a couple more thoughts
it seems that if a feeling is not conveyed in the correct manner it has no validity and that a person can be justified in invalidating your feeling and internalizing it and then using it against you because its become not about your feeling but how you made them feel by expressing your feeling? So their feeling is more important than your feeling?
I understand that long term exposure to negativity can begin to wear on a person and their beginning to not really care anymore about the cause of the problem but rather focus on the results of the problem.
So if I'm having a bad day and I say something that is a sweeping generalization, its ok for the person I'm looking for support from to interpret it in the worst possible way.
Is that a way to live life - having to ensure that everything you say is phrased exactly correctly so you get some validation?
This is actually one of the most dangerous things I've learned in therapy - that my feelings matter and that I should express them. Bullsh*t because apparently the caveat for that is "only express them in exactly the right way"
I agree with many of posters here that say that its important how things are phrased and I have followed through on the advice and while I don't think there was necessarily any benefit to me beyond not having a continued argument about what I said, at least there was that.
one of the things that I try to remember is to think outwardly and that's what I think a number of people here are trying to say but it just seems curious to me that I can't or shouldn't expect reciprocation.