emotional spontaneity and freedom.

I have repeatedly found myself stuck in this wish to click “undo”, but my young child is assisting me in moving past it. As a new mother, I was at times swamped by the amazing requirements of my newborn. Not only the nursing – sometimes for a lengthy period at a time, and then again soon after after that – and not only the changing, and then the repeating the process before you’ve even completed the swap you were changing. These day-to-day precious tasks among so many others – efficiency blended with affection – are a reassurance and a tremendous privilege. Though they’re also, at moments, unceasing and exhausting. What astounded me the most – aside from the exhaustion – were the psychological needs.

I had assumed my most important job as a mother was to satisfy my child's demands. But I soon came to realise that it was impossible to satisfy every my baby’s needs at the time she demanded it. Her craving could seem endless; my nourishment could not come fast enough, or it came too fast. And then we needed to change her – but she despised being changed, and cried as if she were falling into a shadowy pit of misery. And while sometimes she seemed consoled by the hugs we gave her, at other times it felt as if she were distant from us, that nothing we had to offer could help.

I soon realized that my most crucial role as a mother was first to persevere, and then to assist her process the overwhelming feelings caused by the impossibility of my guarding her from all discomfort. As she developed her capacity to take in and digest milk, she also had to develop a capacity to process her feelings and her pain when the nourishment was delayed, or when she was hurting, or any other hard and bewildering experience – and I had to develop alongside her (and my) frustration, rage, despair, loathing, discontent, need. My job was not to ensure everything was perfect, but to assist in finding significance to her feelings journey of things being less than perfect.

This was the difference, for her, between having someone who was attempting to provide her only positive emotions, and instead being assisted in developing a capacity to acknowledge all sentiments. It was the distinction, for me, between aiming to have great about executing ideally as a ideal parent, and instead cultivating the skill to tolerate my own shortcomings in order to do a sufficiently well – and grasp my daughter’s discontent and rage with me. The difference between my trying to stop her crying, and understanding when she needed to cry.

Now that we have developed beyond this together, I feel reduced the urge to press reverse and change our narrative into one where things are ideal. I find optimism in my sense of a skill growing inside me to recognise that this is not possible, and to comprehend that, when I’m occupied with attempting to rearrange a trip, what I really need is to weep.