Couch 140: Knocking pans

No, you are certainly not alone. I could have written your post! I'm working on negative self talk right now myself, and it's helping (?)

((Elio))

non sequitur: T just called me. He wasn't sure about me coming in today because they're laying new carpet in the hall outside of his office. Asked if I want to cancel. Uhh...no? But I should probably leave early in case it's super difficult to get in.

I do exactly this, always have, even when I was little

It fails miserably 8 times out of 10 (thinking people might come looking)

I had a quasi-nightmare that this person I detest was driving me to every rehearsal I had this week, but we were egregiously late to all of them because he wasted so much time explaining things to me.

This is based in real life. Sample convo:

HP (hated person): I hope you have your headlights on
Me: Yes, I do
HP: because it's not dark but it's raining and that's the new law
Me: yes, I know. In the state where I grew up it was always the law
HP: well, you should make sure you always do it because it really boosts your visibility and reduces- ME: YES HP THANK YOU I KNOW

OMG--this is what I deal with on an almost daily basis with a sibling's spouse and I cannot shut it down. It's like they have a repeater chip in their brain that spews instructions and complaints and it cannot be stopped. Sometimes, I literally slump over and they still do not notice or take a hint that I managed to somehow absorb their blunt force message the first time.

He and I are particularly bad because instead of getting road rage, I ask rhetorical questions (which he feels prompted to answer since he's so good at answering)

Me: come on blue car, don't brake! You can do it! Why are you braking? There's no need to brake right now!
HP: well if I had to guess, the blue car is driving too closely behind the car in front of it and is reacting to their... (Anais cannot listen because she has exploded into tiny tiny bits)

Morning couchies. I'm starting on the 2nd assignment for my writing class this morning. The first question is "Why do you want to tell this story (what is your passion)?" That stopped me, I didn't know. So I got on Facebook, the wonderful tool of distraction. Only I think I found my story there. One of my friends posted about her son being bullied in grade school and that brought back for me my own grade school years - all 6 years I was bullied (before bullying was even a thing people talked about) by the same child. He was horrible to me. He would regularly punch me, kick me, throw big rocks at my head, destroy my school projects, throw my class work out the window of the classroom, spread terrible rumors about me, he was so awful. And my parents did nothing even though I told them about it all the time. So I'm finding my passion in that. I'll use the template they suggest "What if (protagonist) set out to (task) in order to (goal for the greater good) and discovered (inner self-revelation)?"

What if the little girl set out to befriend the bully in order to keep him from beating up the new girl in class and discovered that she actually does have self-esteem/self confidence?

This is not going to be easy I don't think, but ultimately I think it's going to be very therapeutic. I'm going to have to write into the story somehow why the bully acts like he does and it dawns on me that I might after all these many many many years finally be able to find some compassion for the wounded little boy HE must have been, I do believe that children are innocent, somebody did something to him to make him act that way towards me, and I may just be able to finally forgive him after what 44 years now? Wow. I need a break already...

This is why you are a better person than me, art. My template would be, What if the little girl set out to learn how to fight in order to beat the bully up and discovered she had a really mean left hook?

My pacifist self never would have thought of that.... but that would be a really big challenge for me to write it that way!

I call that, i backseat drive AND frontseat drive. Not everybody can do that!

When I complained to my mom about my bully in kindergarten, she sarcastically said "so beat him up." Obviously the sarcasm was lost on me, being five, so the next time he tried to pull my hair I really did beat him up. He ran for his life and I chased him all over the playground. We both got detention and he never bullied me again. His name was Scott and to this day I dislike people named Scott.

See? Deterrence works!

Best. Post. Evah!

This is probably one of my biggest problems. I quit a sport i enjoyed, even though it is such a difficult sport and requires you to be mentally tough (which i am not) bc a friend that I care about too much said something that really hurt my feelings.
She apologized almost immediately, but my brain just shut down. That was in early January.
As I sit home weekend after weekend, I realize that no one REALLY cares that I quit. The sport that I had been trying for over a year.
My T keeps trying to convince me to go back, and I did go to one meeting, and one pseudo-practice, but it is so hard, especially feeling so worthless.

So, I totally get it. There is someone on the team who is persistent and she is the only reason I haven't cut off all contact. So, at least one person gets it I guess. I wish it felt like enough.

Oh dear. I would turn my full road rage on him. Also, my yelling at cars in front of me usings many more expletives
omg. hahaha, i'm sorry if this is a bad memory for you--but it is sort of awesome in a female-empowering way.

I don't think children are all that innocent(is being innocent a real thing even?). They really do (from my couple of years as a preschool/toddler watcher at a day care - I worked that at the end of college and before law school) have different personalities - some are rougher, some are wimpys who cry at the drop of a hat, some are independent, some are clingy, some are already little narcs, some are... - I don't think everything stems from someone else having done something to you - even as children.

i wouldn't put it that children aren't innocent, but more that personality is a strong factor in how a child sees and reacts to the world.

A woman i worked with had a betta fish that i related too. I think an infant has a bigger brain than a betta fish. Give em a few months, and no theyre not "innocent" anymore - they have been affected by their relations with the outside world. They are affected even in the womb. So "innocent" is kind of meaningless. Nurture starts happening immediately.

I believe in nature over nurture. I think nurture has some role but nature is dominant.

Maybe I just need to believe that I was innocent. I don't know. I didn't do anything to deserve the crap at home and I didn't do anything to him either. Maybe he was just an evil little monster. I don't know. But I think for the sake of my own healing, I need to decide that he was innocent and had something happen to him that caused him to beat me up, so I can forgive him already. I seem to combine everything I do with therapy, don't I. Goddess I just want to be done with formal therapy so much. This therapy stuff has permeated every blasted area of my life so why do I need to actually GO there still?! Hmph. I need to go work on my story.

It figures una and SD are on opposite sides of the nature-nurture debate.

So let's test this further:

Boxers or briefs?
Coke or Pepsi?
Microsoft or Apple?
Star Wars or Star Trek?
Sean Connery or Roger Moore?

I'd add reason or emotion, but I think we all know the answer to that one.

And the all-important.... sleeping in socks or bare feet?

OMG I LOVE IT SO MUCH!

What - who the hell sleeps wearing socks?!!

(Hello couch!)

Oh, also, I saw that Satsuma was posting here a bit and therefore I really need to present them with this cushion:

Socks. Definitely

Get out.
Just kidding, but seriously, don't sleep in socks.

I stopped sleeping with my bra on a few years ago. Getting to the socks slowly