RE: The "I feel sorry for" statement.

Collarspace Discussion Forums

Home Login Search

RE: The "I feel sorry for" statement.

View related threads: (in this forum | in all forums)

Logged in as: Guest

All Forums >> [Casual Banter] >> Off the Grid >> RE: The "I feel sorry for" statement.

Page: << < prev 1 [2]

Message

<< Older Topic Newer Topic >>

RE: The "I feel sorry for" statement. - 1/9/2014 9:48:22 AM

hlen5

Posts: 5890
Joined: 3/2/2008
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: Missokyst

In this world it is just better to keep joy closeted so as not to offend.

I didn't see the thread that prompted this one. Feeling sorry for someone isn't expressing joy. I wouldn't want a parent to hide their joy.

This part is FR: Feel as sorry as you want, just don't tell the pitied.

_____________________________

My fave Thread: http://www.collarchat.com/m_2626198/mpage_1/tm.htm

One time "Phallus Expert Extraordinaire"

(in reply to Missokyst)

Profile

Post #: 21

RE: The "I feel sorry for" statement. - 1/9/2014 9:52:38 AM

hlen5

Posts: 5890
Joined: 3/2/2008
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: myotherself

I may not have squirted a sprog out of my nether regions, but I know I'm a better mother than some who have.

What a turn of phrase!!

_____________________________

My fave Thread: http://www.collarchat.com/m_2626198/mpage_1/tm.htm

One time "Phallus Expert Extraordinaire"

(in reply to myotherself)

Profile

Post #: 22

RE: The "I feel sorry for" statement. - 1/9/2014 9:57:10 AM

kalikshama

Posts: 14805
Joined: 8/8/2010
Status: offline

There is no stigma attached to missing sunsets but there is a societal stigma to choosing to be childless:

More People Choosing To Be Childless, But Still Facing Stigma

...though it’s becoming more common, a decision to remain child-free is anything but socially acceptable.

“We’ve always had the mandate for motherhood — it’s what women have been deemed ‘for’ in human history,” Sandler told Here & Now. “But lately, the mommy industry is so enormous, what I call ‘the ambient roar of motherhood’ seems to be so deafening, that I think that women who feel like we should have transcended this pressure by now are feeling pretty stigmatized.”

Having It All Without Having Children

...The decision to have a child or not is a private one, but it takes place, in America, in a culture that often equates womanhood with motherhood. Any national discussion about the struggle to reconcile womanhood with modernity tends to begin and end with one subject: parenting. If you're a woman who's not in the mommy trenches, more often than not you're excluded from the discussion. But being sidelined doesn't exempt childless women from being scolded. The Weekly Standard's Jonathan V. Last has made the case in his controversial book What to Expect When No One's Expecting that the selfishness of the childless American endangers our economic future by reducing the number of consumers and taxpayers. With fertility treatment widely available, not to mention adoption, even clinically infertile women have more options than ever to become mothers, which increases the possibility that any woman who doesn't [become a mother] will be judged for her choice.

Read more: The Childfree Life - TIME http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2148636,00.html#ixzz2pvQ44VEa

(in reply to JstAnotherSub)

Profile

Post #: 23

RE: The "I feel sorry for" statement. - 1/9/2014 9:59:32 AM

NuevaVida

Posts: 6707
Joined: 8/5/2008
Status: offline

Fast Reply

I wasn't offended by the statement, nor did it anger or upset me, but I didn't like it. I explained why in the other thread.

The only thing I can really equate it to is, if there was something you wanted all your life, something you thought about since pre teen, something you couldn't wait to do, and something you planned for in your adult life...that you then found you couldn't do (for whatever reason), you're suddenly faced with everything you thought your life would be, being different. You have to make a new plan, and scrap your lifelong dream, which had always appeared to be a future reality. You grieved what you didn't have, because you already loved it in advance, thinking you'd have it.

So sure, make another dream, create another plan, move forward. Accept that the life you planned for is scrapped and it's time for a different plan. That's doable, but there is an emotional effort involved.

While you're readjusting to your new reality, you are surrounded by those who DID get that life ( and quite honestly, yeah there's envy to work through, too). Those who have that life are telling you you will never experience the greatness they have. They aren't malicious in saying so, but they say it whenever they say statements like "Motherhood is the greatest/hardest/most rewarding/most tiring/most ANYTHING job in the world!!" Right or wrong, it's salt on a wound, because of the internal pain of not realizing your lifelong dream and plan.

Add to that, people are constantly asking why you didn't do what you had planned all your life. It's tedious to respond after awhile.

Add to that, you are constantly picking up the slack at work for people who DID get what you wanted, because it interferes with their work life.

Add to that, there's an air in society that assumes you didn't WANT that plan, and thinks you are selfish and materialistic for not doing it.

Just a lot of things that combined, that can cause frustration.

This isn't a pity party, it's hopefully a big picture of the constant, daily interactions which cause you to internally re-address your life being so different than what you had planned for and very much wanted since youth. It's a daily thing. It's rarely vocalized. You just move on with life, but there's always that small pang in the background.

So when someone comes along and casually says "I feel sorry for you" it doesn't sit well. Even when said totally innocently. It bites that pang. One person says so and it opens the door for others to relate. Saying so is met with "You shouldn't feel that way" types of responses, and things escalate.

Those who have kids are never going to fully relate to those who wanted nothing more but couldn't have them. Those who don't have kids are never going to fully relate to those who do. So there's a lot of non-understanding going on, which is...well...understandable.

It's ok to not like where someone's coming from. It's ok to not understand it, either.

_____________________________

Live Simply. Love Generously. Care Deeply. Speak Kindly.

(in reply to myotherself)

Profile

Post #: 24

RE: The "I feel sorry for" statement. - 1/9/2014 10:10:39 AM

JstAnotherSub

Posts: 6174
Status: offline

I definitely do not feel superior because I have a kid, in fact I have often felt totally inadequate, but the joys he has brought me are worth it, and he seems to have turned out ok. I appreciate the comments, and I do understand that there are things that would trip a trigger of mine and many would not understand why, so I am not trying to invalidate anyone's feelings.

(((((((HUGS))))))) to all us chickies, kids or not, sanity or not, most of us pretty much rock.

_____________________________

yep

(in reply to NuevaVida)

Profile

Post #: 25

RE: The "I feel sorry for" statement. - 1/9/2014 12:07:33 PM

NuevaVida

Posts: 6707
Joined: 8/5/2008
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: JstAnotherSub

(((((((HUGS))))))) to all us chickies, kids or not, sanity or not, most of us pretty much rock.

Amen to that, chickie!!

_____________________________

Live Simply. Love Generously. Care Deeply. Speak Kindly.

(in reply to JstAnotherSub)

Profile

Post #: 26

RE: The "I feel sorry for" statement. - 1/9/2014 12:58:41 PM

Domnotlooking

Posts: 249
Joined: 8/11/2013
Status: offline

"I feel sorry for"-statements are mostly just aimless ruminating, right?

My family feels sorry for me for lots of stuff including not having had kids. I don't think they're really angst ridden at all about my various invented by them problems.

It's just them judging me for the pure and cost free pleasure of doing so. It doesn't go any deeper. They're not really invested much in these somber, finger-wagging pronouncements and neither am I.

I do wish I'd had kids, but life just shook out differently.

'Can't explain my life at all to the world at large and really, really happy that I don't feel compelled to.

But if someone wants to park the station wagon closer to the Walmart or take off work to watch little Johnny be a sun beam in the school play, I'm good with that.

They're getting their brains beat in while embracing the river of life and I'm doing fuck all on the average day. I seldom if ever rub that in.

(in reply to myotherself)

Profile

Post #: 27