Comment by geocrasher

5 years ago

When my wife was dying (she has since passed away) and nobody could figure out her illness, she'd be in the most wretched pain, in the ER again, and she'd be retching awfully and almost uncontrollably.

A doctor would walk in, having heard of all this already and ask "How are you?"

Sometimes she gave them the benefit of the doubt, and sometimes she was a bit less charitable.

My point? Americans (as she was), Russians, Ukrainians, Latvians, Japanese, Kurdish, Bolivians, Icelandians, Koreans, Germans, Chinese, Scottish, Irish, Australians, Austrians, Swiss, South Africans, Egyptians, Mixolydians, Bohemians, and even Canadians all agree one one thing:

Being asked "How are you?" is the LAST thing somebody wants to hear when they are suffering.

23 comments

geocrasher

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cycomanic  5 years ago

But in this you can also see the difference between an American and many others. I find the "how are you greeting" very tiring nomatter how I am. When I am being asked the question I internally go through an assessment of, how am I today, how interested is the person, how much do I want to share of this. It takes significant mental effort.

When I was a teenager I did a one year high school exchange to the US and for a long time I really struggled with the daily "what's up?". I was going through the above internal dialogue more than 10 times a day struggling to come up with an answer. Even, when I learned to just answer "yeah what's up" internally the dialogue would often still be triggered.

iJohnDoe  5 years ago

I’m very sorry to hear that, for both you and your wife.

I hope any healthcare for your wife was eventually able to manage her pain and make her at least comfortable.

  • geocrasher  5 years ago

    Thank you. For the most part she was, but it was a pretty awful thing that happened so there was only so much that could be done. But I appreciate it. The last year of her life saw her getting the best care she'd ever had. Unfortunately, it was hospice care. But it was in home, and my adult daughter and I took care of her til the end.

sunshineforever  5 years ago

I have a difficult life and I'm growing very tired of this question. I've even had to ask some of my neighbors not to greet me that way.

  • geocrasher  5 years ago

    Indeed. People do not realize how destructive it is. The other one that really irks me is "let me know if you need anything!"

    1) You are putting it on me to tell you that I need something, right in the middle of my need. 2) If you're my real friend you don't need to say that, I already know I can call you 24/7/365 3) Your willingness to help is nulled by your lack of initiative.

    The best thing anyone ever did was call me and say "I'm at Costco. What do you need? And don't say 'nothing'. I'm going to bring you something, and that's that." That whole pizza and frozen burritos were bad for me, but the last thing I needed on my mind at that time was cooking. And that's what true friends are there for.

    So don't say "If you need anything let me know!" It's borderline passive aggressive.

    • jwilber  5 years ago

      I hope this doesn’t come off belittling but my only reaction to reading this is that some people can find a reason to get upset over anything.

      6 replies →

    • scrollaway  5 years ago

      > Your willingness to help is nulled by your lack of initiative.

      I understand your point and i know it's a difficult question to deal with sometimes, especially during depression.

      But remember that you're not those people's top priority. That sentence means you are allowed to ask them for stuff, but it doesn't mean they're going to drop everything and take you into their care right now without you taking a few steps on your own. They consider that you have enough of your own agency.

      Your willingness to be helped is nulled by that same lack of initiative on your part.

      A trick is to find something easy to ask for, as a go-to response to that. For example, the next time someone says that to you, you could answer:

      "Actually, life has been tough lately, a beer would be nice".

      7 replies →

    • grep_name  5 years ago

      Different strokes. I just told a friend that they should let me know if there's anything I can do to help, which I've never done before (for this friend). His mother is having surgery this week. I've known this person my whole life and he's a lot like me, so I know that taking your advice wouldn't be the right path for this.

      I would like to be told by a friend that they care about me and would like to help in some way if they can. What I wouldn't like is if they said "OK, I'm going to choose a thing that I think I would want in your situation and do it for you, and you have no choice because I'm going to do it anyway." Chances are, what you thought was helpful is NOT what I need in a difficult moment and I don't want to be subjected to another person's choices being superimposed on my situation. Lucky for me I know that my friend feels the same way, and we have different ways of approaching these things with each other because of it.

      "I'm at Costco. What do you need? And don't say 'nothing'. I'm going to bring you something, and that's that" seems incredibly aggressive to me, and if I had many friends who behaved that way I would be endlessly frustrated.