Kevin's Watch

The following are some things that have been said to that caused me pain. Some were said fairly recently, some echo down the years. I'm going to follow each one with one or two important lessons the words taught me. Pain is it's own lesson, of course, but I believe it's also an opportunity to forge what meaning we will from it. Here we go:

I don't want to fight anymore

I saw my Nana say this to my father on her deathbed. She was a wreck. She had opaque cataracts for eyes, that had begun forming years ago. Her once fat body was hanging off her in flabby folds. She gasped this sentence out, as her emphysima (sp?) had left her unable to breathe properly for months. From these I learnt that under certain cirsumstances death can be a mercy. A friend of mine maintains that any quality of life is better than no life at all. I disagree.

Why don't you just fuck off? No-one likes you.

A lesson I took immediately to heart and internalised. The trouble being, once you accept that no-one- in the entire world - likes you, where exactly do you fuck off to? In my confused and miserable youth of the time, I kept going right back to the boy who said this, and the people who agreed with him. They didn't like me, but then no-one did, and at least they kept me around for a whipping boy. It was better than being alone, because I didn't like me either.
The deeper lesson came much later, when I could see this statement as reflecting as much about the speaker as it did about me. He never had the right to speak for everyone, and he certainly never had the right to speak for me. With this in mind, "no-one likes you" is better heard as "I don't like you," in which case fucking off is exactly what I should have done. I eventually did, to groups of people who did like me, and taught me to like myself.

Did I ask you? You're a freak.

The lesson I received at the time: be silent. Draw no attention to yourself. You have little to offer, and what you do have is valued by no-one. A lie, naturally. We all have worth to offer to others, and rejection by a few should only feed our will to give what we have to someone who appreciates it.

I don't think I love you anymore

Speaks for itself, really. The hard lesson here was learned in sticking around in a futile attempt to undo the truth of that sentence.

It's like the pain's too big, and I can't swallow it. It's too big, and I can't swallow it!

Sobbed into my shoulder by a friend suffering from depression, anxiety disorders, and suicidal tendencies. Her mental problems manifest physically as a constant nasty cough in her throat. She spends her days and nights literally choking on her own pain. By the time she said these words to me, I'd already found my answer to my own pain. Sometimes I wear my depression rather comfortably, like and old shoe with a tendency to rub. Where once my feet blistered, I've long since acquired callouses. But sometimes my pain seems bigger than the world. Sometimes it's all I can do to be crushed under it and keep crawling. Those times, I just hold on until I get some breathing space. Once I've got that, I can grow to measure up to my pain.
The heartbreaking lesson with my friend, however, is that those answers cannot be taught. She has to find her own space to grow, and I can't be crushed under there in her place. I would, though, and that's a lesson of an altogether different kind.

Believe it or not, fuck. Not the way you used it, and I've never been hurt by it online, but I've had it yelled at me somewhat angrily a couple of times from cars and somehow it cuts through whatever is going on and gets to me quite effectively.

Other than that I can't think of anything.

You would be so pretty if.............

You are not a cuddly person but you are a straight shooter

I love you

Kudos to Cambo for this great thread and the start he gave it with the examples of others trying to steal our self-worth from us by asserting that nobody else see any worth in us. That is not true, and this is a lesson that a few Watchers of my acquaintance need to learn.

Lorin, I am so sorry to hear that you only hear "I Love You" as words that hurt. Those three words, heard that way, are a story that would make Foamfollower cry. Having met you in RL, I can state that the other two statements in your post are as flatly untrue as any in Cambo's post.

Cambo wrote:

Did I ask you?

Hahaha, my standard reply to that is "If I waited to be asked, I'd never say anything."

--A

I have realized lately how much power over my heart I give people. You would *think* that the ones closest to you should always be safe, but that just isn't necessarily so. No one should have the kind of power over me that they can flatten me with a word, can bring me to despair, can paralyze me. In allowing them that power, I make them a god. (I already have one of those and He suffices, I don't need more.)

Words can wound. I was once in a physically abusive relationship: those bruises and fractures healed long ago but the words were harder to leave behind.

Right now I am praying and meditating on, how do I get that power away from others and give it back to the only One with whom it is safe? (That ain't me, btw.)

I've rarely been the recipient of those kind of direct, cruel attacks, and when I have, the people behind them usually lessen the impact.

The one serious break-up I ever had was done quite diplomatically. It was the long period of silence before that really hurt.

For a while afterward, "You're such a good friend," usually stung a bit, coming from women. I learned to avoid that pattern, though.

More generally, I think the words that hurt me are the so-whats and shut-ups -- words said to demean what I consider important. They're anti-word words, and being a 'word guy,'... they cut deep.

And now for something completely different... "Just six seemingly harmless letters arranged in a way will form a word // With more power than the pieces of metal that are forged to make swords"

Right now I am praying and meditating on, how do I get that power away from others and give it back to the only One with whom it is safe? (That ain't me, btw.)

This is just my opinion, and we're coming from two entirely different worldviews, but how can you expect otherwise when you surrender all agency to an entity outside yourself? Isn't His way to 'turn the other cheek'?

That never worked for me when I was younger. Being poor, too smart for my own good, and socially awkward, there was a group of kids whose epithet of choice for me was "faggot." It didn't matter if I ignored it, didn't help if I tried to explain why I was not. After a while, I even began to wonder if it was true. The thing is, though, I really like women. Maybe too much. It wasn't until I realized their words didn't mean shit to me and offered direct, unflinching retaliation that things got better.

Of course, I also began to throw parties. When you realize there are things you have that people want and that you're entitled to get things in return for giving it... you build social networks. The more people you have behind you, the less those in front of you can hurt you.

[Syl] wrote:
That never worked for me when I was younger. Being poor, too smart for my own good, and socially awkward, there was a group of kids whose epithet of choice for me was "faggot." It didn't matter if I ignored it, didn't help if I tried to explain why I was not. After a while, I even began to wonder if it was true. The thing is, though, I really like women. Maybe too much. It wasn't until I realized their words didn't mean shit to me and offered direct, unflinching retaliation that things got better.

Heh. That reminds me of grade school. A common appellation applied to me was 'retarded' and 'Forrest Gump'. The funny thing I've realized later in life was that these same people came to me for help with their math and science homework.

To me, this just means that, as a friend once said, you sometimes have to show that the devils are more Christian than the angels*. It doesn't help to fight back, it only hurts my soul to chuckle and tell these people that they deserve what's coming to them. A lot of these people are lost, with nothing left to do but lash out at whatever.





*The actual context of this makes the statement infinitly less offensive, and illustrates this point. The friend's daughter had a good friend, and when the daughter had joined a religion her friend was taught was 'evil', he told her he couldn't risk his soul being friends with her anymore. This devasted her, hurt her, and no doubt frustrated her. Her mom told her this statement in response to this, and later she found her friend was struggling through a class and simply went up and started helping him out to the point that he got a good grade. This story has a happy ending in that the friendship was renewed.

Oh boy, was I ever the butt of teasing when I was a kid. The neighbor kids loved to tease me 'til I cried. So did my brother. He's ten years older than me, and never missed an opportunity to tell me I was fat. His favorite nickname for me was "Sisty Ugler", which he thought was a clever play on words but which I found, uh, less than charming.

I was one of the smartest kids in our class, and also the youngest, by virtue of having tested into kindergarten a year early. So yeah, I got crap at school, too -- until later, when kids figured out I could help them with their homework....

At one point, I developed a habit of holding my thumbs as a way of folding my hands. Don't ask me how I managed it -- I tried to do it just now and couldn't figure it out. Anyway, one day on the bus, some kids I barely knew asked me why I held my thumbs -- which of course embarrassed me to the point that I couldn't reply. Now today, I would probably reply, "It keeps me from slugging people who ask me why I hold my thumbs," but in those days I wasn't so quick with a comeback.

But anyway, the hurtful stuff you're told when you're a kid definitely sticks with you. A lot of kids (including me) internalize those messages, and they become ingrained in their view of themselves. It takes a lot of work to get rid of them.

I didn't always realize this but it doesn't really matter what other people think or say about me so much as what I think and feel about me. Accepting that and liking myself seems to draw other people into liking me. Not everyone of course but I do have a lot of friends, much more so than enemies or frenemies. Granted I am far from perfect but being comfortable with who I am seems to make what negative things others say or seem to think have much less impact and often none at all on my mental well being.

This is NOT to say that I haven't been scarred by things others have said in the past, especially my mother who is known for her brutal way of giving a compliment and then taking it right back with a callous insult, kind of like a moment that's pain free and then she rips the fresh sensitive scab off and pours in a bit of vinegar and salt so the backlash is felt in threefold. Prime example, (excerpt of my life after a family reunion about ten years back so yes, scarring.)

Mom: "Your Aunt Dee was saying what a beautiful woman you turned out to be."
Me: "Well that was sweet of her."
Mom: "I think she was just in shock that I could produce a halfway decent looking child."
My thoughts: "Wow, nice to know my mother thinks I am only halfway decent looking."

Gee, thanks, Mom. I think it said more about the way she believes your aunt perceives *her* (i.e., too ugly herself to produce a beautiful child) than it did about the way she herself perceives *you*. But not especially kind, in any case.

Not a word but a value:

$10.72

Which was $427.50 on the stock market Wednesday.

But seriously: I've gotten words from people that were painful too, but you have to consider the source.

If 90% of the derogatory things cruel kids pinned on me was true then I guess that's why I made a 3.8 GPA in college, wrote a novel by 22, am getting my Master's in 2 years. Can bench-press 225 like nothing. On and on.

And the old chestnut: they're off being morons, getting drunk, complaining about age in their 20s. What they want to do. What they did in high school. And bagging my groceries.

Apologies to any supermarket employees.

Most of the posts in this thread have a common subtext: that the ability to laugh, at oneself and others, is powerful defense against words that wound.

SRD wrote:Joy is in the ears that hear, not in the mouth that speaks.

Cameraman Jenn wrote:I didn't always realize this but it doesn't really matter what other people think or say about me so much as what I think and feel about me.

Agreed. Being possessed of a (perhaps too) strong self-image, I can't say that random insults or disregard have ever bothered me much. I've always been either oblivious to them, or unable to take them seriously, because after all, I know myself better than anybody else can. And nobody has that sort of power over you unless you give it to them.

In the end, we decide (not necessarily consciously) how we react to things. Nobody can make you happy or unhappy. You do it to yourself.

--A

Avatar wrote:
In the end, we decide (not necessarily consciously) how we react to things. Nobody can make you happy or unhappy. You do it to yourself.

--A

hmmm...I'm not sure I agree with that. Probably, with learning and practice we can arrive at a point where decision enters the picture. But the hurt at root is part of our social nature...it's the flip side of empathy...and just like empathy various individuals are more, or less, capable/vulnerable. And we can encourage/respect it, or train/beat it into/out of peeps as they grow.

Thanks for this thread, Cambo.

Cambo wrote:A lesson I took immediately to heart and internalised. The trouble being, once you accept that no-one- in the entire world - likes you, where exactly do you fuck off to? In my confused and miserable youth of the time, I kept going right back to the boy who said this, and the people who agreed with him. They didn't like me, but then no-one did, and at least they kept me around for a whipping boy. It was better than being alone, because I didn't like me either.

Sigh. The lessons we learn from things... always a frustration when we "learn" things that are so untrue.

Very much reminds me of a really "this-idea-bothers-me" sort of quote about what happens when people keep their abuse in silence from this one psychology-ish book... (Lemme know if you want me to look it up.)

Cambo wrote:The deeper lesson came much later, when I could see this statement as reflecting as much about the speaker as it did about me. He never had the right to speak for everyone, and he certainly never had the right to speak for me. With this in mind, "no-one likes you" is better heard as "I don't like you," in which case fucking off is exactly what I should have done. I eventually did, to groups of people who did like me, and taught me to like myself.

Sounds like a MUCCCH more accurate and relevant interpretation to me! ...Good for you. GOOD FOR YOU.

Except there is this sadness: if he spoke those words amid the group, and others who were open to a different position (on the matter of liking you or not) remained silent... they DID give him some manner of permission to speak for the group (if not EVERYONE). *hug*

And I have surely done that number before; I'm sure we all have.

And...related to something Linna said...it might even be true that "no one likes you" in particular situations. Been there done that. The trick is discovering WHY...cuz maybe you suck, but you probably don't; mostly it's them that sucks and they "hate" you cuz you don't.
The hard part about this kind of shit is that by the time you know how to read it and handle it without damage it doesn't happen so much anymore.
[Generally speaking...certain individuals/groups hang together and never grow up as I found out recently visiting a hometown bar].

Vraith wrote:The hard part about this kind of shit is that by the time you know how to read it and handle it without damage it doesn't happen so much anymore.

Word.

I finally told my brother point-blank a few years back to stop calling me "Sisty". He hasn't done it since.

And yeah, as someone said upthread, some of it is just learning to inject some humor into the situation -- and *that* comes with self-confidence. Which for most of us is a learning curve. Except for Av, who was apparently, and most unnaturally, born with it.

I find it's easier to deal with the hurtful that the general public might deal out more so than what comes from family. Of course, you can choose your friends but you can't choose your family. I think I can pretty much say that most of the hurtful things that have struck home throughout my life pretty much all came from my mother. Then again I did have a revenge moment which turned the tables in a way. My uncle Bob's funeral was an eye opener for her. My sis and I drew straws, literally to see who would have to room with our mother. I drew the short and got stuck with it. My mother had a serious breakdown and was sobbing about how mean she had been to Bob his entire life (he was the baby, she the middle and Jerry the eldest and also golden boy). She was sobbing and bringing up specifics of things she had said or done that she regretted and I finally got tired of it and instead of being a sympathetic listener I became an active participant and started agreeing about how mean she was and giving her examples of things she had said to me in the past. I told her that she should think about how she treats everyone and what she says to people before she says it. Yes, it was a bonding moment, difficult but bonding. Now when she slips ups and says something mean I call her out on it. I also informed her that night that I would be sitting with my Aunt Dee rather than her and Ellen which set her off, she's always hated my aunt. But it was a good pivotal moment and after we all got home and went our separate ways things seemed to change with us and with her and Dee and she mentioned how her own mother had fed the fires of Dee hatred for years. Families are weird.