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Hi, it's Melanie Petri. I'm a facial plastic surgeon in Birmingham, Alabama and love this podcast. I'm floored everyday when people resonate with it because I don't think people have ever resonated with me. You for I am different am march ma'am be, I don't feel the way 99% of the world does and I wish I did. I mean I think that all of us wish that we fit in with everyone around this and that

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it was easy because

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when people understand how you feel, it just, it's easier and when they don't it feels like you're wrong.

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And

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I have been that way my whole life at, hey Minea lunch in the bathroom because someone would make an animal noise or even a carrot noisy, you know, carrot stew, not make noises. But when someone would tell me that

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it,

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what is hurting that carrot that I was eating it, I just assumed starve. And that's not anyone's fault. But some of us are just so much more sensitive.

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And

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is that something you can help? It's a

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innate characteristic.

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I could tell you what almost anyone had to let for lunch. Like, if you breathe on me, I can tell you

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it's okay.

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If given the choice, that would not be something I would want to know. I would not want to be so perceptive of smells that I may have. Really just wouldn't want to be mean. You don't pick and you go through your life and you learn to, well first you just hate it. Like first you're just a kid and you're not like the other kids and you think, why am I like this? And I can remember being in Charlotte's web in fourth grade and I was convinced they were going to kill the pig, as was everyone else. But everybody else seemed okay with it. And I wasn't. And it wasn't a choice. It wasn't a, I want it to be the one kid in the fourth grade at Saint Andrews in Jackson, Mississippi at developed plaza that cannot handle this. But I just was,

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and

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I can remember going to my teacher, miss [inaudible] lawyer, and I said, um, I cannot, I can't, like, they're going to feel the pit. Like I gotta go. And she said, um, I'm sorry we don't have a bus leaving. You need to go back in the movie. And I mean, there was no way, and that's well I have a quarter. And she said, okay, well if you have one quarter, who you gonna call? That's definitely my dad. And for whatever reason, like he, he was surgeon, but he somehow got my call and I didn't have to stay. I don't know, I really don't think he understood, but I trusted that he would believe in me enough. And Gosh, what a gift that is. I mean, my parents, I just can't even imagine. I mean, I was refusing to say to starfish at, I mean it typically was about animals. I pitched a fit about a worm. I let all my sisters, crickets go for her. Whatever rep tell she had, and it wasn't really a choice, it was a, a mode that you go in and you see something innocent that can free itself and you just can't take it. And it's different. But at some point in your life, it finds his place. And I think that must be the craziest thing of all because now I'm able to realize, okay, I may be ridiculously sensitive and perceptive and certainly wish I wasn't. I don't wish I wasn't now though, because I can be looking at someone or doing a face lift and those perceptions are there then too.

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And

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when you feel that you know that all of those things that you thought, oh dear God, why me? Like I wish I wasn't this way and we've all felt that way about things and in our lives or things that we know are different than our friends. Because at the end of the day, if you gave us the choice, we would all just be the same because then there's nothing to worry about.

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Yeah.

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And you feel included and happy and you don't feel different. But it is those different things. There's things about you that drive you crazy or that you wish you could change.

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Yeah.

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Those are the things that make you who you are.

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Yeah.

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Those are the things that make you different, that makes you interesting and that ultimately lead you down a path that well literally drive you straight to your greatest gift because it's those little nuances that make you who you are. And we all have them. We just have them in different ways. And there is a point where you realize how it all comes to play. I can tell you what 99% of people that even talk to me after noon had for lunch. That's not okay. Like I wish I couldn't that I can. And it's just part of,

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yeah,

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perception. And if I could have chosen something different, I certainly would have because smells are just not my favorite thing. But you get these things and you get these gifts and then you get these little hints into who you are and then you see it come together. He go to take a picture and there's tiny bit of something is not right and you move, but you had to notice it or you're operating in, there's this little piece of skin and maybe literally less than a quarter of a millimeter.

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But it

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get your attention and you fix it. And that's how,

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yeah,

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that's how you know,

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because it,

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it isn't hard. It's so easy. Like you just see it.

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And

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when you look back at life, especially when I do like, things were hard. I mean it was, it was hard to learn physics or by actually love physics that had the best teacher, but there were so many things that were a struggle. So many things that,

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okay,

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I didn't see what someone else was seeing. The, ultimately I was led to a path where I could see my own way and what I saw made people happy

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and

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gosh, that's the greatest happiness. Especially when you've lived feeling like, and knowing that what you felt was very different, that you're, the perception was just on a level that, I mean, you really wished it wasn't. And there's no doubt. I mean, I can't think of a highly sensitive person that I know that ever wished to be that way. And I really didn't even know the term until I came across a ted talk of someone that was talking about highly sensitive people. And I thought,

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oh, that's me and

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well, if you've never really identified with the grave, been all of a sudden you do. There's a good feeling cause hey, it's okay to be different. But I can tell you like as I grew up, it was never, it wasn't ever anything you wanted. Like you just wish so much that you fit in. And I can remember are we had the best principal coach brand. If you're still out there, I'll never forget you as long as I live. And I left the room and for me I was a very good student and that sort of, I mean, they make great grades and I knew that I couldn't just walk out of a class. I mean I would have never done that. But our teacher, mm, I will not say your name because my wishes for you are what I wish they were. But she was making a starfish dance and he wasn't alive. And I think she thought it was great. And she was like, okay. And I said, I'm leaving. I can't. I hope that, I just hope that your life is valued more than your value in the life of this starfish. And I left

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and

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okay, brainy. So what would you do if I said you had to go back in that room? I said, I wouldn't do it like there's no way. And he came up with other things I could do and recognized it because there are all kinds of things we say, okay, I don't want to do that. But there is a point, there is that point, that wall that you hit when you say, I can't, I won't. And it's those things that more than anything else in life that leads you to who you really are. And it's not about a sensitivity to a starfish. Although if I had a wish as where I would let every surface go, because there's nothing worse than seeing a starfish like rigid to me. But it's those things that really get your attention, that stop you, that guide you, and it doesn't have to be about the starfish or the frog. It's about you. And it's about

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what

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your perceptions of life are or what your perceptions of the world are. And to me like to see someone something, anything, whatever you want to call it, stiff and like lists is one of the most, if not the most negative emotion I could ever experience because I can be talking to you now and I am literally in the ninth grade in Ms Garner's wishing I could just hold my breath like until, I mean to see a teacher or someone I respected make something that I deem very beautiful. A starfish only in life, dance around. Even those debt for all these people, like for, for me, that was a, it still is literally impossible to even comprehend how that could be. Okay.

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But

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it's still the same. I mean I still, whether it's someone that wishes they looked a little different or someone that feels like they don't look like themselves, I mean in a sense there that starfish, their dignity or their, their life force or their energy isn't there and I can't stand to see it. I like to see people happy. I like to see people living and feeling who they are with everything in them

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and

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it's what do I get for this is what I left. And when you are able to see someone stiff and being forced to dance much like this, our fish and then you're able to tweak a few things, which in all fairness or if done well or minor in comparison to the weight can make you feel. It's like you have given life back. And what's more beautiful in life, whether it's a blooming flower or a starfish that somehow escape my ninth grade biology class. Life is a beautiful thing and there's nothing in the world that I value more. So when you look at the world and you look at the things that literally catch your breath, I think those are clues. Huge clues to who you are and what makes you you. And if we were all the same, there would be first, my sister would still have our lizard that I, I didn't kill the lizard, but I let all the crickets go and I will still go to a Bates or in back crickets and take them out chest to let them go. Because whether those crickets feel that her not like I can't, I can't look at them in that cage thinking they have no life force or they to me, they know. And you know, it really doesn't matter if they do or they don't because for me to buy a hundred crickets and let them go feels so good.

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That doesn't matter. And

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I think when you follow this little clues, I think you get closer and closer and closer to yourself.

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And for me, when

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those little things bother me, used to be like, Gosh, how are all these people like walking around? And it doesn't bother him. But now it's like, you know, I love that I can do something about it. And I love that this is who I am because you really are who you are. I sound like my mother. But you are like, you are who you are. And when you learn to embrace that and make the most out of it and give it back in whatever way you, you can, you, especially when it's weird, I think you give something to the world. I think that you amend to give that something to the world because if we were all the same it would be boring. And there are those of us that things really matter to you

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and it,

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it's a sense of difference that makes you really think when you meet someone that's different than you, you think, gosh, that's weird. But you think about it. And when you think about things and you think about people and you think about how they feel, it broadens you in many, many ways. And we all need to need that. And we all long for that because that's what makes us feel alive.

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And I, I think it's a beautiful thing. And

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every now and then I have these comments on Instagram about a patient or what I do and it's, it's so superficial and are so vain. And I think what did they see? Because to me, I never see it that way. Like I see it as that starfish that when they couldn't dance and then all of a sudden I'd have life and that may not end, certainly is not the way the world sees a mini lift or a facelift. But it's how I see it because I feel like when your focus or your energies on something that you can change, I think you should. And when you do, as much as I would love to think that everything positive is the physical changes or Sian and clothes,

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it's

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the inside lights you up. And when you feel good about how you look or the fact that your legs move, I mean it's not, there's no better feeling and it takes me back to ninth grade biology and I couldn't help the starfish,

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but

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to me, I'll, I'll, life is so, so much the same and I'm not able to taints that visual of my ninth grade teacher making starfish. Dance will be with me forever and ever.

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And the

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happiness that I see in people when they feel their life restored will always, whether it's a little line or Brown spies, is a matter what it is. It's a feeling

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and

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I feel everything,

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everything, and

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it can be a terrible thing, but it can be a beautiful thing. And we all have that. We all have that thing about ourselves. It's weird or different and gosh, there's so

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many people that wish they could change us, but they can't. And

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I think that's your gift to the world. So whatever that thing is, wherever it is, no matter how many people have told you, you're out of your mind, I think that thing is your clue. And when you look back at your life and you see it really see it, all the pieces come together

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and you, you get it.

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And then when you use that and you help other people realize that it's okay. It's just a beautiful feeling. And there's nothing like it have that feeling almost every day because I see people that, and women are so sweet, we feel bad that something makes us feel bad. But when you tweak it is just this can be the littlest thing that all of a sudden makes you feel like you're on top of the world

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and

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it's like you're that starfish that can dance

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and

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then I understand why I had to be 14 years old and miss garners ninth grade science class.

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Yeah,

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because all of those things shape you and every emotion you feel is part of who you are and part of what you're supposed to do and the ones that are the strongest or the biggest clays, and someday I will find a way to save so many starfish because I think they should dance just like I think we all should. I like should move

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and

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they move the best when we're happy and life is just not a guarantee. You never know what's going to happen

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and

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we just have to live every moment and find our path. And our path is I think in the most difficult moments of our moments where we really feel like

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we don't belong.

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Those are the moments that you find. You find your purpose and you find that place in yourself that will resonate in so many ways with so many people. And that's a beautiful thing. I have a great night.