Harnessing the healing power of snark
My husband sent me the link to this cool map that divides up the United States according to how each region refers to soft drinks.
In the South, of course, the answer is “neither”, because down here everything related to soft drinks is referred to as, “getting a Coke”…as it should be.
-I think I just found my teacher from the 1976-1977 school year on classmates.com, a year which I will always remember as “Kindergarten: The Year I Learned How To Sign The Entire Alphabet, Which I Can Still Do To This Day, With The Exception Of The Letters ‘p’, ‘q’, and ‘x’.”
-Yesterday I was talking with a friend of mine who had recently gone on a cruise. She told me how she unwittingly was photographed for one of those candid pictures that the cruise lines take and then sell to you, and how she threatened the photographer’s life should she ever actually develop said picture.
“Of course, it was the ‘Fat, Old, and Disabled Cruise’,” said my friend.
“Hm,” I replied. “Was that how they actually billed it?”
-Lately my husband has taken to closing the door when he hangs out in his office at night, because the Cat Genie, while quite awesome, is also quite loud when it goes through its cleaning cycle.
Last night I needed to talk to him, so I knocked on his door, went in, and then stopped dead in my tracks.
Now my husband is pretty much the most trustworthy person I’ve ever known, but even he had a hard time looking innocent when I saw that his browser was open to a website that started off with the words, “How Many Goats?”
Happily it was not that kind of site, but rather a site where you could determine the worth of your dowry, as measured by the number of goats a prospective spouse would have to cough up in order to marry you. (9, in case you were wondering)
came from the season premiere of “Bones”. (And let us all do a happy dance of joy in celebration of new episodes of TV!)
Booth and Bones are in the U.K. to present at various conferences. While there, they become involved in solving a couple of murders, and are working with Inspector Pritchard of Scotland Yard.
Booth and the Inspector are questioning the manager of the Highgate Gentlemen’s Club, and have just informed him of the murder of one of its members.
Club Manager: My God. Two nights ago Dr. Wexler was buying drinks for all of his friends, and playing the tables as if he hadn’t a care in the world.
Booth: “Was he with a woman?”
Inspector Pritchard: “No, this is a gentleman’s club, Agent Booth.”
Booth: “I didn’t see a stage, or a pole, or dancers, or anything.””
Inspector Pritchard: No, an English gentleman’s club is for actual, English gentlemen.”
“God divided beauty and gave it to the ten:
Henna, soap, and silk-these are the first three.
The plough, the livestock, and the hives of bees-
That makes six.
The sun when it rises over the mountains-
That makes seven.
The crescent moon, as thin as a Christian’s blade-
That makes eight.
With horses and with books we come to ten.”
-from The Tenth Gift by Jane Johnson
6. Projecting your personal “stuff” onto us.
Lordy Day, did I experience this when I made the mistake of telling anyone who was not me or my doctor that I was taking steroids to help control the agonizing, incapacitating arthritis pain that I was experiencing back in the spring.
I thought I was saying, “Yeah, my doctor gave me some Prednisone to help with the pain,” but apparently what everyone heard was, “I’m currently ingesting a special tonic composed of the leftover radioactive material from the Chernobyl disaster, laced with some accompanying drops of the dark black essence at the pit of Satan’s soul.”
Unfortunately, no one would ever just come out and say, “Hey, I’m concerned that you’re on steroids.” Instead I was regaled with many, many stories involving friends, family members, or someone they’d heard about while standing in line to pay for gas who contracted some kind of illness, stupidly took steroids, then found out that “that was the worst thing they possibly could’ve done,” and now they are crippled/maimed/disease-ridden/comatose/an invalid/dead FOREVER.
The implications in all of these stories were, of course, that a)I was an ignorant, reckless, idiot, who just leaped onto the first treatment plan that caught my attention without actually knowing what I was getting into, b)that I was selfish and inconsiderate for doing something that was clearly upsetting the person I was talking to, c)and that if I were a “good” friend/family member/whatever, I would immediately cease said upsetting action, and instead choose a treatment plan that they were comfortable with. You know, because my illness is all about everyone else.
Give me a fucking break.
It’s not like I just woke up one day and said, “Hm, what can I do that will recklessly endanger my health, as well as freak out the maximum number of people possible? I know-I’ll start using steroids!” I took that medication because I needed it. When it’s your turn to experience such excruciating pain that you can neither move your arms, stand, walk, or even get out of bed, then you can treat it however you want to. But I’m the one who had to live through all this stuff, and this was my choice. So BACK OFF!
Nobody but the sick person knows what they are going through, or what they need to survive. Telling horrifying stories to someone who is barely able to function as it is is just mean, especially when you’re doing it to “punish” them for upsetting you with their choices. Either come out and say what is bothering you, OR KEEP YOUR BIG MOUTH SHUT!
I really appreciate all the comments you guys have been leaving me the last couple of days, as well as the fact that my ranting has not driven you away. 🙂
If you’d like an additional perspective on this situation, the awesome Lynne Morrell has written a companion piece to this series which lists things you can do to help someone living with a long-term illness.
And so, without any further ado, I give you Part Three of What Not To Say:
5. Appointing yourselves as our personal Director of Information.
Attention healthy people: On behalf of chronically ill people everywhere, I would like to take this opportunity to tell you to STOP RESEARCHING OUR ILLNESS FOR US!
We have all the information we need, thank you very much.
We know exactly how sick we are. We know what treatment options are available to us. We know all the bad things that can happen as a result of our particular illness, because we are living through them every day. We are working closely with our doctors, and are following the treatment plan that works best for us.
It may not look like it from the outside, because we aren’t doing things exactly the way you would do them, but I promise: we are already doing everything that can be done.
Oh, and while we’re on the subject? Please also stop telling us about all the additional awful illnesses you’ve found that match the symptoms we are having. We already have enough to deal with; we do not have the energy or the resources to worry about something new that, more than likely, WE DO NOT HAVE.
This kind of research may be a nice, intellectual exercise for you, but it just causes massive stress for us. It is also frustrating to be treated as though we have no idea what we’re doing, when we are the ones living with this illness-not you-and all we are ever doing is working to get better.
So please, just keep this information to yourself, because we don’t want it. Otherwise, don’t be surprised when we strangle you with your own computer cables. Because you deserved it.
Alrighty then. Now that I’ve most likely chased off my five remaining readers with my intense and unfiltered pissiness, I guess there’s no reason not to keep right on going with it. So this morning I present my next installment in the ongoing saga of
The Worst Things You Can Say To Someone Dealing With A Long-Term Health Challenge
3. Expecting our recovery to be linear and predictable.
This occurs whenever we’ve experienced a handful of “good” days, and then suddenly go back to feeling bad again.
What you say:
-“Oh no-what happened?”
-“What did you do?”
What we hear:
-“What did you do wrong?”
-“Wow, how’d you fuck this one up?”
“It’s obviously your fault that you’re not feeling better anymore.”
Um, no-it’s not. Healing is messy. Healing is not pretty. Healing does not follow a nice, tidy, predictable path that you can plot on a graph. Healing has no cohesive form. Healing is primal and cuts right down to the bone. Healing brings up all the dark, nasty, unpleasant, icky places-that’s what’s being healed. Healing has its own timetable, and works on its own schedule. Healing doesn’t give a rat’s ass about when you feel you SHOULD BE WELL ALREADY, DAMMIT! Healing just goes right along doing its own thing, often in spite of you.
Having one good day means nothing, except that in that particular moment, we are feeling okay. It is no predictor of anything; there is no ongoing meaning that can be extrapolated from it. It just means that right now, we are feeling good. But there’s not one single thing, good day or not, that will prevent us from feeling utterly miserable in the very next moment. And, once again, that doesn’t mean anything either.
So whenever we’re out there, bashing around, trying this, that, and the other, feeling good, feeling bad, experiencing utter unpredictability, randomness, and chaos, remember: This is what healing looks like. Please don’t attempt to hold us to anything, because right now our lives are in constant flux, from one moment to the next. There is no constant for us right now.
4. Pushing us on
What you say:
-“I really think you’re on the upswing now.”
-“I’m praying for a complete and total recovery/miraculous healing/some other extremely specific outcome for you.”
-“We’re gonna get you back to your old self again really soon.”
What we hear:
-“You need to hurry up and get well.”
-“Where you are right now isn’t good enough.”
-“You need to be somewhere other than where you are right now.”
-“Only this Very Specific Outcome that I have completely detailed in my mind is acceptable for your ‘healing’; nothing else will do.”
-“Your healing has to look a certain way in order to be ‘good enough’.”
Oh my god, this is SO. MUCH. PRESSURE on us. Because, as I might have mentioned once, or twice, or eleventy billion times, we have absolutely no control over this healing process that is taking place inside of us.
We have no idea what anything will look like once we get to the other side of this thing. And feeling like we have to somehow make our healing live up to whatever it is that you’re expecting from us, sometimes just makes us want to stay sick, because that would be a whole lot easier.
We very much appreciate your care and support, but we really need it to come in a form that is much easier, gentler, and more open-ended. Statements like,
-“I’m holding you in the light.”
-“I’m sending you lots of love and healing energy.”
are very gentle, supportive phrases you can offer us, if you are so inspired.
This concludes today’s rant. We now return you to your regularly scheduled day.
I’ve learned a lot over the past 10 months as I’ve dealt with all of my ongoing health problems, but the one issue I want to address in my next few posts is this:
The Worst Things You Can Say To Someone Dealing With A Long-Term Health Challenge
Because unfortunately, I’ve had an awful lot of experience in this particular area of late.
And so, in no special order, here we go.
1. “How are you doing/How are you feeling?”
This most likely comes as a surprise to you, because you probably feel it is a sign of your care and concern to ask this question. But speaking on behalf of chronically ill people everywhere, this question just makes us feel worse. And I’ll tell you why.
Because we are shitty. And we are TIRED of having to talk about how shitty we are all the damn time.
So if you know someone who is living with a long-term illness, and you’re ever wondering how they’re doing, DON’T ASK! Instead, just go ahead and assume that they currently fall somewhere along the following Scale Of Shittiness.
10-we wish that we were dead; we don’t understand how someone can continue to be alive while experiencing such excruciatingly unbearable pain
5-able to get dressed and sit up, but not much else
1-able to function at about 50-75% of our pre-illness ability; pain is mostly managed, but still felt; and most likely we are having to deal with some new physical problem (migraines, allergies, infections, etc.) due to our compromised immune system
So remember, when you catch yourself asking us how we’re doing that, even on a “good” day? We’re still shitty, and we’re sick of talking about it. And when we’re not shitty any more, we’ll let you know. Trust us.
2. Asking us to mathematically quantify our illness and recovery for you
What you say:
-“So, did your doctor give you any kind of time line for when you’d be over this?”
-“On a scale of 1-10, where are you today?”
-“In comparison to [some other day], where would you rate this day?”
What we hear:
-“Why aren’t you well yet?”
-“You’re still sick-geez!”
-“What’s wrong with you?”
-“You must be doing it wrong.”
-“Please ‘spin’ your process for me in a way that I can understand, and that will make me feel better.”
And, most especially, “It is really upsetting me that you are so sick, because it reminds me that this very same thing could happen to me/that I am totally powerless in this situation. But I don’t want to realize that, so you really need to hurry up and get well so that I can feel better. You need to stop upsetting me by being so sick.”
HELLO! We barely have enough inner reserves to wake up every morning and face the day. We do NOT have the energy to take care of your feelings on top of everything else, nor is it our responsibility to do so. If you’re upset by our illness, then go away and figure out some way to DEAL WITH IT YOURSELF! Our illness is not about you.
That’s probably enough for today. Stay tuned for more on this subject later in the week.
Welcome to what life in the Ryan household has been like for the last ten months. Because, despite having what is quite possibly the world’s most expensive litter box, Tigger’s preferred venue has continued to be the guest bathroom tub, which is located RIGHT NEXT TO the world’s most expensive litter box. Just to make sure we get the message.
This war has been marked by various, distinct stages, starting with
Phase One: Denial
This phase was characterized by the excessive use of phrases like, “Well, it could be worse,” and, “At least it’s easy to clean up,” and “Well, if we take this spot away from him, then he’ll just go somewhere else,” along with a sharp decline in outside visitors, so as to better hide the shame of our dirty little secret, plus enabling us to continue laboring under the delusion that everything was just fine, if a little smelly.
Phase Two: We Start To Get Really Pissed Off
Characterized by: Big talk that went nowhere.
Phase Three: Where We Think We Are So Smart
Characterized By: Long strips of blue painter’s tape strung horizontally across the opening to the tub.
Secret Weapon: The tape was placed sticky side out.
Success: Lasted 24 hours, until the need to poo in the tub outweighed Tigger’s fear of the sticky.
Phase Four: Where We Think We Have Plugged The Hole In The Previous System
Characterized By: Strips of tape strung vertically on top of the tape strung horizontally.
Success: See Phase Three results.
Phase Five: Where We Are Losing The Battles, As Well As The War
Characterized By: the inability to believe that, despite our combined eleven years of post-secondary education, we continue to be outsmarted by a f^$@ing cat, as well as the inability to find a baby gate that could meet our tub-protecting needs.
Phase Six: Where We Regroup
Characterized By: Lots and lots of swearing.
Phase Seven: Armageddon
Here’s an excerpt from today’s session.
My coach: “So, how are you doing?”
Me: “Not so good. I’m feeling really bad physically.”
My coach: “What’s up?”
Me: “Well, I keep thinking that maybe I don’t actually need to keep taking Ibuprofen for my arthritis. So I keep stopping, and then I’m fine for a few days, and then I start to hurt again.”
My coach: “Why don’t you want to take your medicine?”
Me: “Because for some reason, I just think that I should not take medicine. Also, I just want this to BE BETTER, DAMMIT!”
My coach: “Well, isn’t it better when you take your Ibuprofen?”
Me: (blows a giant raspberry into the phone)
