Not that we’re supposed to call it a “relationship.” It’s a “situation.”
February 25, 2020 2:05 PM Subscribe
Ask Polly counsels a women who moved off-grid with an emotionally stunted older man: “All of these allergies to love are really a longing for love in disguise. You can see that now, right? You haven’t fallen in love before because you’ve never taken the risk of making yourself vulnerable to another human being before. You chose to pioneer with a robot just so you could finally experience vulnerability. AND IT’S WORKING! Isn’t that cause for celebration? I’m serious! Now you finally know how much you value love! Now you realize that love needs to be affirmed through words! Now you know that you need verbal proof that this man loves you!”
Her reply starts: “Dear Please Just Say I Love You Goddammit,
Okay, let me catch my breath here. Eight months of hot sex inspired you to purchase an off-grid farm with no hot water, toilets, showers, heating, or any steady electrical source, with an emotionally stunted man 20 years older than you.
Let’s just… Okay… We need to just take in the glory of this decision. We need to really soak in your devotion to an emotional version of extreme sports. Because right now, your life is like that show where athletes train to compete on an incredibly taxing and impossible obstacle course while the cameras roll, except replace the bright lights and giant foam mountains and high wires with shitting into a hole in the ground and living in isolation with someone who doesn’t believe in feelings, let alone believe in using words to express those feelings.”
And ends what (obviously) is a huge DTMFA with this call to action:
“So welcome this gift of a curse. Welcome this curse of a gift. Fill your heart with gratitude, because now you know that every gift is a kind of a curse and every curse is a kind of a gift. Each day brings you more riches. Treasure all of this.
This is how it feels to no longer be a robot. This is how it feels to be wide awake and alive. Treasure it.”
Her reply starts: “Dear Please Just Say I Love You Goddammit,
Okay, let me catch my breath here. Eight months of hot sex inspired you to purchase an off-grid farm with no hot water, toilets, showers, heating, or any steady electrical source, with an emotionally stunted man 20 years older than you.
Let’s just… Okay… We need to just take in the glory of this decision. We need to really soak in your devotion to an emotional version of extreme sports. Because right now, your life is like that show where athletes train to compete on an incredibly taxing and impossible obstacle course while the cameras roll, except replace the bright lights and giant foam mountains and high wires with shitting into a hole in the ground and living in isolation with someone who doesn’t believe in feelings, let alone believe in using words to express those feelings.”
And ends what (obviously) is a huge DTMFA with this call to action:
“So welcome this gift of a curse. Welcome this curse of a gift. Fill your heart with gratitude, because now you know that every gift is a kind of a curse and every curse is a kind of a gift. Each day brings you more riches. Treasure all of this.
This is how it feels to no longer be a robot. This is how it feels to be wide awake and alive. Treasure it.”
I get that Polly has to be supportive, and she has a certain schtick, but if this woman were my friend I'd beg her to come back to the city immediately and talk to a lawyer. The situation sounds like it could get unsafe for her really quickly.
posted by airmail at 2:35 PM on February 25, 2020 [12 favorites]
posted by airmail at 2:35 PM on February 25, 2020 [12 favorites]
What could be more divine and perfect than living in isolated, uncomfortable filth with a mean, withholding daddy?
Your life is a neurotic emotional overachiever’s ultimate fantasy. Next-level overachievers are on a lifelong quest to overcome all weakness.
...these labels elevated you above the need for human connection, societal approval, and traditional relationship norms.
YOU DON’T CARE, YOU’RE COMMITTED TO THIS, THIS IS ABOUT LOGIC, YOU ARE SIMPLY A MATCH, THIS IS WHAT YOUR BRAIN HAS DECIDED YOU SHOULD DO AND YOU’RE STICKING TO IT, GODDAMN IT
I don't identify with this at all, I rebuke this, this has nothing to do with me, I have never done anything like this, absolutely nothing in my life could have set me up to find myself in a situation like this, and further more how dare you.
Also, I really liked this passage:
Once you have a lot of compassion for people and a lot of compassion for yourself, you don’t see everything through the lens of people punishing each other. A lot of times people are just weak and confused and needy. A lot of people are in unhappy marriages, too, but they don’t know what to do about it. A lot of people are craving more love and excitement in their lives. That’s natural. It’s just important to know yourself very well, and to realize what you can and can’t live with, and to recognize who might get hurt along the way if you do whatever the fuck you want at every single turn.
It’s important to know yourself well. That requires the kind of deep self-reflection that people love to deride these days, as if it’s just a big masturbatory exercise and not something that helps people BE BETTER and MORE HONEST and MORE COMPASSIONATE.
We throw around the word "mindfulness" alot and it's gotten a bad wrap, but when I think about mindfulness (and Buddhism) it's this kind of stuff that gets lost in all the bad associations we've created around those words.
posted by bleep at 2:42 PM on February 25, 2020 [21 favorites]
Your life is a neurotic emotional overachiever’s ultimate fantasy. Next-level overachievers are on a lifelong quest to overcome all weakness.
...these labels elevated you above the need for human connection, societal approval, and traditional relationship norms.
YOU DON’T CARE, YOU’RE COMMITTED TO THIS, THIS IS ABOUT LOGIC, YOU ARE SIMPLY A MATCH, THIS IS WHAT YOUR BRAIN HAS DECIDED YOU SHOULD DO AND YOU’RE STICKING TO IT, GODDAMN IT
I don't identify with this at all, I rebuke this, this has nothing to do with me, I have never done anything like this, absolutely nothing in my life could have set me up to find myself in a situation like this, and further more how dare you.
Also, I really liked this passage:
Once you have a lot of compassion for people and a lot of compassion for yourself, you don’t see everything through the lens of people punishing each other. A lot of times people are just weak and confused and needy. A lot of people are in unhappy marriages, too, but they don’t know what to do about it. A lot of people are craving more love and excitement in their lives. That’s natural. It’s just important to know yourself very well, and to realize what you can and can’t live with, and to recognize who might get hurt along the way if you do whatever the fuck you want at every single turn.
It’s important to know yourself well. That requires the kind of deep self-reflection that people love to deride these days, as if it’s just a big masturbatory exercise and not something that helps people BE BETTER and MORE HONEST and MORE COMPASSIONATE.
We throw around the word "mindfulness" alot and it's gotten a bad wrap, but when I think about mindfulness (and Buddhism) it's this kind of stuff that gets lost in all the bad associations we've created around those words.
posted by bleep at 2:42 PM on February 25, 2020 [21 favorites]
But yes, I hope the letter writer has someone in her life to tell her to come home, or an AskMe account.
posted by bleep at 2:45 PM on February 25, 2020 [13 favorites]
posted by bleep at 2:45 PM on February 25, 2020 [13 favorites]
I appreciated Polly's response as a piece of daffy and freewheeling prose disconnected from someone's actual situation, but under the circumstances I think I'd rather hand it over to one of the commenters.
LW needs to know exactly what her legal rights are if she wants to get out of this. If she speaks up to this unemotional man she may find he DOES have emotions and they're very negative when the woman he's managed to isolate from civilization suddenly has a mind of her own.
posted by mykescipark at 3:14 PM on February 25, 2020 [60 favorites]
LW needs to know exactly what her legal rights are if she wants to get out of this. If she speaks up to this unemotional man she may find he DOES have emotions and they're very negative when the woman he's managed to isolate from civilization suddenly has a mind of her own.
posted by mykescipark at 3:14 PM on February 25, 2020 [60 favorites]
Yeah, this is one of those "I don't have emotions, what do you mean, anger counts as an emotion?" types.
posted by praemunire at 3:15 PM on February 25, 2020 [15 favorites]
posted by praemunire at 3:15 PM on February 25, 2020 [15 favorites]
Annotations and marginalia!
Everyone I know — every living being — is attracted to the shadow this way. We all find some form of alternative timeline alluring.
Yes. See also: The opening monologue in Slacker. This is certainly an abiding interest.
For intellectuals and neurotics and overachievers who were raised by other intellectuals and neurotics and overachievers, this is even more true. But meanwhile, the planet seems to be dying in front of our very eyes! So even if you’re determined to encounter the people in your life with a compassionate, open heart and you’re determined to cultivate gratitude for everything you have...it’s still possible to emerge from a long period of soothing love and gratitude with a distinct feeling that, I don’t know, you might just be dead soon so why not have everything you’ve ever wanted immediately?
Yes. There's all kinds of reasons we might be dying soon. You might as well live your life. That was one thing I remember my aunt repeating all the time when I was a kid, perhaps hoping my mother would hear it sooner than she did: Life is for the living.
And I want to just stand up for what you’re digging for, in this gargantuan-sea-change, shock-to-the-system of a life that you’ve created. Obviously you were trying to build something completely different from anything you’ve ever had before. Isn’t that at least a tiny bit admirable and interesting? And didn’t you stand up for your strange desires in a bold and courageous way, when everyone around you was saying, “What in the hell?” and “Please seek help”? I feel like there’s something to be said for having the conviction to thumb your nose at the world in such an audacious fashion.
I’m very into both the shadow and audacity itself at the moment. I’m very into honoring my most confusing and bewildering and deliriously irrational desires — not just honoring them, but actively stating them out loud and standing up for them and refusing to feel ashamed of them. I feel pretty strongly that you can do these things without hurting other people, if you’re honest about everything.
I mean, I think it's admirable and interesting. And I have been standing up for my strange desires in a bold and courageous way lately, even as so many of my friends seem determined to become an annexation of the Matrix and the Man. This is the kind of stuff that Rob Brezsny says all the time, and I loved him for it for a long time, before I let myself realize how casually white-guy appropriative his column is. I still resonate with writings that see the world that way. Same for Richard Bach, back in the day. I still think these are important things and that moving beyond whatever shame others might want me to feel about my life choices is exceedingly important.
These days, people love to harp on how self-involved and shameless and awful those who trumpet the importance of living without shame and doing what they really want are, as if they’re the most lamentably selfish motherfuckers on the face of the Earth. But the truth is that when you refuse to feel ashamed of the fact that you’re a human animal with needs, it really clarifies and sharpens your values and principles. You can slow down and identify what you’re really looking for. You can recognize the shadow in some of your desires. You can see how arbitrary your needs and attractions are. And you can feel the pull of certain desires without surrendering yourself to them, because you know in your heart what will feed you and what won’t.
Yes. Sometimes it's exceedingly important to be selfish and do what you want. Say what you feel; ask for what you want. I hope the letter-writer can do that for real, because being someone who's unafraid to radically change their life is intensely powerful if you're actually changing it to get what you want. Side note: It's interesting how ascendent so many ideas are right now that were in currency when our parents were our age (speaking for myself as a high millennial, in any case), for instance living off the grid and homesteading, polyamory, embracing radical change... These are such boomer ideas in their own way, and perhaps they do read as self-indulgent—but maybe there's a way that our generation can transcend the shortcomings of those ideas and do better by them.
So then I started to write about how marriage was actually a living nightmare of bad sounds, coming from the same tedious human, for the long stretch of your remaining days on the planet.
Written like someone who perhaps married someone with a severe chronic illness that's a symphony of bad sounds! I know that reality too.
That doesn’t mean that the perfect answer is to abscond to the big city and start sleeping with an emotionally available man ten years younger than you who drives a Range Rover to his job at the investment bank. Who knows what kind of a life you’ll design for yourself from this point forward?
Hahaha. But no, no, right, it means the answer is to abscond to the big city and start sleeping with an emotionally available man 10 years younger than you who intensely shares your values, then move back off the grid together when you're with someone who can meet you where you are and relate and connect and share and grow. At least, that's one possible answer in a world of interesting answers!
You have a lot of exploring to do, that’s all. The first step is this: State what you want out loud, using words. When you state your desires directly and ask for exactly what you want, you are also saying, “I am a human being who deserves things.” And you’re saying, “I feel vulnerable and scared, but I’m not going to settle for less than what I need.” Plus you’re saying, “My desires matter to me, and I’m going to honor them.”
Yes. Stating your intent is in fact the basis of magic, self-made or otherwise.
Anyway, I loved this piece for all that it is. I saw myself in it for sure, and while I can imagine certain of my friends reading it and wanting to send me pieces of it like "See? This is what I'm talking about when it comes to your behavior!" I can also imagine sending them pieces of it to the tune of "See?! This is what I'm talking about and why I love the life I'm living." Thanks for this!
posted by limeonaire at 3:22 PM on February 25, 2020 [7 favorites]
Everyone I know — every living being — is attracted to the shadow this way. We all find some form of alternative timeline alluring.
Yes. See also: The opening monologue in Slacker. This is certainly an abiding interest.
For intellectuals and neurotics and overachievers who were raised by other intellectuals and neurotics and overachievers, this is even more true. But meanwhile, the planet seems to be dying in front of our very eyes! So even if you’re determined to encounter the people in your life with a compassionate, open heart and you’re determined to cultivate gratitude for everything you have...it’s still possible to emerge from a long period of soothing love and gratitude with a distinct feeling that, I don’t know, you might just be dead soon so why not have everything you’ve ever wanted immediately?
Yes. There's all kinds of reasons we might be dying soon. You might as well live your life. That was one thing I remember my aunt repeating all the time when I was a kid, perhaps hoping my mother would hear it sooner than she did: Life is for the living.
And I want to just stand up for what you’re digging for, in this gargantuan-sea-change, shock-to-the-system of a life that you’ve created. Obviously you were trying to build something completely different from anything you’ve ever had before. Isn’t that at least a tiny bit admirable and interesting? And didn’t you stand up for your strange desires in a bold and courageous way, when everyone around you was saying, “What in the hell?” and “Please seek help”? I feel like there’s something to be said for having the conviction to thumb your nose at the world in such an audacious fashion.
I’m very into both the shadow and audacity itself at the moment. I’m very into honoring my most confusing and bewildering and deliriously irrational desires — not just honoring them, but actively stating them out loud and standing up for them and refusing to feel ashamed of them. I feel pretty strongly that you can do these things without hurting other people, if you’re honest about everything.
I mean, I think it's admirable and interesting. And I have been standing up for my strange desires in a bold and courageous way lately, even as so many of my friends seem determined to become an annexation of the Matrix and the Man. This is the kind of stuff that Rob Brezsny says all the time, and I loved him for it for a long time, before I let myself realize how casually white-guy appropriative his column is. I still resonate with writings that see the world that way. Same for Richard Bach, back in the day. I still think these are important things and that moving beyond whatever shame others might want me to feel about my life choices is exceedingly important.
These days, people love to harp on how self-involved and shameless and awful those who trumpet the importance of living without shame and doing what they really want are, as if they’re the most lamentably selfish motherfuckers on the face of the Earth. But the truth is that when you refuse to feel ashamed of the fact that you’re a human animal with needs, it really clarifies and sharpens your values and principles. You can slow down and identify what you’re really looking for. You can recognize the shadow in some of your desires. You can see how arbitrary your needs and attractions are. And you can feel the pull of certain desires without surrendering yourself to them, because you know in your heart what will feed you and what won’t.
Yes. Sometimes it's exceedingly important to be selfish and do what you want. Say what you feel; ask for what you want. I hope the letter-writer can do that for real, because being someone who's unafraid to radically change their life is intensely powerful if you're actually changing it to get what you want. Side note: It's interesting how ascendent so many ideas are right now that were in currency when our parents were our age (speaking for myself as a high millennial, in any case), for instance living off the grid and homesteading, polyamory, embracing radical change... These are such boomer ideas in their own way, and perhaps they do read as self-indulgent—but maybe there's a way that our generation can transcend the shortcomings of those ideas and do better by them.
So then I started to write about how marriage was actually a living nightmare of bad sounds, coming from the same tedious human, for the long stretch of your remaining days on the planet.
Written like someone who perhaps married someone with a severe chronic illness that's a symphony of bad sounds! I know that reality too.
That doesn’t mean that the perfect answer is to abscond to the big city and start sleeping with an emotionally available man ten years younger than you who drives a Range Rover to his job at the investment bank. Who knows what kind of a life you’ll design for yourself from this point forward?
Hahaha. But no, no, right, it means the answer is to abscond to the big city and start sleeping with an emotionally available man 10 years younger than you who intensely shares your values, then move back off the grid together when you're with someone who can meet you where you are and relate and connect and share and grow. At least, that's one possible answer in a world of interesting answers!
You have a lot of exploring to do, that’s all. The first step is this: State what you want out loud, using words. When you state your desires directly and ask for exactly what you want, you are also saying, “I am a human being who deserves things.” And you’re saying, “I feel vulnerable and scared, but I’m not going to settle for less than what I need.” Plus you’re saying, “My desires matter to me, and I’m going to honor them.”
Yes. Stating your intent is in fact the basis of magic, self-made or otherwise.
Anyway, I loved this piece for all that it is. I saw myself in it for sure, and while I can imagine certain of my friends reading it and wanting to send me pieces of it like "See? This is what I'm talking about when it comes to your behavior!" I can also imagine sending them pieces of it to the tune of "See?! This is what I'm talking about and why I love the life I'm living." Thanks for this!
posted by limeonaire at 3:22 PM on February 25, 2020 [7 favorites]
So welcome this gift of a curse. Welcome this curse of a gift. Fill your heart with gratitude, because now you know that every gift is a kind of a curse and every curse is a kind of a gift. Each day brings you more riches. Treasure all of this.
This is how it feels to no longer be a robot. This is how it feels to be wide awake and alive. Treasure it.
This is where I am in life and y'all, it's absolutely fucking amazing. Getting here was hard and I have many physical and emotional scars from the path my life has led. But damn it was worth it to know what this kind of empowering freedom feels like.
posted by nikaspark at 3:32 PM on February 25, 2020 [24 favorites]
This is how it feels to no longer be a robot. This is how it feels to be wide awake and alive. Treasure it.
This is where I am in life and y'all, it's absolutely fucking amazing. Getting here was hard and I have many physical and emotional scars from the path my life has led. But damn it was worth it to know what this kind of empowering freedom feels like.
posted by nikaspark at 3:32 PM on February 25, 2020 [24 favorites]
I think I might have actually seen this exact situation last night on TV. Discovery in Japan shows most of the same shows, just, y'know, a couple years late, and there are some I just find myself watching, especially the ones about people (usually unbelievably dumb) living off grid, and last night, the one about the train line in Alaska that also sort of serves the offgridders that live along it. And, on last night's episode, there was a couple living in a cabin with a small infant. The woman was in her early twenties, and the guy was 20 years older than her. She said she'd just come to see Alaska on a short trip, met the guy, and fell in love, and now there she was, living off grid with the guy. The dynamic between them was clearly that he was in charge and would make the decisions. The whole thing felt incredibly uncomfortable, and made me wonder about these shows and the crews. How do they deal with situations like that?
posted by Ghidorah at 4:57 PM on February 25, 2020 [4 favorites]
posted by Ghidorah at 4:57 PM on February 25, 2020 [4 favorites]
Well. My now-ex husband left me for a younger, more alcoholic, less stable, less boring, prettier, less fat I'm not even going to finish typing, I'm just gonna go cry in the work bathroom again.
posted by Occula at 5:29 PM on February 25, 2020 [21 favorites]
posted by Occula at 5:29 PM on February 25, 2020 [21 favorites]
Your life is a neurotic emotional overachiever’s ultimate fantasy
Yes it is *sigh*
posted by ipsative at 5:31 PM on February 25, 2020 [5 favorites]
Yes it is *sigh*
posted by ipsative at 5:31 PM on February 25, 2020 [5 favorites]
Oh Polly, this is exactly what I needed to hear today.
posted by ipsative at 5:46 PM on February 25, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by ipsative at 5:46 PM on February 25, 2020 [3 favorites]
For all that is good and holy, someone please edit Polly and slash out 3/4 of the text of her answers. There's about 6 plugs for her book in there, and she only has one idea but it takes her FORTY paragraphs to spit it out.
posted by See you tomorrow, saguaro at 6:08 PM on February 25, 2020 [29 favorites]
posted by See you tomorrow, saguaro at 6:08 PM on February 25, 2020 [29 favorites]
*hugs occula virtually and notes that the other woman is definitely going to be more of a problem someday that her ex will regret.*
posted by jenfullmoon at 6:22 PM on February 25, 2020 [15 favorites]
posted by jenfullmoon at 6:22 PM on February 25, 2020 [15 favorites]
For all that is good and holy, someone please edit Polly and slash out 3/4 of the text of her answers.
Now and then you need to take the time to twist the knife.
posted by mhoye at 6:50 PM on February 25, 2020 [3 favorites]
Now and then you need to take the time to twist the knife.
posted by mhoye at 6:50 PM on February 25, 2020 [3 favorites]
My guess is that the Polly column author lives in a state where marijuana is legal, and got a new batch before sitting down to answer this.
posted by hippybear at 7:03 PM on February 25, 2020 [6 favorites]
posted by hippybear at 7:03 PM on February 25, 2020 [6 favorites]
[internal screaming]
posted by grandiloquiet at 7:37 PM on February 25, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by grandiloquiet at 7:37 PM on February 25, 2020 [2 favorites]
My guess is that the Polly column author lives in a state where marijuana is legal, and got a new batch before sitting down to answer this.
Or drank six cups of coffee? I don't disagree with her response, but I would agree that it could have been a bit more concise.
I've had a number of friends/acquaintances who moved into the exact situation the letter writer describes, and it was painful to watch every time. Sometimes people just have to make their own mistakes it seems, no matter how inevitable it seems that things will end in disaster.
posted by Dip Flash at 8:04 PM on February 25, 2020 [3 favorites]
Or drank six cups of coffee? I don't disagree with her response, but I would agree that it could have been a bit more concise.
I've had a number of friends/acquaintances who moved into the exact situation the letter writer describes, and it was painful to watch every time. Sometimes people just have to make their own mistakes it seems, no matter how inevitable it seems that things will end in disaster.
posted by Dip Flash at 8:04 PM on February 25, 2020 [3 favorites]
I admit I wish I’d read this seven years ago when I uprooted my inner city life to follow an aged tantric hippy into the woods on the other side of my continent, armed with a shovel for an ambitious regeneration of an old banana plantation.
Without my mood lighting, dishwasher, coffee shops or I dunno, roads, it didn’t take long for the realities of being with an isolating weirdo to set in. I furtively watched sad or terrible videos about animal abandonment on YouTube to cheer myself up. (‘See, some things are much worse!’) A python curled around my outdoor bathtub was the last straw. Bye Felipe. I walked twenty miles down off the mountain and hitched to the airport and flew the fuck home.
I might have a hot bath, turn on my dimmable lights, crank up some tunes on my electrical device, and re-read Polly’s zesty reply with a celebratory wine from my fully functioning fridge.
posted by honey-barbara at 10:10 PM on February 25, 2020 [83 favorites]
Without my mood lighting, dishwasher, coffee shops or I dunno, roads, it didn’t take long for the realities of being with an isolating weirdo to set in. I furtively watched sad or terrible videos about animal abandonment on YouTube to cheer myself up. (‘See, some things are much worse!’) A python curled around my outdoor bathtub was the last straw. Bye Felipe. I walked twenty miles down off the mountain and hitched to the airport and flew the fuck home.
I might have a hot bath, turn on my dimmable lights, crank up some tunes on my electrical device, and re-read Polly’s zesty reply with a celebratory wine from my fully functioning fridge.
posted by honey-barbara at 10:10 PM on February 25, 2020 [83 favorites]
The whole thing felt incredibly uncomfortable, and made me wonder about these shows and the crews. How do they deal with situations like that?
By profiting on them handsomely?
posted by StarkRoads at 10:23 PM on February 25, 2020 [1 favorite]
By profiting on them handsomely?
posted by StarkRoads at 10:23 PM on February 25, 2020 [1 favorite]
I walked twenty miles down off the mountain and hitched to the airport and flew the fuck home.
You are fucking metal.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 2:10 AM on February 26, 2020 [40 favorites]
You are fucking metal.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 2:10 AM on February 26, 2020 [40 favorites]
A python curled around my outdoor bathtub was the last straw. Bye Felipe. I walked twenty miles down off the mountain and hitched to the airport and flew the fuck home.
Flagged as fantastic.
posted by unicorn chaser at 3:10 AM on February 26, 2020 [10 favorites]
Flagged as fantastic.
posted by unicorn chaser at 3:10 AM on February 26, 2020 [10 favorites]
I think one of the great things about creature comforts, or even elementary stuff like basic sanitation and, yes, roads, is how they help make life a little less susceptible to the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. You're just a little less vulnerable. The piece really lost me in that regard, because I don't think the advice seeker needs to develop vulnerability by realizing her true desires; I think the guy put her in a situation that's made her more vulnerable, and I think it's good advice to be wary of folks who put you in vulnerable situations, especially when they make it a point to demonstratively dismiss your concerns / feelings / desires / needs / points of view. It's okay to be vulnerable, but you can't be defenceless.
posted by dmh at 4:34 AM on February 26, 2020 [7 favorites]
posted by dmh at 4:34 AM on February 26, 2020 [7 favorites]
...and of course it is more than just 'okay' to be vulnerable. It's glorious to be vulnerable and it's necessary to be vulnerable, because you need to open up before any relationship can grow. But, you know, that's not always the view of everyone you meet.
posted by dmh at 4:51 AM on February 26, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by dmh at 4:51 AM on February 26, 2020 [2 favorites]
Every now and then I think of myself as possibly interesting and unconventional. Then I read
posted by soren_lorensen at 4:59 AM on February 26, 2020 [15 favorites]
(not that we’re supposed to call it a “relationship.” It’s a “situation.”)and realize, nope. Calling a relationship a situation, gtfo with that immediately, bring on the convention.
posted by soren_lorensen at 4:59 AM on February 26, 2020 [15 favorites]
I like Ask Polly, and this response seems like an answer from her evil newsletter. Still, this: "Your life is a neurotic emotional overachiever’s ultimate fantasy. Next-level overachievers are on a lifelong quest to overcome all weakness." I...after years with an alcoholic, I took up with an older man in an isolated setting, in a series of choices it still scares me to think about. The weirder and more dangerous it got--and perhaps the handgun under the pillow should have alarmed me more than it did--the more I told myself It's cool, I got this, look at how competently I am handling this and maintaining my day job as a Serious Person! He was an interesting guy, and we'd go have adventures, and I'd walk in on a Monday morning with muscles and a tan and get coffee among all of my pale and severe colleagues and think, I'm alive. I was. But also I didn't care if I died. Nobody knew what was going on, not really, and to this day I remember my best friend's worried face, her careful cadences as I talked blithely about my secret life, like I was too cool to worry for myself. I chose to let my wish for competence--my ability to handle shit--be taken for granted. It made me a low-maintenance girlfriend who didn't need the work required by emotions. Besides, who needs relationship and feelings when you can have risk and daring? Isn't that story enough? Reader, it was not. Younger me got out of that situation with dumb luck and my life, and in gratitude, I do not revisit anything about that period. I got this, I can handle it, I say, even when driving through my old stomping grounds and my stomach drops, shrinks, burns and my heart races and I feel thanks for my big sunglasses and a different car than I had then. Letter-writer, take a day to go back to your city, find a damn lawyer, and exfiltrate yourself from the madness. Your future self, complete with electricity and running water and a more realistic take on her emotional needs, thanks you in advance.
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:05 AM on February 26, 2020 [32 favorites]
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:05 AM on February 26, 2020 [32 favorites]
I like Ask Polly, and this response seems like an answer from her evil newsletter. Still, this: "Your life is a neurotic emotional overachiever’s ultimate fantasy. Next-level overachievers are on a lifelong quest to overcome all weakness." I...after years with an alcoholic, I took up with an older man in an isolated setting, in a series of choices it still scares me to think about. The weirder and more dangerous it got--and perhaps the handgun under the pillow should have alarmed me more than it did--the more I told myself It's cool, I got this, look at how competently I am handling this and maintaining my day job as a Serious Person! He was an interesting guy, and we'd go have adventures, and I'd walk in on a Monday morning with muscles and a tan and get coffee among all of my pale and severe colleagues and think, I'm alive. I was. But also I didn't care if I died. Nobody knew what was going on, not really, and to this day I remember my best friend's worried face, her careful cadences as I talked blithely about my secret life, like I was too cool to worry for myself. I chose to let my wish for competence--my ability to handle shit--be taken for granted.
Uh yeah...in my most recent manifestation of "how to solve the biggest problem in human form" and perhaps the last dying breath of my 6 year streak of emotional death, emptiness, and nihilism I fell "in love" with someone who was severely broken and potentially dangerous. This was after I had a reawakening of my once demolished vulnerability, so it was even more confusing that I didn't run in the opposite direction. This fellow was anger manifest, but it never surfaced, and man was that thrilling to know it was there, like standing at the feet of an active volcano. I liked the danger, I liked that he was obsessed with his own strength and immortality and that I couldn't ever reach him emotionally while I wallowed in pain from that rejection. I also liked the idea that he could and would strangle me to death if I stepped on his fragile ego and I definitely tested the limits there. It was probably the "situationship" equivalent of dabbling in heroin. I was in a place of such psychic pain that I couldn't figure out or solve where the idea of hard drugs just to make it stop was very appealing.
I was also "alive" compared to how hum drum and trapped and typical and utterly isolated my life had become and I also didn't care if I died and his bed was a comforting tomb. My friends were extremely confused and concerned about my choices. But this only lasted a month at best, even as I was courting it for months.
Then one day I woke up and it stopped. All of that nebulous pain stopped. Now, I feel reset, and primed to connect with others. It's so bizarre that I am not the only one in my age range that has made these choices.
posted by Young Kullervo at 6:13 AM on February 26, 2020 [8 favorites]
Uh yeah...in my most recent manifestation of "how to solve the biggest problem in human form" and perhaps the last dying breath of my 6 year streak of emotional death, emptiness, and nihilism I fell "in love" with someone who was severely broken and potentially dangerous. This was after I had a reawakening of my once demolished vulnerability, so it was even more confusing that I didn't run in the opposite direction. This fellow was anger manifest, but it never surfaced, and man was that thrilling to know it was there, like standing at the feet of an active volcano. I liked the danger, I liked that he was obsessed with his own strength and immortality and that I couldn't ever reach him emotionally while I wallowed in pain from that rejection. I also liked the idea that he could and would strangle me to death if I stepped on his fragile ego and I definitely tested the limits there. It was probably the "situationship" equivalent of dabbling in heroin. I was in a place of such psychic pain that I couldn't figure out or solve where the idea of hard drugs just to make it stop was very appealing.
I was also "alive" compared to how hum drum and trapped and typical and utterly isolated my life had become and I also didn't care if I died and his bed was a comforting tomb. My friends were extremely confused and concerned about my choices. But this only lasted a month at best, even as I was courting it for months.
Then one day I woke up and it stopped. All of that nebulous pain stopped. Now, I feel reset, and primed to connect with others. It's so bizarre that I am not the only one in my age range that has made these choices.
posted by Young Kullervo at 6:13 AM on February 26, 2020 [8 favorites]
I am blown away by the stories here that mirror the Ask Polly OP. I had no idea this was A Thing, and yet...it does make some of my friends' choices make more sense. The desire to fling yourself at risks rather than deal with your demons certainly isn't limited to men. It makes sense that "risk" for many straight women is less "wear one of those hang-glider suits and jump off a mountain" than "uproot your life for a dude who is a Bad Idea in multiple ways."
I'm glad you all survived and moved on.
posted by emjaybee at 7:24 AM on February 26, 2020 [18 favorites]
I'm glad you all survived and moved on.
posted by emjaybee at 7:24 AM on February 26, 2020 [18 favorites]
Stephen King pretty much wrote that situation as a horror story when experienced from a man's point of view.
posted by Gelatin at 7:30 AM on February 26, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by Gelatin at 7:30 AM on February 26, 2020 [3 favorites]
It makes sense that "risk" for many straight women is less "wear one of those hang-glider suits and jump off a mountain" than "uproot your life for a dude who is a Bad Idea in multiple ways."
Oh I did that sort of thing too.
I can't speak for every woman, but mine definitely came from a subconscious place of wanting to confront my own fears of vulnerability and death. Putting yourself in a situation that is the absolute worse case scenario/bottom of the world situation definitely helps you to put the feelings and situations you pushed aside (like loving, interdependent relationships that take, you know, WORK and are emotionally difficult sometimes) into perspective. To me as an intellectual and overachiever there was nothing more hellish to me than the idea of a life spent surrounded by apartment walls and every night spent on a sofa watching Netflix, which is sometimes how things go in the day to day with another person (it can't always be exciting, right?). Now that idea is far more appealing having literally escaped my own mental hell.
posted by Young Kullervo at 7:47 AM on February 26, 2020 [13 favorites]
Oh I did that sort of thing too.
I can't speak for every woman, but mine definitely came from a subconscious place of wanting to confront my own fears of vulnerability and death. Putting yourself in a situation that is the absolute worse case scenario/bottom of the world situation definitely helps you to put the feelings and situations you pushed aside (like loving, interdependent relationships that take, you know, WORK and are emotionally difficult sometimes) into perspective. To me as an intellectual and overachiever there was nothing more hellish to me than the idea of a life spent surrounded by apartment walls and every night spent on a sofa watching Netflix, which is sometimes how things go in the day to day with another person (it can't always be exciting, right?). Now that idea is far more appealing having literally escaped my own mental hell.
posted by Young Kullervo at 7:47 AM on February 26, 2020 [13 favorites]
I've seen this happen in an established, long-term relationship too - different bait, same trap. The guy had a dream, and his wife went along because that's what she always did. Things she would have enjoyed (maintaining ties to community, space/setups for her hobbies, etc.) were often too expensive or impractical or just not a priority. None of it was malicious, but it wasn't good either. Her world shrank so much.
I don't think Polly's advice applies to that scenario as well - but the practical advice of "run" and "lawyer" does.
posted by mersen at 11:10 AM on February 26, 2020 [3 favorites]
I don't think Polly's advice applies to that scenario as well - but the practical advice of "run" and "lawyer" does.
posted by mersen at 11:10 AM on February 26, 2020 [3 favorites]
.... please tell me that someone else finds Heather Havrilesky's advice basically unreadable? Because I could find absolutely no sense in this particular word salad.
posted by nerdfish at 12:38 PM on February 26, 2020 [5 favorites]
posted by nerdfish at 12:38 PM on February 26, 2020 [5 favorites]
I am blown away by the stories here that mirror the Ask Polly OP. I had no idea this was A Thing
ha! I read this and thought to myself, "yea, what's up with that?" and then I remembered the time a young me went backpacking across africa with some crappy boyfriend...
posted by 5_13_23_42_69_666 at 12:50 PM on February 26, 2020 [2 favorites]
ha! I read this and thought to myself, "yea, what's up with that?" and then I remembered the time a young me went backpacking across africa with some crappy boyfriend...
posted by 5_13_23_42_69_666 at 12:50 PM on February 26, 2020 [2 favorites]
.... please tell me that someone else finds Heather Havrilesky's advice basically unreadable? Because I could find absolutely no sense in this particular word salad.
There's this very unfortunate trend in advice columns where the columnist feels licensed to spin every question into Deep, Lengthy Musings about Life, which, just between you, me, and the fence post, are rarely that Deep. I suppose Dear Sugar is to blame.
posted by praemunire at 3:09 PM on February 26, 2020 [8 favorites]
There's this very unfortunate trend in advice columns where the columnist feels licensed to spin every question into Deep, Lengthy Musings about Life, which, just between you, me, and the fence post, are rarely that Deep. I suppose Dear Sugar is to blame.
posted by praemunire at 3:09 PM on February 26, 2020 [8 favorites]
I have a friend and a relative who live this high wire life of giving, giving, giving without any real emotional or mental support from their husbands. They take on the emotional care and literal feeding of so many people in their orbit on top of caring for their husbands and children. I watch closely in one case and from afar in another but just wonder how long can they keep up this behavior of so much giving.
It's not as physically dangerous as the woman in the letter but they are putting so much out there for others. I feel it's the same type of negation of their own inner problems by having so much drama and action. The feeling of constant accomplishment through caring for others leaves their own inner selves in a very isolated place that they can easily ignore. I had to separate myself from the relative because I tried to tell her gently many time to not get involved with so many destructive people and focus on her own and her immediate family's emotional well-being. She never got the message.
posted by narancia at 3:26 PM on February 26, 2020 [4 favorites]
It's not as physically dangerous as the woman in the letter but they are putting so much out there for others. I feel it's the same type of negation of their own inner problems by having so much drama and action. The feeling of constant accomplishment through caring for others leaves their own inner selves in a very isolated place that they can easily ignore. I had to separate myself from the relative because I tried to tell her gently many time to not get involved with so many destructive people and focus on her own and her immediate family's emotional well-being. She never got the message.
posted by narancia at 3:26 PM on February 26, 2020 [4 favorites]
I suppose Dear Sugar is to blame.
And don't forget ol' Cary Tennis! I found Cheryl Strayed a little prolix, but very readable, though.
posted by See you tomorrow, saguaro at 6:01 PM on February 26, 2020 [3 favorites]
And don't forget ol' Cary Tennis! I found Cheryl Strayed a little prolix, but very readable, though.
posted by See you tomorrow, saguaro at 6:01 PM on February 26, 2020 [3 favorites]
Oh, I quite like Ask Polly - I return to a number of her columns when I feel in the need of some life inspo - You are not uniquely fucked is a personal favourite. I actually find her very wordy, rambling style a tonic in the era of pithy Instagram-inspiration. But I can get why people don't like her style - it's not for everyone.
posted by unicorn chaser at 3:12 AM on February 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by unicorn chaser at 3:12 AM on February 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
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posted by Young Kullervo at 2:27 PM on February 25, 2020 [16 favorites]