On the phone last night, my mother said she was hoping to have the family over for dinner on the 18th, before she leaves to spend Christmas in Texas. The 18th will be the first anniversary of my father’s death. Mom’s doing pretty well, but she mentioned that she wanted the dinner that night for “selfish reasons” that she didn’t want to be alone.
So, I was talking to my sister today and she said, “Oh, it’s the 18th? So she can drag us all to some memorial service?”
I said, “She just doesn’t want to be alone that day.”
She said, “So we can all sit around talking about how sad we are?”
You know, I can be a cynical person. I don’t think it’s one of my more attractive traits. And when I see it in others, especially at times when it seems so out of place, it just depresses me. When I told my sister that Mom wanted a distraction, she said, “She never tells me things like that.”
All I could think was no wonder! If anything she says is going to be twisted around into something unpleasant, no wonder she doesn’t tell you anything.
So, how do you handle this sort of negative thinking, either when the people around you are doing it or when, like me and my sister, you find yourself unfairly believing the worst of people?
Good Lord! I always figured people like that had families somewhere but I never could figure out who they belonged to. I know a few people like that and I believe that is a personality trait that you can’t change. I just try to minimize contact with them. Even if they end up at the same place as me, they are not going to get any conversation or more than a nod if they speak to me first.
Wow. Just, wow. I’m a cynical person, and I freely admit it. I mean, we had a really critical patient code and die right after I got to work the other night, and my first two thoughts were, “My night just got a lot easier,” and “Huh, sometimes the mean ones don’t live forever after all.” And I look at your sister’s response and think, “Damn, that’s cold.”
Youch! I’m cheerfully not uncynical myself, but that just seems heartless, especially for family - and God knows I can be cynical about my family, but they’re the only one I’ve got.
I have a sister-in-law like that. She’s the type who will poke and prod you with “you seem kind of crabby today; are you crabby?” incessantly until you snap and yell “I told you, I’m not crabby!” and she gets to “told-you-so” back in response. She will comment on things with a pessimistic opinion even if she doesn’t know what you’re going to talk about - you could start off a sentence indicating you were going to talk about something at work, and she’ll jump in with comments about how work must just suck for you, etc., even when that’s not the case. She nagged one of her sisters, who was relaxing calmly at a family gathering, about how she (the sister) should be enjoying herself because her kids were all off to college now, and wouldn’t listen to comments that she was doing fine.
While I’m not glad you have to deal with it too, I am glad that I’m not completely alone.
Actually, I know I’m not alone. I’ve seen too many threads here get derailed by someone taking a post at its absolute worst possible meaning.
Poster #1: “I should make my kid rake the leaves.”
Poster #2: “You support child slavery! You’re a terrible mother! It’s no wonder the world is a mess!”
In your sister’s case, I think maybe she doesn’t want to share her emotions (or possibly lack of them) with anyone “on queue”, per se. When you’re talking grieving, everyone does it their own way. If she’s always cynical, you just have to try to keep her from poisoning your attitude. If you’re fairly cynical, you need to stop and ask yourself why you always assume the worst. Sometimes just acknowledging that you’re being unfair can help you break the habit.
Whenever anything went even slightly wrong, my husband would always attribute the worst motives to everyone involved. Someone would miss an appointment with him, and he’d say he thought that they were probably blowing him off because they were lazy or they were passive-aggresively trying to avoid doing the thing he needed them to do. I’d say, “Gee, honey, maybe they just forgot. People do that sometimes. Or they had to deal with some emergency and didn’t have time or the means to contact you.”
This also part and parcel with him being a world-class worrier. “It’s been 3 days since I ordered that package, and it didn’t arrive today. I wonder if [shipping company of your choice] lost it or if somebody stole it, or maybe the company hasn’t even shipped it yet, but boy, I bet they already charged my credit card for it, and if they don’t ship it and if it’s lost I’ll have to dispute the bill, and the credit card company might side with them and . . .”
“Uh, yes dear. All those things are possible. Or maybe it’ll get here tomorrow.”
I’m comperatively a really laid back person, and it drives me nuts when he stresses out over things like that. He’s gotten better—or maybe he just keeps it to himself because got tired of me saying, “You know what I think you should do? You should worry about it. That’s sure to help. For goodness sake, you’d better not [call them to see what caused the mix-up / chill about it until Monday when you can check on it / forgive the guy and move on / etc. ]” which has been my stock response for a long time.
The thing I think is saddest about it is that he must think that everybody is thinking the same thing about him. How stressful would it be if you assumed that your every mistake was being interpreted as signs of malice or gross incompetence? It bugs me that he might think about me that way, too, though naturally he claims that he doesn’t.
Perhaps your mom has played the “grieving card” numerous times this year to ease her pain.
Perhaps your sister has a colder attitude towards death (as I do) and isn’t being mean, per se, but more just stating her reality, “he’s dead. let’s get over it.”
Some people think a death anniversary should be properly ignored. . .not a time to get together, to remember. Perhaps that’s all your sister is thinking and she just doesn’t phrase it all that tactfully.
Perhaps what I said really doesn’t apply at all, but there at lots of cases of your type of thinking. . .ya know, like if someone doesn’t want to “secret santa” they’re a Grinch, if they don’t want to go to a parade, they’re an old grouch, if they don’t want to dress up for Halloween, they’re no fun.
It doesn’t reflect a “negative” face, but perhaps a reluctance to put on a forced chipper one.
My mother is the most negative, cynical person I know. Don’t get me wrong, I love her, but she drives me crazy.
Me: “Hey mom, I just got a letter saying the insurance company was offering me $23,000 to settle. Isn’t that great?”
Mom: “It must have been a mistake. They’ll never give you that much.”
Me: “Hey mom, I’m really upset because I started a new cycle today. We’re not pregnant this month…again.”
Mom: “That’s because you are trying too hard. I didn’t try and look what happened to me, I got pregnant just by looking at your father. You should stop charting and seeing that specialist for all those fertility problems you supposedly have.”
Me: “Ummmm…we tried for 7 months without charting or really knowing what we were doing, it didn’t work. And not charting isn’t going to make my REAL fertility problems go away.”
Mom: “Oh, please. You should just try having sex now and then, maybe that’s the problem. You know, I’m not getting any younger and I would like to have grandchildren before I die.”
AAARRRGGGHHH!!! I have learned to stop going to my mother for support. I only tell her AFTER good things have happened…not even that I am hoping for good things because then I get the usual “don’t get your hopes up” speech. :rolleyes:
My husband drops into this mode every once in awhile. He gets it from his family. They are the most negative, complaining, cynical people alive. He really tries to not be like that, but every once in awhile, it all comes out.
This weekend, we were standing in line waiting so that our son could have his picture taken with Santa. Santa and the photographer were really taking a lot of time with each kid, talking with them, listening to their requests, etc. My husband starts getting pissed and muttering under his breath that they need to hurry up, they’re dawdling, they’re just trying to waste time until they get to go on break and leave the rest of the line standing there. Oooooh, it really annoyed me. It’s Santa!! He’s not trying to screw you!! Turns out, our boy is terrifed of Santa, so we didn’t end up actually getting a picture.
Usually, I can joke him out of being “grumpy”, but this incident really made me angry. When we got home we talked about it and it turns out my husband is really stressed over Christmas and the money it involves, combined with some other stresses. After we talked and made a plan to solve those issues, he was able to get himself out of the non-negative mood.
Anyway, maybe your sister is upset and stressed about the anniversary? Maybe she is picturing herself losing it when the date comes and is embarassed to be around the family when she does (especially if she typically puts on a tough act around you all).