Making Space for Your Reality

It may sound innocuous on the surface, but when you share something difficult with someone and they insist that you turn it into a positive, what they're really saying is, My comfort is more important than your reality.

~Dr. Susan David, Author of Emotional Agility

My friend Diana is a good person. She's kind and funny and generous. A couple of weeks ago, she called me. It was a day after I'd had a run-in with my brother. Long-time readers of this site might recall that my former therapist attributes much of my issues with anger to my brother. She insists that what I always chalked up to normal sibling stuff was actually full-on emotional and physical abuse that my parents largely ignored. I suspect she's right. But I'm a grown woman now. So when my brother called to scream at me because he doesn't believe I'm taking good enough care of my elderly dad, I told him, calmly and clearly, to stop speaking to me that way. He responded by hanging up on me then texting me to "grow up and step up".

A few years ago, that would have sent me into a tailspin. I would have questioned myself (Am I really not doing enough for my dad?" Am I a bad daughter? A bad sister? A bad human being?). I would have lain awake at night beating myself up while also mentally cataloging all the ways in which my brother is a jerk. I felt angry, absolutely. But a healthy anger. An anger that says, "you don't get to treat me like that".

But here's the story: I was filling in my friend, Diana, about what happened. Matter-of-fact. Telling her that I'm done with letting my brother take his fury out on me, I'm done dutifully following his instructions. Just...done. 

Diana responded with some murmurs of support but then she said, "you don't really mean that. You want your brother in your life. You'll get over this."

I felt...unheard. I felt disrespected. I felt patronized. And so, when I read the above quote on Brené Brown's Instagram, it resonated. Because that's exactly how it feels, right? When we share something that feels personal, that feels...raw, and the person in whom we've confided responds with platitudes or minimizing, well, it's clear that our feelings are putting them in supreme discomfort and they want it to stop.

A whole lot of us know that experience, don't we? It took me more than 40 years to finally understand what people were really saying to me when they called me "too sensitive" or "too emotional". What they were saying is, "your feelings are making me uncomfortable. Please stop having them."

I've learned over the years to not share a lot with Diana. She minimizes her own feelings too.  No matter what is happening in her life, it's "all good" even when it's clear to all that it's not. So what I learned from my most recent conversation with her confirmed what I already knew: Feelings make her horribly uncomfortable. She can't show up for me because she hasn't yet figured out how to show up for herself.

What does any of this have to do with betrayal and infidelity? Infidelity triggers strong feelings in people, uncomfortable feelings. And if, when you confide in someone you trust (please be discerning) their response is to minimize or to try to turn this into a positive, then I want you to recognize what's happening. 

You are entitled to your feelings, no matter what they are. They are real and deserving of acknowledgement. Your job is never to prioritize others' comfort over your reality. Never.