Posted by fxckfeelings on October 6, 2014
Much is made of the inextricable link between trust and love, but the assumption seems to be that you can’t love someone else unless you can trust them (to listen, keep it in their pants, rescue you from a sinking ship, etc.). Just as important, however, is the ability to trust yourself and your own judgment when entering into a relationship; if you have too little confidence, you can sabotage your relationships, and if you have too much, you’ll make commitments that won’t last and will hurt like hell when they break down. Learn to trust yourself by gathering facts, observing carefully, and using common sense to judge your friendships and make smart decisions. Then, regardless of over or under-confidence, you’ll be able to love someone you trust and have trust in whom you love.
–Dr. Lastname
I am in a good relationship and have been now for a while (around 9 months). But none of my relationships seem to last more than a couple of years (I’m now in my 40s), and I worry that some of them I have sabotaged myself. I am at a point in this relationship where we have acknowledged that we love each other and have started making plans months into the future (nothing like moving in together, but definitely trips and such), and suddenly, I have this fear I’m going to lose him. But not just lose him—lose him to someone, and that someone is my friend. I had a friend when I was younger that flirted with my boyfriends, and even though nothing ever happened, it bothered me that she never understood these boundaries, didn’t have a sense of loyalty towards me, and used her looks and sexuality to get attention from those that should be considered off limits. Now I have a newer friend who is younger than me—she’s very pretty, smart, and single, and she has a tendency to try to connect with my boyfriend in ways that I am unable to by finding the gaps and honing in and I don’t like it. I am acting as though they have already run away together, or have a secret relationship. Is my own insecurity causing me to worry about this? My goal is to alleviate these fears of betrayal.
Having fun friends with fickle boundaries may damage your calm, but you do yourself more damage by letting them distract you from the real issues surrounding your boyfriend and your future together. Instead of worrying about whether your gal pals have good intentions, focus on doing the necessary homework to find out whether your boyfriend is a good match.
Assuming you’re not able to stop yourself from being insecure about your friends and boyfriends, use your insecurity to assess your boyfriend’s trustworthiness. Maybe you can also use it to get better at screening friends in the future, but for now, believe it or not, your best weapon against your paranoia is paranoia itself.
Instead of trying to feel better by talking about your fears and asking for reassurance, use them to review your boyfriend’s history with women and your girlfriend’s history as a femme fatale. Your anxiety will drive you to ask the right questions, and, with any luck, the right answers will allow you to tell that anxiety to shut up. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on September 18, 2014
Many relationship blow-ups are due to the most fleeting of bad moods; who knows how many divorces could have been avoided if both parties had just been well-rested, fed, and/or not stuck behind that school bus on the way home from work. The most dangerous bad moods, however, are the ones that don’t have a simple/stupid source, and if those cause someone you’re in a relationship with to push you away, you don’t have much room to negotiate. If they simply want to be alone, and have no blame to bestow, you’ll often do best to keep your distance while leaving the door open. If, on the other hand, they want to dump on you for something you know you haven’t done, use their push as a head start to get away as quickly as possible. In any case, bad moods can make relationships difficult, but moody people can make relationships impossible; stay away unless you’re good at protecting yourself and putting their moods second and your needs first.
–Dr. Lastname
I’m in high school and I’ve been very good friends with this one guy for a very long time, and he’s kind of a passive, detached person; he generally doesn’t really care that much about most things, but it really wasn’t that big of a problem. At least until recently, since he’s started acting like he doesn’t care about our friendship. I know that he isn’t worth it, but we’ve been friends for such a long time that I don’t just want to let go. When I asked him why he was so bitter, even towards me, he said that he didn’t want any friends because everything is temporary, he doesn’t care about anything, etc. Now I know it sounds cool to be like, “fuck other people, I’m alone,” but I’m afraid he’s going to end up alone and sad if he continues to be a dick like this. My goal is to make him less bitter and be my friend again.
Before you make it your goal to reclaim a lost friendship, take a second to reconsider, not because your ever-detached friend might not be worth fighting for or just doomed to a life of dick-dom, but because you probably haven’t lost his friendship in the first place.
From what he’s said, you have no reason to think his feelings about you have changed. All that has changed is his mood and attitude towards the world, which, at this time of life isn’t that unusual. That his adolescent attitude has changed in a negative/apathetic direction is even less rare. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on September 4, 2014
For something that’s both incredibly intangible and subjective, potential is remarkably admired. At least money can buy you lunch and loved ones can share dessert; potential is usually only valuable in absentia, when you’re either mourning it’s loss or praying for it’s arrival. Instead of pining for how you could have been, or used to be, a “contender,” stay focused on meeting your daily priorities with the things that have actual value, like work, friendships, and family. Whether your potential was really lost or was never there to lose, you can always respect what you’ve done if it’s worthwhile and ignore what could have been.
–Dr. Lastname
I used to believe in seizing the day and not thinking too much about the future, but now that I’m in my sixties, I find the things that bother me just don’t go away— seizing the day is too hard, and thinking about the future too painful. I’ve got bad knees that make it very hard to climb stairs or get through an airport without a wheelchair and my monthly medications cost serious money. Feeling helpless is the first step to feeling hopeless, so I find myself thinking depressing thoughts and feeling depressed a lot of the time. My goal is to figure out a way to not let pain and negative thinking wear me down.
When you rely on a “seize the day” philosophy to get the most out of life, you often forget that many days have nothing much to seize. On other days, you may be forced to seize moments of eating shit and compromising in order to keep your promises or protect your future security. Crap-e Diem, indeed.
If seizing the day is what really matters, then yes, as you get older, there’s less that’s new and exciting, and your seizing opportunities are fewer. If, on the other hand, you also value the less glorious and not always enjoyable parts of life, like making a living, raising kids, and being a friend, then aging just means there’s less to seize and more to savor. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on June 5, 2014
The need to talk out a problem is one of those unfortunate instincts, like walking off an ache or steering out of the skid, that’s intended for survival but is more frequently sabotage. If somebody doesn’t want to talk out a conflict, either because they can’t own up to it or just don’t want to, you should resist the urge to press for negotiations and take a moment to ask yourself whether talking would actually help, or just stir up trouble. Most of the time, it’s better to shut up and make the best of flawed relationships, because usually, if somebody refuses to talk it out, they’re not being difficult, they’re doing you a favor.
–Dr. Lastname
I’ve been very supportive with my brother when he was first getting sober, which is why I was so surprised and hurt when he recently attacked the way I manage the family business, which he usually has very little to do with. He implied I’d been keeping him in the dark and cheating him out of his share. I kept my cool and decided to just let it lie and wait for him to come to me calmly, and now it’s a month later and he’s acting like nothing happened. Looking back, I know he’s done this before–attacked me verbally, then forgot about it entirely, including apologizing—but I don’t see how we can be friends if we don’t have a talk about this and try to clear the air. My goal is to try to get through to him this time, because I can’t tolerate this level of nastiness.
Since you know your brother’s habit of venting and vanishing all too well, perhaps it’s time to see your brother’s behavior as less temperamental, and more like a version of Tourette’s Syndrome. It’s not a nice habit, but it certainly isn’t personal.
After all, you and others have tried and failed to get him to see that he has nasty spells hurt people and drive them away. For you, it means you can never fully trust him or let down your guard. For him, it means he’s always going to be damaging relationships and there’s nothing that friends or shrinks can do about it. If he could keep his venom to himself, he would, but the venting is beyond his control. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on May 1, 2014
Unlike most pay-cable drama series, old relationships can often be best judged by how they end; bad relationships tend to leave you with lingering attachment and confusion, and good relationships can leave you feeling so free, you might even wonder whether you cared enough in the first place. Of course, what matters most is not whether a relationship leaves you feeling fettered or free, but what you did with it and how you carry it forward into the future. You might never get over how your relationship/Dexter ended, but if you look at your relationships in terms of effort, value, and achievement, instead of feelings alone, you will have no trouble finding positive meaning in what happens next.
–Dr. Lastname
I’m scared about trusting again. I met my now ex through a friend last year and the attraction was instant. When we met he was up front that he would be going traveling six months later for an indefinite period, but this was fine with me as I understand the need to travel. It was the easiest relationship either of us had been in, it just worked. At first, he changed his trip to come back every couple of months for some weddings, so we thought we would try long distance to see if it could work. Then, unexpectedly, he breaks up with me because he said he doesn’t love me and feels he should be madly in love with me by now. He also says he’s never been in love before (the butterflies in the stomach kind which I tried to explain wasn’t love but initial lust) even after being in long term relationships. I went through his phone and turns out he met someone while volunteering. the fact that he has left me for someone else and could replace me so quickly has crushed me. I feel betrayed but mostly feel so insignificant. My thoughts have become obsessive over it. My goal is to stop how feeling so horrible about myself.
When the one thing you and your beloved have in common is a belief in the power of close chemistry, you know you’re in trouble; that’s like having a relationship based on the fact that you’re currently sharing an elevator or a common cold. Don’t start planning your jubilee anniversary just yet.
Unfortunately, getting along quickly, easily, and intimately with a lover is never a good guarantee of anything other than that he’s someone with real sales potential.
The fact he intended to travel for a long, unlimited period of time and isn’t in his early 20s (I assume) also tells you that he values excitement over commitment, and the most exciting things in most long-term relationships is figuring out what to have for dinner.
Ask yourself how thoroughly you completed a due diligence character review before deciding he was a wonderful partner. You should have checked out his prior relationships and how they ended, as well as what he wanted to do with himself when he came home and whether he wanted a partner to do it with. It would be interesting to know how big a nest-egg he was using and how he planned to replenish it. These questions may not build romance or make good love songs, but they sure predict how things will turn out.
You were right to suspect that the value he places on good company might allow him to replace you pretty quickly, and probably before you knew you were history. Since friendship is all about having a good time together, there wouldn’t be much point in his continuing the relationship since you, clearly, were no longer having a good time or likely to be good company.
You’re absolutely right, you deserve someone who believes that you, and a relationship with you, is important. What you must screen out are people who feel that you’re important as long as you’re pretty, charming, and/or fun, and not for deeper reasons. You didn’t get dumped because you’re insignificant but because you didn’t make this distinction and protect yourself properly.
Let your pain teach you a good lesson, namely that it’s important to put a higher value on your definition of a serious relationship, and not to give your heart to someone who doesn’t take relationships as seriously as you do.
Hopefully, they’ll also be fun, at least some of the time, and enjoy traveling, but whether they are or not, you may someday find yourself thanking your ex, the wandering schmuck, for helping you learn what’s important to look for and hopefully for finding the real, not-temporary thing.
STATEMENT:
“I feel like I’m disposable to someone who seemed to think I was wonderful, but I know I did nothing wrong to lose his love. I may feel like shit, but I’ll accept my lesson in how to make better choices.”
I grew up with my wife, so we knew each other for most of our lives. We got married right after high school and were especially close when she died last year, so it seems very strange when a day goes by and I actually find myself having a good time. The kids give me a funny look when they see me smile, as if they can’t understand why I’m happy. Of course I miss her and often talk to her, but she was dying for two years and, now that it’s over, I can feel life getting easier and simpler. Sometimes, I wonder if I’m avoiding grief, or if I cared as much as I thought I did. My goal is to respect and value the most important relationship I had.
One thing you understand better than your kids is that a relationship is better defined by actions than feelings. It’s not that you didn’t have loving feelings for your late wife, but you’re also proud of the way you cared for her during her illness while also raising kids together. Without that actual achievement, loving feelings wouldn’t have meant nearly as much.
So don’t measure your love by how passionately distraught you are now that she’s gone; rely on your own experience and wisdom to define what’s meaningful about your love. It sounds like you could rely on one another and that you shared a dedication to the kids and one another’s lives and concerns for years. The way she lives in your heart is more important than the depth of your sorrow. Help the kids value what they shared with her, rather than dwelling on what they missed out on. Pain causes us to think about what we could or should have done or what might have made things better, so instead, lead them to think about the difference she made in their lives and the ways they helped her get through her illness.
If you feel more vulnerable and in need of support, be careful to find the right kind. Find a positive therapist or hang out with friends who are good at reminding you that your strength did not depend on your wife, and that you can find ways to keep your family life steady and manage loneliness as a surviving, single spouse without requiring an immediate partner.
A good marriage doesn’t leave a void that has to be filled or a grief that is more unbearable. It leaves you, in this case, with a strong family and confidence in your ability to keep it running the way you and your wife believed it should be. You know the advice she’d probably give you; to not make up criticism you don’t deserve while you get on with life and see how well you can manage the family on your own.
STATEMENT:
“I feel like the world should never be the same after the loss of my wife, and it isn’t, but we worked to build a world together, so if it seems, in some way, to continue on unchanged, that’s partly our doing and what I’ll continue to do until something better comes along.”
Posted by fxckfeelings on April 28, 2014
Everybody knows that parenting is a tough job, but like any job, you do it because you have to, regardless of whether you feel like it (and when your children are toddlers and teens, you often feel like throwing them off a bridge). What fewer people know is that having parents is also a job, so no matter how much you feel like staying away or sticking permanently by their sides, you have to consult your basic principles and figure out what you need, not want, to do. Give weight to the time and energy a parent invested in the job of parenting you, even if they couldn’t do it well, and don’t make yourself responsible for pain you can’t ease. You may not be able to ration your time in a way that feels right, but you can always do it right by your standards, and do your job right, whether they did their job or not.
–Dr. Lastname
I was getting coffee with a friend recently and when it hit me—and it hits me quite often—that I am going to have to see my father in the very near future, and whenever it hits me, I have an anxiety attack. My relationship with my father is basically nonexistent…I don’t like him, how he behaves, or what he says because he always makes me feel bad about myself and always has, but I don’t hate him, I think? I don’t know if it’s my fault that I feel this way, because I’ve tried to have a good relationship (my parents split when I was very young), but maybe not hard enough. I just don’t like being around him or talking to him. Anyway, when I was getting coffee with my friend I was complaining about the fact that my dad is coming to visit me and she said I shouldn’t feel that way. She told me how one of her friend’s parents committed suicide and that I should feel lucky to have him, even though I don’t like him. When she told me this, I didn’t actually feel anything, and if he died, I don’t know if I would feel anything, either. I don’t know if I should try to make a better relationship with him and try to numb myself to his manipulative victimization or if I should just maintain this distance and feel like a jerk when I don’t reply to his texts.
Since you and your father seem to have unfinished (maybe unfinishable) business, try seeing your relationship through a business lens. It’s like a family lens in that it enhances positive engagement, but with extra filters to block out all the messy emotional stuff.
When you strip away the crazy feelings, you get to use the same approach as customer service; positive interactions that promote business-like behavior, within defined boundaries, no negatives allowed. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on April 17, 2014
Timing isn’t just a crucial factor in comedy and decent microwaved popcorn, but also in finding relationships, especially when you’re reentering the dating scene after a long absence. Some people decide they shouldn’t try again because they got hurt, and some that they should just to relieve loneliness. In truth, however, some hurt people have good reasons to keep dating and some lonely people are likely to get into trouble if they try it. So don’t let feelings guide your dating decisions. The most important thing to consider when timing your return is whether dating is worth doing and whether you have the skills to manage the risks. Then, whether it works out or not, you’ll know you made the right decision, and you’ll know when the time is right.
–Dr. Lastname
I’m in my early 50s, and newly widowed after my husband’s extended illness. I’ve been lonely for a long time, he had Alzheimer’s and was like a child for many years. Recently, I joined a dating site and met a number of men. In the last three months, I’ve had eight sexual partners. I decided to get testing done for STDs and found out that I have hepatitis B. I ‘m not really sure whom I contracted it from, and not sure if that matters. I have advised all of my partners of my diagnosis. My question is, how do I go on from here? I’m scared of what this diagnosis means, and embarrassed to be in this situation. I can’t tell my family or friends because they would be appalled that I was having casual sex, and a couple of my partners have been nasty and threatening. I had hoped to eventually pursue a healthy long-term relationship, but now I feel dirty and like damaged goods.
To endure a husband’s suffering and early death from Alzheimer’s is a major achievement, at least to anyone who knows how hard it is to watch someone slip away bit by bit and not be able to mourn him or move on because he’s not yet gone. It’s a harrowing experience that would leave anyone struggling to find her footing.
Whatever other feelings your brain may throw your way, or however you explore your post-married life, you deserve to feel pride. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on April 3, 2014
As we’ve said before, if you’re not careful, money can be kryptonite to family, or it can be concrete, driving relatives apart or keeping them closer together. That’s why you have to try to keep cash out of the big picture, because there are always good reasons for maintaining family relationships, regardless of financial grievances, and good reasons for encouraging independence, regardless of how money and affection may promote dependence. Develop and heed your own ideas about the proper distance to maintain in close family relationships, then impose those ideas regardless of the push and/or pull of financial pressures.
–Dr. Lastname
My brother was never a warm person, and people warned me he could be unscrupulous, but we were both brought up to put family first. That’s why I was shocked when my brother manipulated our dying, demented father to leave him everything in his will. Everyone was shocked, not just because I got along well with my father, but because I still had school loans (my brother dropped out of high school), not to mention hospital bills from my wife’s illness. Needless to say, my brother was not interested in sharing the inheritance, so we didn’t talk often after that. Now that we’re both growing old and he’s my only family, I find it harder to avoid his emails and calls. My goal is to follow through on the best side of my inheritance, which is to value family, and try to be closer to my brother, though I can’t really like or trust him.
While your brother got the money and you didn’t, it still sounds like you lucked out in terms of family inheritance; you were left good values and a decent personality, and he got the gene for being a natural-born Asshole™.
If he is, indeed, an Asshole™ in the technical sense, he would see himself as deserving of whatever he could persuade your father to cough up, and you as petty, vengeful, and wrong. It’s just the Asshole™ way.
Part of you knows this, which is why you chose to cut him off rather than engage him; you understand how any mention of what he did or why he did it will probably elicit angry justifications that you don’t want to hear or respond to, and won’t bring you any closer to getting money, justice, or anything but a headache. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on March 10, 2014
If you think of your life as a rollercoaster—and there are plenty of inspirational posters that would like it if you did—than the downhill plunges will feel uncomfortable, scary, and inducing of barf. Whether you’re looking back on your best days or your worst decision, it’s hard not to fear the transitions and wonder what you did wrong to fall so profoundly, even when you’re not at fault. If, however, you accept your current low as a painful fact of life that hasn’t changed your values or basic priorities, then you need never feel like a failure and instead can take pride in enduring whatever life throws at you and still working hard. Then life will be less like a scary rollercoaster, and more like a steady old road.
–Dr. Lastname
I wish I could stop thinking about how I’ve ruined my life. I used to be comfortably well off and never worried about the food bill, basic repairs, or even taking a vacation. Then I had to make a major financial decision about my capital and decided to put it all into an investment that was a total bust. There’s no point in explaining everything that went wrong, but, by the time I got out of it, I was broke, and now, every time I thing about it, the bills I haven’t paid, or the phone calls from creditors I have to constantly ignore, I want to throw myself out a window. It was the biggest, stupidest mistake of my life, and I shouldn’t have believed any of the advisers who said it was a good risk. My goal is to stop being haunted by the feeling that my life is, or should be, over.
If you judge your actions by how they happen to turn out, then every bad luck turd that comes your way is a personal failure, including: getting the flu (you were too stupid to get a shot!); getting laid off (too foolish to prepare for the recession); and getting hit by a meteor (too busy watching “Real Housewives” to buy a telescope).
In a fair world, where everything is safe and predictable, you’d be right, but in this world, you’re just being mean to yourself over something that probably couldn’t have been helped. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on February 10, 2014
As the main motive for most of life’s poor decisions—shotgun weddings, gift cards as birthday presents, matching tattoos—guilt can cause us to avoid responsibility that is ours and impose responsibility that’s undeserved. So don’t let your conscience be your guide until you’ve carefully considered what you actually control, rather than feeling bad because there’s pain and you’re involved. Then, if your conscience won’t listen to reasonable judgment, learn to ignore it and pay more attention to what you believe is right instead of what makes you feel wrong.
–Dr. Lastname
I don’t know how to help my son deal with a crazy high school relationship. He’s been dating a very troubled but pretty girl who now says she’ll kill herself if he ever breaks up with her. He’s a sweet kid and always likes to help people, but he also feels drained by all the attention she requires and he tells me he really would like to break up with her. I think it’s an unhealthy relationship and I’m delighted he’s ready to move on, but, like my son, I’m worried about what will happen if she tries to kill herself. I can’t speak with her parents because my son won’t let me—he says that would break his promise to her and make it even more likely she would hurt herself. My goal is to figure out a way to protect my son and this girl.
Unfortunately, whenever a soon-to-be rejected, needy lover threatens suicide, there’s no way you can protect anyone from pain and potential guilt. It’s effectively a hostage situation, which means, by design, it can’t end well for everyone, will always end badly for someone, and may well end with irreversible disaster.
No matter what happens, your son’s girlfriend is going to get hurt and maybe hurt herself, whereupon your son is going to feel guilty, and so will you, if your son accuses you of violating his confidence. So forget about who’s going to suffer for what and just focus on doing the right thing and getting everyone out as safely as possible.
Your first priority, of course, is doing what you can to reduce his girlfriend’s risk of self-harm. If her parents, shrink, and/or school officials know she’s at risk and are monitoring her closely, then there’s nothing you can add and nothing further to do, but the only way to find out is to tell them. It’s true, your son might not approve, but you have a duty to make sure those who care for her know what they need to.
Don’t expect to stop feelings of guilt simply by doing the right thing. All it takes to feel guilty is to be the type of person who feels responsible for the feelings of others—a description that fits most of us shrinks—or to be told by someone you care about that you’ve made them suffer, disappointed them, or let them down. For most of us, guilt isn’t rational and there’s no escaping it. We may try to feel better by bending over backwards, but this usually just causes a sore back, a bigger sense of responsibility, and even more guilt.
What you can do, however, for your son and yourself, is not accept that this guilt is deserved. Begin by asking yourself, and your son, how much responsibility a loving person should take for the feelings of someone who is needy and sensitive to rejection. You’d like to think that your love can protect them, but unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way. The more you nurture them, and the closer you get, the greater the chance you’ll trigger their sensitivity, and then it’s all down hill. It’s no one’s fault, so it’s best you keep your distance until they develop tools for managing their sensitivity, if that’s what they’re able to do.
Do what’s necessary to protect his girlfriend’s life, and give your son the tools to judge his responsibilities apart from guilty feelings. Initially, of course, they will control how he judges his actions and yours. You can then show him, however, that, regardless of guilty feelings, you have better methods for making decisions that make the best of situations that can’t be good for anyone, and that he can learn your methods when he’s ready.
Learn to negotiate, not just with his emotional captor, but with your own emotions, and with luck you can help everyone emerge safely.
STATEMENT:
“I hate to think how my son is likely to blame himself, and possibly me, when his girlfriend blames her breakdown on his dumping her, but this is a life dilemma he needs to learn how to deal with. I will show him how to use ethical reasoning to define his actual responsibility, apart from guilty feelings, and do the right thing.”
I’m having trouble getting over my mother’s death in a car accident because it was so sudden and we never had a chance to make up after a nasty argument the night before. She had a fiery temper, and we had a stupid argument that really meant nothing, but I hung up on her while she was yelling at me and I can’t stand the idea that that was our last interaction and that the stress of our fight may have caused her to drive mad and get into the accident that ended her life. My goal is to find a way to live with my guilt.
As noted above, guilt seldom has anything to do with actually doing wrong; if you feel guilty about your mother’s death, it’s because people usually feel responsible for protecting those they love, whether or not they actually have the power to do so. It’s an instinct that probably helps us look out for one another and is thus mostly helpful, except in situations like yours, when it can tear you apart.
Instead of trying to ease your guilt by kicking yourself, ask yourself how you would weigh a friend’s responsibility under similar circumstances. Give your friend a small share of blame if he was particularly cruel to his mother before her death, but give his mother responsibility for managing her own sensitivity, protecting herself from hurt, and controlling her anger.
Then think of how you would like to be remembered after your death; not by the circumstances of your last few years, days, or minutes, but by the sum total of what you built, who you were, and the good things you left behind. So spend some time assessing the value of what your mother did for you, and you for her, during those times when you weren’t having screaming fights.
Write out a statement that does justice to your whole relationship. Don’t try to diminish guilt through apology or confession, just ignore it by honoring values that are more important and using them to build a view of your relationship that is truer to what matters. The unexpectedness of her death shouldn’t teach you to avoid ever being mean, but to remember that life is short and most aggravations don’t really matter.
Honor your temper and where it came from. Remember that arguments never really drove you and your mother apart, as painful or stupid as they were, and they never really interfered with your relationship, which could only be cut short by accident and death. Now, your job is to prevent guilt from interfering with the relationship that you will continue to have with her for the rest of your life, and to protect yourself, and that bond, from being devalued.
STATEMENT:
“I can’t help feeling guilty over not having made up with my mother before her death, but that’s not how I really value our relationship. I will cherish her memory for the things that mattered, and carry on what was best about her values, while ignoring guilty feelings that I can’t stop having, but that are unimportant.”
