Take Care of Yourself

 I have been thinking a lot this week about healthy communication vs unhealthy communication. There was a time I was in a relationship where there was a lot of unhealthy and manipulative communication happening. My feelings got pushed to the back because when I brought things up it lead to this person talking about how bad they are and how bad I think they are. It got to the point where I felt like I couldn't bring things up but as my job was to help this person improve I had to. It got to the point where I didn't know what to do, as even I feel statement and trying to empathize with this person was causing problems. I literally did not know how to respond to them when they got upset because nothing I said ever helped and saying nothing did not help and there was no winning. As time went on I started to give less feedback and avoid any topic that could lead to contention. Looking back now I recognize that there were a lot of things wrong. There was a lot of manipulation and gaslighting and just a lack of desire to communicate.

This has led me to think about when the right time to even start communication is. Or the right people. Are there people that it is better to not even try to communicate with? My thoughts on this are simple. I think you should do what you can, when you can. Try using I feel statement, telling the person how you feel and suggesting solutions and if needed working together to find a better solution. Empathize with the other person and try to get you both on the same page. Some other things that are important to understand is that you do not need to take excuses. If you talk to a person about a situation and they start making excuses, it is okay to tell that you understand they have had a hard time but you are not asking them to apologize for their situation, you are asking them to apologize for what they did to you, said to you, or said about you. It is okay to put your foot down and stand up for yourself! If you do not stand up for yourself then no one else will.

After doing everything you can, evaluate. How has it been going? Have they been listening to you? Have you been listening to them? If things have been going badly, what can you do better? After a while though, after putting in 110%, if nothing changes it is more than okay to just stop. If they are a friend then maybe consider not being friends? If they are family then maybe something needs to change. Maybe you need to go to therapy. Maybe they need to go to therapy. Maybe you both need therapy! The intresting thing about communication is that it takes two, you can not do it alone. You can do your best, you can try all the tips and tricks, but in the end talking takes two, you can have good communication or a good relationship alone.

Another thing to note while communicating with people that are difficult is that you need to make sure that you are taking care of yourself mentally and emotionally. It can be easy (for me at least) to put everything you have into helping others while absorbing their hate and anger and just storing that. As that goes on it can get worse and worse until you overflow and release just what is too much, still holding on to the majority of those feelings. After a while you may even get numb to that and not even realize that you are not doing okay. So look out for yourself, take care of yourself. Work on the relationship but also work on yourself!