Didn't Know For Years....

I am 68 years old and was "different" all my life and never understood why until I found the "Highly Sensitive" book (just a few years ago).  It was so amazing to finally discover what my real situation was and is.  Reading the book made me feel like someone finally understood me, even though I'd never meet that someone...just wish there were people in my actual life who could relate.  I was called "shy" as a child and "oversensitive" as a young adult.  I believe it was the actual reason for my divorce from my first husband.  Someone at my workplace (about 20 years ago) told me I needed to "change my personality".  People just do not understand.  I've even had a lot of trouble when in the hospital because the doctors and nurses don't even understand a person having low threshold of pain, etc.  The part I hate to tell you is that the nervousness and sensitivity in general don't get any better with age - in fact, it's been my experience that it gets worse - sorry to say.
I am very emotional these days and subject to periods of bad depression - I do have good periods in between.   I reallly don't want to take medicines that will mess with my brain chemistry, so I work very hard at finding ways to get myself out of these bad periods.