i really need to vent here!

[quankanne]

as one of the pathetic ones who's been offering encouragement and support to some of the posters, here's my take on it:

 

it's easy to tell someone, 'grow up, blah- blah, you're whining for nothing,' and a bit more challenging to truly offer help when someone needs it. Until last winter, I didn't understand how chronic pain/illness affected someone's mental outlook, but now that I do, I tend to be more empathatic when someone talks about those kinds of problems because I know that it's a complex issue. Getting into someone's face just because you don't/you refuse to understand tends to compound the problem, not help solve it.

 

if we appear to be too touchy-feely for your liking, well, consider yourself blessed with ignorance of how life actually works. Men and women DO get involved in relationships that are toxic. There ARE people out there who like playing mind games with their friends/lovers/spouses. People DO feel hurt and pain over their problems, even when the solution is obvious to us. So if we discern that one of the posters needs some kind of support, who are you to deny them? Until you've experienced their problems, don't be so dismissive of them -- at some point, it could be you in need of the comfort we've tried to provide all along.

[Just A Girl2]

I have lived with chronic pain as a result of a motor vehicle accident, for the past 8 years. I know all about being debilitated, having decreased movement and mobility and having to deal with pain on a daily basis. Many people do. I have also had to deal with chronic illnesses such as severe endometriosis and interstitial cystitis. I am no stranger to chronic pain or difficulties or discomfort. However, I don't use what life's given me, as a convenient excuse to wallow in self-pity, or play the victim. I am not alone, for there are millions who don't, either.

 

There is a vast difference between offering support to someone in a place such as this, and enabling them to remain playing the victim.

 

Many of us have been in toxic relationships. It seems to be the norm these days. But there's this concept called self-empowerment. Some of you might want to read up on it.

 

There's also this concept of self-accountability. And this one about personal choice.

 

From what I read amongst the enabling and victim-ish ladies here, is a resounding need to receive sympathy from one another, while taking no steps to help oneself.

 

This place can be used as a sounding board, but when people are posting about the exact same complaints and problems for over 2 years, that's indicative of someone not doing anything constructive to make changes in their life.

 

This place isn't a substitute for professional help. This place isn't going to be the magic "fix" to anyone's troubled life.

 

There comes a time in everyone's life where you just have to accept what life has given you, be an adult, take the advice you've been given and take the bull by the horns and make some changes. In during that process, stop blaming everyone and everything for your sh#tty life.

 

There are so many convenient disorders out there today, seems that everyone has one. Chronic fatigue, anxiety, panic disorder, agoraphobia, stress, seasonal affective disorder, just to name a few. No doubt that these are legitimate disorders, but they are often used and abused. We have a problem in life and we choose to wallow in self pity and play the victim, then it's easy to just blame it on our "disorder."

 

What was life like 25 years ago, when none of these disorders were known? 50 years ago? 100 years ago? Women had much tougher lives back then. There were no modern conveniences (or less), women didn't have the option to pursue a formal education and have a career, women didn't have the freedoms and choices they have now. Right?

 

HERE we have people posting bizarre and paranoid beliefs, and nobody is even stopping to question them, when even a child would shake their head and think "something doesn't make sense here." A lot of you ladies are coddling each other, and being all nicey nicey, but let's get with reality.

 

How many times is Crystal going to post complaining about her boyfriend? How many times is she going to call him a jerk? How many times is she going to threaten to leave him but then say she can't because she doesn't work and can't afford to leave? How many times are people going to give her the same advice: to either get her act together and leave, or quit complaining? How many times are people going to keep repeating their good and heartfelt advice, only for her to come back a few days later, posting about the same stuff?

 

How many times are peole going to come here pouting that they didn't get the sympathy they were wanting? This isn't a sympathy forum. Nor is this a place for people who have intense psychological or reality problems.

 

How many times are people like Crystal told about good books that would help her? Only she's still back here, sounding like a stuck record? What is she doing to help herself? Nothing. She just puts all the blame on her boyfriend and her health. Where's the personal accountability? Is someone putting a gun to her head to force her to stay with a man she calls a jerk and other foul names? There are woman in much worse situations....who are beaten within an inch of their lives...who have small children.....who live with a spouse who controls their every move......who has them living in fear on a daily basis.....yet countless women in these situations gather up the courage and smarts to make changes, and they leave. Now THESE are women with problems.

 

Reading a lot of the posts here, by the women who do all the complaining and coddling and enabling, it's no wonder that men often view women as weak and nagging.

 

Just my opinion.

[Ally Boo]

Life is short....you have to do what makes you happy. And if some people are happy with dysfunction...then so be it. Its not your business. But if you can help another person, in any way, you've made your life worth living. Live your life how you want to. But if someone else has another way to live it...you'll never get them to change their mind...all you can do is be there. And THAT, my friends, is the beauty of this board. Tolerance truely is a gift....if you learn to have that in your life, you will be much happier.