YOU GET TO FIGURE IT OUT FOR YOURSELF

Let's just start off by saying there are usually many right ways to accomplish whatever, but many individuals still insist they're right about pretty much everything.

Admittedly, being right feels good. We're like kids in the classroom, eagerly raising our hands when we know the answer. We love winning--being right!--so  much that many of us are tempted to cheat to get there.

There are unfortunately lots of times in life when we don't know the answer. The more experience you have, the more chance that you'll run into situations that don't even have a right answer, but many of us deal with this uncertainty by sticking to our answers--our solutions to most everything. No where is this more evident that politics and parenting. If we're not very aware, we can end up trying to shove our perspective down others throats.

This never gets us what we want. Ever. But it's hard to resist.

The biggest area in which we insist we have the answers is in parenting, particularly parenting teens or young adults. Let's be honest, the young often have limited views of life and, yes, they screw up. You've been through various situations in your life and life has taught you a thing or two. Sometimes harshly.

So when a younger person that you love is heading in what you fear is the wrong direction, you can insist that your way/your perspective/your answers are the right ones.

Just let me ask, when your parents tried to tell you as a young adult what you needed to do, did you appreciate it? Did you listen or shut them out? And when you're in a dilemma now and your friends insist on telling you what to do, don't you tend to ignore them?

We human beings have a strong need to create our own fates. We don't want others telling us what to do, no matter how invested they are. As a therapist, I occasionally see clients who want me to give them the answers--tell them what to do. I resist this kind of question because I respect your right to decide on your own answers. No one should tell you what you should do. The irony of this is that clients do what they want, no matter what their therapist or parents or friends say they should do.

This is how it should be.

When young adults--or older adults!--are floundering, it would be a relief(we think) to have someone hand us answers, but it doesn't work this way. We all deserve to make our own choices and find out the realities of life for ourselves.

We deserve to screw up and fail our way toward the best path for us.

YOU'LL DO

The most frequent reason given as to why individuals don't leave unsatisfactory relationships is that they don't want to be alone.

We live in a couple world where many see even an unhappy connection as better than no connection at all. We'd rather have miserable Valentine's Days, dissatisfied with whatever does or doesn't happen, than have no valentine to be unhappy with. This seems to hold true even when couples share few values and have widely divergent lifestyles.

We just don't want to be alone.

Human beings are typically social beings. Even if you really like alone-time and you don't do crowds of people, you still probably like human interaction one-on-one or with a few close friends. This connectivity is part of who we are, but when our only critieria for being in a relationship is that the other person has to be breathing, we sell ourselves short.

Some people hate Valentines Day because it underscores that either they have no one special in their lives or the one who's supposed to be special, isn't. For a day intended to celebrate love, Valentine's can be difficult and divisive. Lots of people feel pressured to make that one day wonderful. It seems to heighten expectations and even if one is in a generally happy relationship, knowing how best to acknowledge it can be complicated.

With the desperation to always be in a relationship, we can make foolish choices, committing to individuals who we don't feel loved by and who don't share our ideas about the future. When the relationship breaks down, people run out to get hooked up to someone else.

It's kind of like musical chairs. When the music stops, we rush to grab the closest chair...even if it's rickety and destined to fail us.

Individuals on the downside of relationship break-ups tend to rush out to hook up with anyone. Getting with someone else who wants them somehow seems to mean they're actually okay and not as lousy as the last partner believes. Some see relationships--even the unhappy ones--as a kind of validation, a confirmation that they're okay people. At least, this person wants to be with me.

We need to develop better belief in ourselves and work to create lives--single or with a significant other--that will make us happy. While relationships are complicated and challenging at moments, they're also tremendously beneficial to our well-being. We're healthy and live better lives in happy relationships, but unhappy relationships don't offer the same safeguards.

Rather than jump into the first relationship that happens along, ask yourself what you need out of a partnership...and work toward being the kind of individual you want to be.

VALENTINE RULES FOR ESTABLISHED COUPLES

Valentine's Day is one of the most celebrated/hated days of the year. With the focus on showing your love, things often get twisted, so adhere to these rules for couples who've been to a few rodeos:

Don't Do Unto Others.....

Following the golden rule is a pretty good way to live, except not everyone wants you to be done unto in the same way. This is especially true when in comes to expressions of love and that makes sense because the same things don't always trigger people to feel loved. Some folks would get upset if they didn't get a bouquet of red roses sent to their workplace every Valentine's Day. This just says love to them. Others couldn't care less about cut flowers and still other individuals prefer an expression of love tailored just to them to a standard card-and-going-out-to-dinner. Some people want their lovers to know them well enough to recognize that they'd prefer a rock-climbing vacation to a stay at a bed-and-breakfast.

Do you know what conveys love to your special person? Or what triggers you to feel loved? Think hard about this. Different people have different answers. If you're a sexy undies person, your partner should know this.

The 1st to Mention Valentines....

If the two of you are a collaborative couple, then make sure you recognize that the first person to open the topic of how you're going to celebrate Valentines doesn't go first in making suggestions on this. If they bring it up, you need to be the first to respond with ideas. It's just part of being a team.

Don't Use Stress as an Excuse

Connecting to a loved one actually reduces stress. Yes, you're busy people with demanding jobs and possibly raising a family of demanding children. This doesn't mean having a moment to share together with your significant other is unimportant. You need your partner's love even more when faced with challenging situations...and which of us aren't?

I'm With You, Isn't That Enough?

No, it's not. Some individuals don't enjoy or need celebrations of love--not wedding/dating anniversaries or Valentine's. I get that. Not everyone is the same, but that doesn't excuse you from responding to what your partner needs. Almost invariably, a non-Valentines/non-wedding anniversary person ends up with a partner who loves these moments. Get with the program and show love to your special person the way that person receives love.

If that's sex while wearing a red thong or a flight in a hot air balloon or a night alone watching movies on the couch with the kids at a sitter, so be it. This is a day to express your love. Do it so your special person feels loved.

And you deserve the same from them.

ADJUSTING: YOU OR THE KIDS?

Dr. Carol

"Our son Ethan is 3 yrs old and when my husband asks for him to give him a kiss or hug him he refuses. He will easily give me kisses and hugs though. It seems like they are already starting to butt heads. My husband tends to use an authoritarian style parenting. He will tell him NO and then not listen to him or try to talk to him. It seems like its resulting in my son not having a close relationship with my husband. It really bothers me and I'm afraid its going to cause them to have further issues in the future. I don't know how to handle this, so I tend to get upset and then snap at my husband or I end up just taking over my son and handling his temper tantrums myself. I also know that taking over is also causing problems. So I try not to do that, but sometimes what he is doing to handle our son is just not working to calm him down or whatever. I know that I'm not perfect. I also have tendencies to be an authoritarian. I've been trying to work on this, but I'm not a very good communicator. In fact, neither of us have very good communication skills. I have a hard time communicating to my husband what I think without sounding like I'm telling him what to do. I was just hoping that maybe you had some suggestions."--   Troubled Mom/Wife

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Dear Troubled,

 

 

I do have some suggestions. First, you need to know that your son is in a rough developmental stage. Saying no is one of his favorite things. At this age, children are trying to become individuals, separate from their parents. This is understandable since he's been dependent on you for everything. As he grows older, he needs to find his own ability to handle the world. At this point, he's alternates between defiant and clingy.

 

Developmental stages with similarities--all in the process of your child growing into independence--will reappear at roughly ages five to six, ten to eleven and fifteen to sixteen(the dreaded teen years). The challenge for parents at these times is to foster this forward growth while holding firm to a structure. Kids need consistency. It provides them with comfort, even when they're yelling at you.

 

The second part of the dilemma you're having now has to do with your relationship to your husband. Parenting is best when the parents are a team, working together to provide love and security. This requires parents to communicate, which you've indicated is a troublesome area for you. I think you and your husband would benefit from a few sessions with a therapist, just to work through the basics of listening to and understanding one another. If this isn't an option, then you need to address this yourself.

 

I suggest you listen carefully to what your husband wants for your son. I would guess this is not very different from what you want. You both love the kid and you want him to prosper personally and socially. Then, you need to ask your husband how he thinks you get in the way of his parenting. I know this is a difficult thing to ask and it will be even harder to really listen with an open mind to what he says. It's important, though. Resist the urge to defend yourself. After you've given him opportunity to tell you what he thinks, then tell him your concerns.

 

The two of you need to establish that you want the same things and then talk about your son's behaviors that are most concerning. Take a parenting course together to help equip you to parent most effectively. Parenting really brings out issues in a relationship and seeking help is very important.

 

This parenting gig is challenging and ever-changing. You need to be a team to do it really well.

 

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ADJUSTING: YOU OR YOUR KIDS

 

Kids need to learn to fit into the world, but adults need to expect them to do this at the appropriate developmental moments. It's not appropriate for parents to expect a 10 month-old to stay on a rug, not crawling to touch other things in the room. Children need safe environments to explore. This is how they learn, by reaching out and discovering the world.

 

Rather than following a child around, saying "No, don't touch" (which is exhausting for the parent and both frustrating and confusing for young children) create an environment that allows the child to be safe and yourself to relax. Little kids just don't understand "No" beyond that you're angry with them.

 

Taking a child to a grownup movie past the child's bedtime, expecting youngsters to conform to fine dining environments or letting them run wild in public places, such as malls or department stores, only creates stress for the adults around you and failure for your children. As children grow older, they are able to comprehend more what is expected in certain environments.

 

Parents sometimes struggle with having to adjust their own lives to accommodate their kids, but this won't be required forever. When you chose to be a parent, you signed on to adjusting your life somewhat to the needs of your children.

 

Having children is one of the hardest things we do. Don't expect children--who haven't yet developed their life skills, to adjust more than you are.





VALENTINE LOVE

Valentine's is a day of big expectation and a certain amount of stress. This is sad because love is supposed to refresh, comfort and renew. But that often isn't the reality for some. So, here's a prescription--

Ask What Makes Your Love Feel Loved

A surprising number of people can't accurately say what makes their special person feel special. This is not because you don't love the person, but because we humans tend to see the world from our own view points. We know what makes us feel loved, but not necessarily what triggers our loved one to feel loved. Some, but not all, really appreciate getting red roses--delivered at work for all to see.

Do you know what makes your lover get all warm and gooey inside?

I strongly suggest you ask and ask seriously. Give your lover some time to think about this because you don't want a flip answer. You really want to know what works for your loved one. Don't expect that this will be the same thing that makes your knees buckle. We all have wonderful individuality and this goes for the Valentines thing, too.

Some people love getting diamonds, but some couldn't care less. I think it's important not to criticize either way.

Accept That Your Loved One is Different From You

This is a big, big deal. Just because you love hiking through the mountains--and your loved one does this with you--doesn't mean he loves it, too. He might really prefer vacations at the beach. Let him be different, even if you don't get it.

I may have mentioned it here, but my husband loves sports. I've often said that if a ball is involved, he's there. This may be an exaggeration, but not by much. He loves football and baseball and softball, just to mention a few. I, on the other hand, play a mean game of Trivial Pursuit or Word With Friends. That's about as competitive as I get, but this doesn't mean we don't like one another. He makes me laugh like no one else and he loves me like no one else. I have many examples of his love, but the fact that I drive a really fast, hot car--that he helped me get--is example enough.

Let your lover be different from you.

Listen, Listen, Listen

This can't be said enough because most of us suck at listening.We hear what we think they're saying, not what they're actually saying. Test this out--ask your loved one a question about a hot topic. Then see if you can repeat back to your lover what he or she said to you. You may have to give this several tries before you can do it because we tend to hear the noise in our own heads more than the words of the person talking to us.

When you love, you want the very best for the other person, even if that complicates your own life some. This is particularly hard when 'the very best' means different things to the two of you.

Find out what works for your special person. Then Valentine's Day will be a lot easier. If he likes buying diamonds, but she couldn't care less, love means foregoing the jewelry and doing what she wants.

Hopefully, she'll love you this way, too.

CONVEYING RESPECT

Even if you feel loved, you may not feel respected.

While the term respect technically means to be valued, it also can mean being treated with courtesy and having certain rights, which is where the problems often come in. 

In the complexity of relationships, we need to both be respected and to respect, but that can be difficult.

Parents talk of their children not respecting them and I have to ask what exactly they mean by this term. Usually this involves a teen or preteen who back talks and doesn't do chores. Every now and then, parents seek help for dealing with adult children--some who live at home and some who don't--and before we can address the problems, we need to outline clearly both what you want and what you don't feel you're getting.

Respect is vital for healthy relationships. This involves seeing the other person as having worth and free will. The last part is often difficult because their free will effects us.

I've been married since I was nineteen and the relationship has been a fertile area of learning, let me tell you. Somewhere in the early years, I noticed that when you love someone, you're very affected by what they do and don't do...but even with this, others(and we) have free will. I don't get to tell my husband what to do or not to do.

He's an individual and he gets to decide what he does. My power lies in the reality that I get to choose to stay in the relationship or not, but I don't get to tell him what to do.

This is a delicate balance. Again, when you're in a loving, committed relationship, you don't have the right to tell your partner what to do. You definitely do have the right--and the responsibility--to let your partner know how his or her behavior effects you. If, say, he's flirty with other women and this bothers you, you need to let him know how you feel. You don't, however, have the right to tell him to cut it out. He gets to choose that, if he cares about his relationship with you.

We all want to be respected by those we love--that just means we want them to care how they're behavior impacts us.

Parents want their teens to care enough to listen to their cautions and directions. When you tell your kids not to text and drive, you want them to listen and respect your input on this. You want them to recognize that you do, in fact, know some things.

The tricky part of this is that, as a parent, you need to respect your kids, too. You need to listen to them(check yourself on this. Kids often don't feel listened to). You also need to acknowledge that your kids are making their own decisions--this needs to be part of your behavior.

But kids making their own choices is often really scary for parents. They mess up and make mistakes--sometimes distressing ones. But part of respecting your kids is letting them sort life out. Let them make mistakes--and this is important--let them suffer the consequences of those mistakes.

When one of my teen-aged daughters was caught skipping out on her job, her dad and I sent her straight to her work to talk with her boss. She had consequences and she had to deal with these, not us. The urge to shield kids often leads parents to interfering with their kids' learning.

Respect involves believing in the other person, be they lover, friend or child. We need to act as if we know the other person has the capacity to respond to life events.

Think of yourself when you were a kid--you resented your parents telling you what to do. You wanted them to believe in you and let you bumble your way toward learning.

Respect is complicated because we're so emotionally tangled up with each other. You want to be valued and you want your rights to be recognized. It can be hard, however, to do the same for the ones you love.

 

QUESTIONING YOURSELF

We focus a lot on resolutions at the first of the year--often the same ones every year--and after getting a gym membership and a personal trainer, subscribing to a diet service or promising ourselves we'll live better lives in various ways, we often fail. Let's admit it, sometimes we suck. We don't tell our bosses or our loved ones the truth, we speed(admittedly a flaw and joy of mine), we are crabby towards the ones we love the most and we don't take care of ourselves physically.

In the middle of this brutal honesty about ourselves, it's important to see the full picture. Questioning yourself isn't fun, but it's important to do. Haven't you always looked at others being stupid and said you hoped you're never that self-deluded? To avoid self-delusion, it's helpful to have honest, loving people around you, but it's most important to question yourself.

This isn't pleasant, as it almost always involves acknowledging to yourself the things you could have--and need to next time--done differently. Kind of brutal. This self-questioning is a great habit in that it helps you become a better person, if you'll really work toward personal honesty. But personal honesty involves something even harder than acknowledging your mistakes.

Give yourself credit.

While you probably defend yourself to others(who may seem to be attacking you), acknowledging the good things about you can be difficult. Weird, isn't it? Most of us are quick to deflect when others give us compliments, whether we think this just makes us look humble or whether we really don't believe the nice things they say. We can more easily make of list of our faults than of our strong points and this means we struggle to view ourselves objectively.

No one gets better than me how easy it can be to react emotionally to life--subjectively. Being objective means viewing situations and ourselves without giving a slant. Just seeing it as it is. Not good or bad, but as it really is. Now, there will be moments when you're a stinker. We all are, sometimes. But there will be other moments when you're pretty decent, too.

You don't have to drag a victim out of a burning house or lift a car off an injured driver to be kind to someone else. These are wonderful moments, but not everyone gets to shine like this and fire may scare the bejeezus out of you.

Sometimes, kindness takes different, gentler, everyday forms. Smiling at the cashier, even when he's slow or gives you the wrong change. Being decent to the cop who stops you for speeding(again, my downfall). Or not reacting angrily when you've told your twelve-year old niece/cousin/child/brother/neighbor a dozen times not to play their video game/music so loud when you're sleeping after having worked the night shift.

Give yourself credit for the times you've kept your temper, even if you lose it way too often, in your own estimate. Acknowledging that you've messed something up doesn't mean you've messed everything up.

Some people drank and drove on New Year's Eve. Some of them had never done this before or don't do it routinely. They may have killed or hurt someone; maybe themselves. This is a sad, sad situation and, while it shouldn't ever happen, few would say that the drunk driver was all bad. Even people on Death Row for their crimes aren't all bad. They, like those who drove drunk, have big regrets, but they aren't worthless.

I am amazed by the number of people who sit in my office and tell me they're worthless. These are people who are loved and loving, for the most part. When I ask if they've hurt or killed others, most tell me no. They pay their taxes, work jobs(when these can be found) and are generally upstanding citizens.

But they don't give themselves credit for any of this. 

Self-delusion is a bad thing, but that includes not acknowledging your strengths. Question yourself. It's a good habit, but along with your faults, don't forget to see how you benefit the world, too.