Posted by WorryGirl on May 14, 2003, at 19:23:26
In reply to Re: Why?, posted by whiterabbit on May 14, 2003, at 18:56:39
> WorryGirl - methinks you have a touch of the manic depressive in you. If so...welcome, welcome to our dark little club. Don't be put off by the opium-den atmosphere - take off your shoes, sit down and relax.
>My sister is bipolar, and I always thought I had escaped it, but while living with my abusive boyfriend years ago I somehow may have learned to supress it. I showed signs when married the first time. I treated him badly at times, out of frustration for how badly his parents sometimes treated me. I shocked myself at how mean I could be to him, but so genuinely sweet to everyone else. Nobody else evoked those angry feelings. He took it meekly as I shoveled it out. The longer we were married the more enraged I felt.
> You under-estimate your gifts. Your writing is clear and intelligent. You scoff at being "sweet",
> which means you have the capacity to care deeply about someone else. Which means that, in your correspondance, in the way you relate to others,
> your conversation isn't the usual, "Mememememe and me, and did I tell you about me?" Don't ever let anyone convince you that caring for others is wrong, that you SHOULD be just as competitive and selfish as the next guy. This doesn't leave you defenseless in the rat race, because you don't have to BE in the rat race at all. Step aside, leave the race to the rats. You be sweet, girl.
>> I don't always reply to everyone when they post to me BUT I always appreciate it, I really do, when someone takes the time to answer me. (Every once in awhile I do offend somebody - not too far back, somebody called me a bigot - but those posts are few and far between.) I get support and advice here, and try to give the same in return when I feel I have something to offer. Most importantly - I believe I posted this recently to someone, can't remember who - the act of writing itself is a healing process, as it allows you to organize those thoughts in your head. When someone replies with a kind word, that's a special bonus.
>Well, this is a bonus. I've always appreciated your responses, and as I told Lee, you, too, have a gift with words (as do so many others). You each have your own special style and it works for you.
I think I remember reading that you once were into the Gothic lifestyle before it was really hip? I can see that in you, which is cool, but I also see a soft, sweet side that you may not show on the surface, but it's there in your words.
In the mid 80s I hung out with a girl who convinced me that my best look was black hair and pale skin. It wasn't truly gothic but I had people calling me Morticia or Elvira for a while!
> So don't cut yourself off from that! I can tell you, the way we see ourselves and the way others see us is quite different. We're not flat, one-dimensional beings, we're all multi-faceted as jewels, presenting different sides of ourself to others. This doesn't mean we're deceptive, just complex. For instance, my husband thinks I'm impossibly strange and probably quite mad. (And he does know how to push those buttons that set me off, quite right.) But not everybody has that opinion of me and I will no longer let him convince me that I'm some kind of freak because we're polar opposites...we might be very different, but that doesn't make ME wrong or wierd
> or somehow inferior to him. Just different. Hallalujah for different.
> -GracieI think different or strange is good! I know I've said this somewhere before, but as long as it isn't accompanied by super bad breath and/or b.o., I like weird.
Once, in a conversation with a woman who didn't like me, I said, "Well, I guess I'm just too weird". And she said, "Don't flatter yourself. It takes a few brain cells to be weird". That hurt!
I think it's my meekness that makes me appear dumb sometimes. Since I'm not that way with my husband he can't see it. He sees me as "different in a good way". He says that's why he fell in love with me. That was 8-9 years ago. I wonder if he still feels the same!
poster:WorryGirl
thread:226613
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20030506/msgs/226685.html