Posted by fxckfeelings on September 16, 2010
Everything about having a kid, from the “birth plan” to the child’s name to the choice to procreate itself, is fraught and complicated. If you choose to have a kid, you feel responsible for making the experience perfect, and if you choose not to, you’ve failed to take a responsibility that many people believe you should. So, if you’re feeling guilt or regret, learn what triggers that guilt-reflex and how to disregard it when your own moral judgment clears you of wrong-doing. And if you could avoid naming your child any derivation of Aiden, all the better.
–Dr. Lastname
My younger brother and his wife just had a baby. While I’m thrilled for them and love my baby nephew to death, it’s been harder for me than I thought it would be. While I’m in my early 30s and don’t have any children of my own (but I do have a great husband), I’m not jealous. Actually, I feel guilty for not being jealous, or not holding my nephew and wishing I had a child of my own. I don’t understand why I don’t want kids, but I really don’t. When I married my husband, he felt the same way, but now he’s started talking about starting a family and I feel awful that I can’t get on the same page, or just can’t be normal and want a baby as much as I think I should. I want a second dog way more than I want a baby, and that I feel that way makes me feel terrible. My goal is to figure out what’s wrong with me and why I can’t be a mom.
If you and your husband agreed in advance to live in the country and he later decided he preferred Manhattan, you probably wouldn’t feel guilty about thwarting his desires by keeping him in the sticks, even if it made him unhappy.
So, while you wouldn’t like to deprive him of his dream, you wouldn’t feel guilty about it, either. Ask yourself then why having children should be such a different issue.
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Posted by fxckfeelings on September 13, 2010
Whenever you’ve got a potential conflict between friendship and business, you have to draw a line in the sand (maybe literally if you and your pal work in beach rentals). There is always a “boundary” that represents the best possible compromise between your emotional needs and values, and the necessities of your life. Ignoring boundaries is fun at first, but in the thunderdome of the personal and professional, two sides enter and only one leaves. So, instead of mixing the sides of your life until one falls falls apart, keep your boundaries intact with your friends on one side, your work on the other, and life will remain a (boring) beach.
–Dr. Lastname
My old college roommate is one of my closest friends, and he’s always been one of the most generous people I’ve known. When I got laid off and totally broke, he got me a job at his company, and when I first started working there, everything was great. Now he’s my boss and things are very weird. Outside of work, he’s the same old guy—we carpool to work and crack jokes like always. Once we get into the office though, he’s a different guy, not just serious, because that would make sense (he’s my boss, after all), but really nasty with me. He snaps whenever I ask him questions about work stuff, like I’m an idiot who didn’t follow directions and is wasting his time. I really don’t think I’m asking him to do anything above and beyond, just regular employee/boss stuff, but he’s a total jerk about it. I want to stay here because I need the money and like the company as a whole, but I’m afraid that if I do stay, our friendship will fall apart. Then again, if I leave, he might also take that personally. My goal is to keep my job and my friendship intact.
Fortunately, you don’t have to worry about your friend firing you anytime soon. Instead, you have an opportunity to choose whether to lose your friendship or your job.
As Jack Benny once famously said, when a robber barked “Your money or your life,” “I’m thinking, I’m thinking.” And, of course, you could wind up losing both.
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Posted by fxckfeelings on September 9, 2010
It’s hard not to judge yourself by how people say you’re doing, particularly when those people are family or family-equivalent; a family or relationship can turn anyone into a version of Ed Koch. We assume that peace of mind begins with being forgiven and accepted, but that’s bullshit (or dogshit if you’d like to keep the Koch analogy going). Just because you love people doesn’t mean that they can stop themselves from giving you shit you don’t deserve or not giving you attention you do, and never being able to see what they’re doing. So be prepared to pursue your own investigation and consult your own conscience before seeking peace, reconciliation, and another term as a well-liked human being.
–Dr. Lastname
I can’t get my ex to forgive me, even though I had good reason for doing the things he’s mad about. He’s the one who said we should just be friends (no sex) after we’d been living together for years, which was OK with me, but then when he found out, by accident, that I had a discreet fling (I like sex), he flipped out and told all our friends I’d betrayed him, and walked out. I can’t get him to see I care or that he really has no grounds to be pissed, and it’s an awful way to end things. I now know what his parents meant when they told me years ago he was difficult. My goal is to get him and others to see that I wasn’t a slut and that our relationship wasn’t a farce.
Even before the existence of cable news, gossip websites, and Stephen Colbert, opinion has come more from feelings than facts.
Your hyper-emotional ex sees the past through the “veil of truthiness,” so determining the meaning of what happened is something you’ll have to do on your own.
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Posted by fxckfeelings on August 26, 2010
Just as everybody wants to go to heaven without having to die, everyone wants to find true love without having to suffer through dates. Lucky people make it look easy, but good partners are very, very had to find. That’s because you can’t force someone else to change and changing your own personality is almost equally impossible. Know what you’re looking for, what’s important to you, and how much compromise is really possible. If you do, you’ll also know what all that dating is for and become better at protecting yourself from the hell of loving someone who can never be good for you.
–Dr. Lastname
Just after my girlfriend and I started dating, she decided she had to stop hanging out with her closest friends, not because I told her to, but because she decided they partied too much and it wasn’t good for her anymore. I supported that 100%, but it puts a lot of pressure on me to spend a lot of time with her since she literally has no one else to hang out with anymore. Plus, I have to travel a lot for work, which is why I took the job, because I love being on the road. Even though she knows this about me and tells me it’s OK, I can tell that my leaving town really depresses her and so I feel really guilty because I know she’ll be really lonely when I’m gone. I want things to work with her, but I can’t change who I am and don’t want to change what I do. What can I do to feel less guilty? How much compromise is too much?
I’m not sure if this is comforting, but it’s not guilt telling you that you’re making your girlfriend unhappy. I can see why this is confusing, because your girlfriend isn’t outwardly saying she’s unhappy, either.
Still, guilt isn’t your problem because you haven’t made vows, you don’t have bad intentions, and you don’t owe her something for giving up friends and a lifestyle that weren’t good for her in the first place.
You feel guilty just because you’ve chosen a lifestyle that may make her unhappy, but, given that you’re the ramblin’ kind, it’s also your responsibility to find out if you’re the right boyfriend for her.
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Posted by fxckfeelings on August 23, 2010
Family issues are the grist for any shrink’s mill, and while that’s good news for us, it’s bad news for almost anyone with a relative. After all, you can’t choose your family, but you also can’t choose how the people you marry—those you bring into your family—will or won’t gel with their new kin. Knowing that most of those mismatched relationships can’t be fixed might not be what you want to hear, but it’s the truth, and if you can accept it, you’ll still be unhappy, but at least you’ll save money on therapy bills.
–Dr. Lastname
My family, whom I’ve always been close to, has never liked my wife—they didn’t like her when we were dating, they did a shitty job of hiding how pissed they were when I said we were going to get married, and they still don’t like her now. I know she can seem pushy and anal-retentive, but she’s a good person and she’s been incredibly supportive of me. When we started dating, I’d just lost my job, but she stood by me and even helped me find work again. When we needed a new place to live, she took charge. I’ve tried to get my family to see her the way I do or, if they can’t, at least be polite, but they always manage to undermine her plans and mock her way of doing things, and it drives her nuts. I can’t keep forcing my family on her if things don’t get better, but I don’t want to stop seeing them. My goal is to get my family to change before they drive her, and me, away.
There’s a special kind of torture in trying to make peace in vain. If we all had Hillary Clinton’s job, we’d probably just give up and wear pantsuits, too.
At least your peace-making efforts are not doubly cursed with your wife’s accusing you of being unsupportive and not standing up for her…or maybe you’re not telling me the whole story because you’re forever protecting your wife’s back.
Either way, I assume that sharing your concerns with your family hasn’t worked. Indeed, telling them they’re hurting your wife’s feelings may feed their hope of changing or punishing her or driving her away, and then they’ll act worse. If so, it’s time to shut up and give up on trying to solve this problem and instead ask yourself how to make the best of it.
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Posted by fxckfeelings on August 16, 2010
When it comes to happiness, Americans are entitled to the pursuit of, not the right to, but try telling that to someone who insists their good feelings come first. No one likes a party-pooper, so you can’t expect your earnest warnings to be heard unless you can persuade people that you like happiness just as much as they do, even if you don’t expect it to arrive any time soon (and are more knowledgeable about American history).
–Dr. Lastname
My son did well in his first year of college and now he’s thinking of going to law school. I told him he needs to talk to an adviser and maybe get a summer internship in a law office, but he told me I’m giving him a headache and that the whole point of college is to explore things, try things out, live in the moment, and learn how to be happy. I don’t want to be a wet blanket—and, of course, he’s not listening to me—but getting into a decent law school is highly competitive and it won’t happen unless he’s careful about his choices in the next 3 years. What do I tell him, without destroying his change to enjoy college?
I don’t like being a killjoy, either—well, that’s not true, but anyway—since when do you spend a vast portion of your limited family fortune so the kid will have a good time?
You want your son to be happy of course, but happiness, being the shitty goal that it is, is also a shitty top priority. He’ll be happier in the long run if he can support himself, since sweet memories of keggers gone by won’t pay the rent.
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Posted by fxckfeelings on August 5, 2010
We’ve talked many times on this site about how controlling other people is essentially impossible (at least in the long run, but you’d be surprised how obedient people are short-term when you have cake). That’s why pushing for someone else’s acceptance isn’t just hopeless, but when we put that need ahead of our own convictions and priorities, it’s downright dangerous. People in AA are taught right off the bat to accept what they can’t change, which is a valuable lesson to anyone, with or without booze (or cake).
–Dr. Lastname
My husband worries a lot about my drinking and depression but, to my mind, I don’t think my drinking is a problem and I don’t think I’d be depressed if I wasn’t worried that he’d leave me. For the sake of our marriage, I’ve agreed to stop drinking for a while and go to AA, but I really feel that my drinking wasn’t causing me any problems and that I’m doing this to make him happy, which makes me feel weak and angry. I want to get him to accept me the way I am before I can’t take it anymore.
You’re in a tough spot, because partnership really can’t work without acceptance, and acceptance is not something you can control. The more you force acceptance, the harder it is to achieve. Accept that, buddy.
If you try too hard to get his acceptance, you’ll hide whatever you think he won’t accept, which means putting your drinking in the closet and going to the mall instead of AA meetings.
On his end, if he tries too hard to make the relationship work, he’ll pretend you’re not really drinking or that you’re going to change, which also means no real acceptance.
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Posted by fxckfeelings on July 26, 2010
Everyone wants to wow the one they love, but sometimes, no matter how good our behavior, kind our gestures, well-trained our show-poodles are, we fail to make an impression. When you can’t get praise from or live up to someone you care about, it’s not the end of the world. Besides, you’ll always have those show-poodles to fall back on.
–Dr. Lastname
I’ve worked hard at managing my temper—I can’t help it, I can always find something to be mad about, even when my family is behaving perfectly—and I’ve become really good at not snapping at my husband and kids. The kids are great, but my husband doesn’t seem to give me credit for how much better I’ve gotten, and he hasn’t gotten any nicer himself. He still treats me all defensively, as if I’m Godzillette, and it’s starting to get me mad. My goal is to get some credit for the progress I’ve made and achieve more marital peace.
If you want credit, here you go; One million space bucks worth of reward for your good deeds and strong effort. Now go in marital peace.
While you deserve marital credit from your husband, too, making it a goal to get what’s fair from anyone, especially a spouse, is usually a bad idea.
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Posted by fxckfeelings on July 22, 2010
Ignoring problems is supposed to be bad for you; the only thing we love more in this society than money and fried foods is unbridled confrontation. Sometimes, however, not paying attention to life’s annoyances is the best option for dealing with the nasty little tricks your mind likes to play with you. Until life’s problems go away—which they won’t—you can train your self to stop paying attention to them (and the over-reactive voices in your head). Instead, focus on other important things, like getting paid and eating onion rings.
-Dr. Lastname
My biggest frustration on a daily basis is having someone ask me a question and then either get angry in response to the answer or the fact that a decision has already been made and then ignore the answer they asked for. My wife will ask “do you mind if I do/go/be “x,” and if I answer “yes I mind” then she’s angry and usually proceeds with what she’d already scheduled anyway. Just today my sister asked if the coffee I was holding was warm enough. I said yes, and she then proceeded to take the cup from my hand and run to the microwave with it. OK, so maybe her intentions were good…but why the hell did she ask me, when my answer didn’t matter? Because this seems to happen to me ALL the time, by MANY different people, I’m getting to the point that I don’t even want to be around other people. Should I just shut up and quit even answering questions, or start answering with what I know they want to hear? Giving honest answers is clearly NOT working for me. Can you shed some light on what I’m doing wrong here? And more importantly, what do I do about it?
Nobody likes to feel ignored—at least by people we like and particularly by the ones we love—but some people are particularly sensitive to it.
They feel it as a kind of peace-destroying personal injury that injects them with a festering dislike of their fellow human beings. This leads to a desire to learn wilderness skills or get a solo gig on a space station.
You’re the kind of person whom being ignored gets to, and if I asked you to change, you couldn’t help but ignore my request, even if you tried not to.
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Posted by fxckfeelings on July 12, 2010
Not everyone is good at showing those they love how much they love them. In fact, some people are so disorganized they can’t help but blow off the ones they love, which is something, surprise, those loved ones hate and tend to take personally. You can try rewarding or punishing your beloved flake in order to set them straight, but you’d be acting in vain. For the loved-yet-jilted, it’s important to remember that the love is still there, even if the organization isn’t.
–Dr. Lastname
My son’s a good kid, very smart, and he does pretty well in school, although they’ve diagnosed him as having attention deficit disorder. Anyway, he’s so busy I rarely get to see him, so I thought we should spend more time together, and I made a deal that I’d give him some extra money for video games if he’d put aside some time for the two of us, and he agreed very willingly, but then he kept on forgetting about our scheduled times and blowing me off. Now, I feel I can’t give him the money without giving him the message that it’s OK to be irresponsible and disrespectful. Frankly, I’m hurt. My goal is to get him to be a good kid.
People often assume that hurtful actions by others are a personal affront. In fact, often when people get shat on, it’s totally thoughtless—they’ve been blown off because everything gets blown off, and nobody’s special. Feel better?
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