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 22, 2014
When we say, as we often do, that communication is overrated, we’re referring to touchy-feely emotional purges, not basic verbal interaction. Being able to get a reliable, understandable answer to your questions and ideas is essential in life, which is why it’s so infuriating when you either can’t get through to someone who can’t hear what you’re trying to tell them or get an honest response from someone who just says what you want to hear. In either case, trying harder to get through by expressing that frustration will probably do you no good. Instead, watch carefully to see where the message gets lost and then decide whether what you need is to alter your language or give up on words. In either case, you’ll be more effective at getting your message across while keeping emotions at bay.
–Dr. Lastname
Please Note: We’re taking Monday off for Memorial Day here in the US, so keep serving us up your problems while we remember those who have served our country.
My son is serious about being a massage therapist and he’s starting to get paying referrals, but I can’t get a straight story out of him when I ask him how much he needs to live on and when he thinks he’ll have enough to move into his own place. I know he’s always had trouble giving people a straight answer—he struggled with word problems in Math, and his English papers often failed to answer whatever question the teacher had in mind—but it gets me pissed off when all I want is a simple business plan, including how much he needs to make, how much he expects to earn per hour, and how many billable hours he thinks he can get. Instead of giving me facts, he tells me he’s pleased and optimistic and happy with the way things are turning out. My goal is to get the facts out of him without screaming at him.
Despite all the strict rules of grammar and structure, everyone knows there’s no one way to speak any one language; regional dialects and accents create thousands of variations (in New England alone, there are at least five different ways to say “garage”).
What few people realize is that, even when speaking to someone in a language/dialect they understand in the plainest way possible, there’s more than one way to hear and interpret what’s being said. Especially if you’re speaking to someone whose brain, as in this case, has a bad track record of interpreting words in general. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on May 19, 2014
A job well done is like a tree in the forest; is a good performance really gratifying if nobody else makes a sound about it, specifically genuinely approving sounds like the words, “hey, well done!” Whether you don’t get recognition that you deserve, or get recognition you don’t deserve, the disconnect between effort and reward can undermine your belief in the value of hard work and excellence. So, instead of valuing hard work and excellence for expected success, accept the fact that recognition is often beyond your control, and that hard work and excellence do nothing more than allow you to know you’ve done your best. Then, regardless of recognition, your self-respect is your own, and you won’t be falling over yourself, in the woods or the office, for recognition from anyone else.
–Dr. Lastname
I know I’m a good painter, but I really haven’t managed to accomplish much over the last few years. I love painting, but I can’t stand the fact that I’ve never received much recognition and much of what I like about my work isn’t popular right now or likely to sell. So, between having limited free time to paint (after doing my day-job and time with family), being poorly organized (I’ve always had trouble keeping track of appointments, taxes, etc.), and not knowing how to paint something that people will respond to, I’ve gotten very little done. My goal is to figure out how to paint something that people will admire and want to buy.
While teen behavior mostly gives lessons in what not to do—take naked selfies, get YOLO tattoos, etc.—there is one thing teens understand that creative adults seem to forget, and that’s to never, ever to make it obvious that you’re trying too hard.
If you force your art to be something it’s not, it’s not going to connect with anyone. You won’t get mocked in homeroom, but you won’t get rich, either. In your case, it’s because your need for approval isn’t strong enough to force you to fake it, so you just can’t get anything done. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on May 15, 2014
Whether it’s wealth, wine, or just white meat chicken, life’s perks are harder to enjoy when they have a dubious source. This is especially true with money that comes from someone else’s generosity, so it’s natural to promote financial independence, either by giving criticism or praise, especially if that generous someone is you. Unfortunately, being financially dependent is a lot like being a caged hen—it’s often beyond your control—so your attempts to promote it may cause or worsen feelings of failure. Instead of trying to change financial dependence when you can’t, ask yourself what people can do to manage it most effectively. Then you’ll be ready to respect what people do with financial dependence, even if it takes a long time for the dependent party to ripen/become free-range.
–Dr. Lastname
I can’t stand the sad way things have turned out for my daughter, and my life is no better. She had kids, got depressed, lost her marriage and most custody, and lives a marginal life because she can’t get it together to find work. I help her out as much as I can, but I’m not as good with kids as my late wife was, plus the grandkids have special needs. The result is that my daughter doesn’t have a decent place of her own, the grandkids have all kinds of unsolved problems, and I’m going broke. I feel we’ve all failed to do the only thing that matters, which is to help our kids, and I remind my daughter how badly I think things have turned out, and how much she needs to change if things are ever going to get any better, but it doesn’t seem to make a difference. My goal is to find a way to turn this disaster around.
Depression is a terrible disease that can sap your energy and scramble your brain’s ability to get organized, so it can have a devastating effect on a person’s ability to be a parent or hold a job. While medications, talk therapy, and other treatments don’t necessarily help, too-tough love can actually make things worse.
Through the filter of a depressive mind, your “come to Jesus” talks may be interpreted as “go make a living, loser” lectures.
If she is making an effort—and, since you’ve been trying to help and push her for many years, it’s a safe assumption that she is—focusing on failure isn’t fair, disrespects your contributions, and may interfere with good planning. Nobody wants her to pull herself up by her bootstraps more than she does, but her depression’s opposing pull seems to be stronger. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on April 7, 2014
Love and/or laughter might be so-called universal languages, but they still require some sort of verbal communication. Hate and criticism, on the other hand, must be intergalactic languages, because, in couples especially, someone can be ripped to shreds without anyone saying a word. In any case, whether you express them openly and verbally or just quietly roll your eyes, negative feelings have a way of chain-reacting in a marriage. Few good marriages don’t have at least a bit of it, but too much can be explosive, especially when two emotional people are expressive at the same time. So, whether your spontaneous criticism is loud or quiet, try to balance it with some of that universally spoken love through deliberate praise and appreciation. That’s why most good marriages are not just a reflection of spontaneous loving chemistry, but also hard work and carefully chosen words of all kinds.
–Dr. Lastname
My wife and I spent years running our own restaurant and, though we both have strong opinions, we usually worked together pretty well. Recently, however, we got bought out by a larger restaurant group and hired by them as consultants to start a new place from scratch. The problem is, I just don’t like her vision of how it should be done, from the location to the menu. I think my own format is more exciting, cheaper, and easier to do, but she doesn’t agree. I’m afraid her plan will cost too much and get us into trouble. My goal is to get her to see the flaws in her plan before it’s too late and we lose everything we’ve worked for.
There are lots of decisions, small and large, that go into putting together a new restaurant—the color of the napkins, the cuisine, the shape of the forks—but before you make any more choices involving fusion or flatwear, you must decide what’s more important: your marriage or your vision for the restaurant.
Of course, if you and your wife are still talking after having worked closely together for years, you might think it’s easy to have both, but then you have to remember that two people with strong tastes and opinions, faced with an open opportunity to create their dream restaurant, may have a hard time finding middle ground.
So face the worst-case scenario of not reaching agreement on your dream restaurant and having to accept a plan B that is less satisfactory to your standards, but more satisfactory to your vows. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on March 31, 2014
Sometimes those who are responsible for nurturing others don’t know how to crack the whip, and those who are responsible for whipping people into shape don’t know to drop the whip because they’ve cracked a little themselves. In any case, before you wield any weapon or argument, know where your responsibilities end and others’ begin. Once you know those boundaries, you’ll have no guilt about expecting others to do their job or letting yourself off the hook for jobs that aren’t yours, and find that you’ve whipped your priorities into shape.
–Dr. Lastname
I know my husband can’t help being mentally ill with depression and I think it’s important for family to stick together, particularly for the kids, but the latest crap he and my son are pulling is driving me crazy. While my husband was driving my son to work (my husband never works, which is another story), they get into a terrible fight over nothing (not unusual, they both have bad tempers). My son then grabs the wheel, so my husband, convinced our son was trying to kill him, has our son arrested without telling me. Now, remember, my son is the one who is working and doesn’t get into trouble, and my husband is the guy who does nothing but see his doctor and sit on the couch watching TV, but if I tell him he’s caused us a lot of trouble and expense that we can’t deal with and that he should have spoken to me first before going to the police, he’ll tell me I don’t know how to set limits on our son, and I just don’t want to hear it. I’m ready to kill both of them, particularly my husband, but before I do that I have to figure out whether my son will need a lawyer and how we’re going to afford it. My goal is to figure out how to survive with such a crazy, fucked-up family.
There’s a sort of physics to marriage; with every aggressive, crazy (or morbidly obese, or nasty) partner there is an equally sane, passive (or stick thin, or sweet) partner. While congrats are in order for being the sane one, the passive part means you seem too willing to accept helplessness than to consider your options.
No, you can’t change your husband or persuade him to work, think or consult you before he acts, or control his temper, but you have the power that accrues to functional, responsible people over time. If you learn to use it, the laws of science won’t be disrupted, and nobody will have to call the law itself. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on March 27, 2014
Anxiety and depression can act like funhouse mirrors, distorting your thoughts and making it hard to perceive the benefits and obligations of social relationships. Some people can’t say no to social responsibility, no matter how unreasonable, and some people can’t say yes to it, even when it’s minimal. Regardless of the distortions that make you over- or under-embrace your social pleasures and responsibilities, use objective methods to figure out how much is good for you and how much is necessary. Then you can build a social life and discharge responsibilities without burning out or drying up, and substitute the funhouse for actual fun.
–Dr. Lastname
My elder brother was diagnosed with MS when he was in his 30s, and now he’s in a nursing home and a wheelchair. He’s given me his health care proxy and told me he was relying on me, calling me five times a day and giving me a hard time if I don’t answer, so now my anxiety has gone through the roof. He’s always been a spoiled brat and now it’s worse. His health care is actually pretty good, and there are people and activities in the nursing home to keep him occupied, but he expects me to drive 100 miles to visit whenever he asks. I’ve always been the one everyone turns to for help, but now I go around with a knot in my stomach and desperately need to take more medication, even though I know it’s addictive and likely to make me fall. My goal is to find some way to relieve my anxiety that doesn’t kill me.
If you’re an anxious person, then there’s no substance in the world—pill, liquid, magic bean—that can make you suddenly be a not-anxious person. Especially if you continue to do things that feed your anxiety, like say yes to anyone who needs your help because you’re too anxious to say no.
Sadly, the things that currently give you immediate relief are A, making others happy, and B, medications, both of which have side effects. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
Posted by fxckfeelings on March 20, 2014
Families have the magical ability to hide their contempt in plain sight or, sometimes, create the illusion that that their torment doesn’t really exist. No matter what type of nasty sorcery your family works on you, don’t fight it ineffectually by rebelling or getting angry. First figure out what you think is right, then, when you have sufficient conviction on which to ground your courage, draw a line without allowing yourself to be drawn into a fight, and shazam, the spell is broken.
–Dr. Lastname
My husband knows his family is full of overbearing jerks, beginning with his father, but he has a strong sense of duty and wants our kids to know their cousins. So, for a long time, we spent long holidays with his father and sibs, but after a few years my husband agreed that it would be best for me to opt out because they were especially nasty to me and I couldn’t see any point to putting up with it except during special family events. The strange thing is that my husband still spends quite a bit of time with them, even though they’re pretty sarcastic and critical with him, and then he comes home worn out and grumpy. I wonder if he spends more time there than is good for him, but he treats my concerns as if I just want him to take my side against his family. My goal is to get him to see that I don’t want him to support me against his family, just to own up to the fact that his family possibly isn’t that nice to anyone and he spends more time than is healthy.
Whether you wish to comment about a husband’s overinvestment in anything from booze to his bracket to, yes, social time with an overbearing family, you can’t tell him what to do without becoming an overbearing wife who “hates” his dad. And while you may indeed dislike his father, that’s not your point.
You don’t want your relationship with or opinion of his family mediated or commented upon, because the issue concerns his relationship with them, and you wish he would take your concerns seriously rather than treating them as a personal emotional problem, a challenge to his loyalty, or a general rattling of the chain the he imagines connects you to his ankle. 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 20, 2014
Some parents are gluttons for responsibility and guilt, while others are just regular gluttons for video games and donuts, but neither instinct necessarily leads to good home management. To raise a child while both honoring other responsibilities and occasionally indulging some pleasures requires you to create priorities and stick with them, whether they feel good or not. You may sometimes need to frustrate those who depend on you, and sometimes yourself, but your goal—as with any diet, nutritional or behavioral—is to figure out a balance that will work and just stick with it.
–Dr. Lastname
About a year ago, I found a rental for my parents, sister, spouse, and my baby to live in. My parents and sister were living with my aunt prior to the move, but things were not going so well there and I was a new, panicked mother seeking support, so I thought all of us living together would be the perfect solution. Before getting into it, I was fully aware that my mother had a gambling addiction and my stepfather was in and out of a job. They have always been financially irresponsible and neglectful in general when it came to other responsibilities. Well, I feel miserable here and I want to leave, but there is this overwhelming amount of guilt I feel. I know I shouldn’t feel responsible in any way, but I am the only person here who wants to build a better future, and I feel like they cannot have one without me. My mom works 40 hours a week with terrible health issues and has lost some of her teeth, so she feels sick all the time and has very low self-esteem. Because I love her so much, I can’t help but feel an overwhelming amount of sympathy. She hasn’t gambled as much as she use to. Probably because I started to when we moved in together, had a small gambling addiction myself, then I banned myself from the casino. It may have woken her up a bit, but we are still broke. My spouse and I have to constantly pay for what they can’t with the bills and do all the grocery shopping. Everyone here but my spouse is passive aggressive, and when I get the courage to speak up, my family gets very emotionally wounded. I’m fed up with myself because I can’t find the strength to leave, and I am confused because there are times when I want to stay, but that is only when things are going well, which is rare. I need advice on how to handle my over excessive guilt and how to speak up when it’s needed.
At a certain point, all parents are confronted with their own, special chicken/egg dilemma; they don’t have to figure out which came first, but who comes first, given the conflicting needs of their parents versus their kids, and their duties to both. It’s painful enough to make you wish you were poultry.
After all, there’s nothing wrong with helping your mother or seeking her help with childcare. As a married mother who runs her own household, has a child to support, and is obliged to share decisions with a spouse, however, it’s your job to ask yourself if you can withstand the harm it might do to your new family if you live with your mother and her entire damaged entourage. WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
