What does making her feel leaden mean in Lyddie?

To feel leaden is to feel heavy
burdens due to strong emotions.

To feel leaden is a .  Leaden
is afor emotions.  Metaphors compare unlike things.   is not really full of lead.

When Lyddie feels leaden it means that she feels very heavy or burdened by her
emotions.  For example, when she talks about her home and family, she describes herself as
feeling leaden with sadness.  This means she is so sad that she feels as if she cannot move,
like she was full of lead.

"There's no hurry. Wait
till your family comes. I don't know when my brother and I can ever get back." She felt
leaden with sadness. (Ch. 6)

This incident occurs when
she gives Ezekial money to help him run away.  He tells her that she needs the money and should
not give it to him, and she replies that she got it from selling her calf and does not need it
yet.  She feels a desire to help him.

Lyddie feels sorry for Ezekial because
he is one person worse off than she is.  Although Lyddie has lost her family farm and is on her
own, she still wants to help a runaway slave.  Lyddie shows compassion for Ezekial but helping
him is a way of feeling better about herself.  She feels that she has nothing.

Throughout the book, Lyddie fights an inner war between feelings of selfishness and her
desire to help others.  Lyddie is basically a good person though.  She is tenacious and
compassionate.  In the end, she always desires to help those in need.