I have a 30-year-old patient whom I’ve been seeing in weekly psychotherapy for 6 months and he had a terrible history of sexual and physical abuse and years in state care. Amazingly, despite all his trauma and several prior failed treatments, he settled into a trusting relationship with me. He tells me I’m the first person he’s bonded with, and he’s been able to stop using cocaine, and, for the first time, sees some hope for himself. The problem is that he just got a new job, and I’m not covered by his new insurance plan. He wrote me a letter telling me how much he feels his recovery depends on continuing the treatment we’ve started and I feel professionally obliged to put his welfare ahead of my financial needs, but I’d like to get paid. My goal is to do right by my patient, and not trigger the feelings of abandonment that underlie much of his negative behavior, but I’m not sure how long I can afford to see him for nothing.

There are many therapists who believe the best thing you can do for a troubled patient like this is to “be there,” providing the steady acceptance and secure relationship that they need for healing. I’m not one of them.

The sad fact is that the healing power of currently available treatments is vastly over-rated and a good example of false hope and the harm it can cause.

What’s wrong is that our treatments, in terms of demonstrated effectiveness, are all rather weak, and it shouldn’t be surprising; we do our best, but life, such as it is, is a bitchmonster from hell. You can’t undo the past, change personality, stop drug cravings, or even guarantee that you’ll be available next week.

Look where you’re going with this treatment and “mind the gap,” as they say on the London Underground, because, as ideal a healer as you seem right now, there are many ways this dynamic could get tripped up.

For example, unexpectedly, you and/or your treatment rub the patient the wrong way. It may be that you fail to live up to an impossibly high ideal or that you have a bad day and say the wrong thing. When that happens, trust disappears and with it, your patient’s rationale for healing.

You try to stay calm, remain empathetic, and ride out the storm while resenting having your personality dissected for an unpaid hour. If your anger shows, it gives your patient more reason to feel victimized and find a therapist who can help him recover from his latest trauma/treatment.

Another common outcome is the “Bill Murray Morass,” whereby he continues to feel strongly that treatment is beneficial and can’t imagine living without it, and you, and this continues for many years, while you continue to feel responsible and indispensable. “What About Bob?”, indeed.

You and “Bob” could argue that treatment has benefited his control over negative impulses, but it has also fostered a sense of dependency and fragility that will surface if, God forbid, you should die first, or, more likely, he just changes his mind.

So don’t buy into his idea of your precious relationship. If he liked you, it proves he has the capacity to like another therapist. There are many fish in the sea, many therapists in his insurance directory. If he depends on that positive feeling to stay sober or maintain a positive idea of the future, he’s in trouble, and so are you.

Your goal is for him to build up ideas for staying sober and fighting off despair that are not dependent on a single relationship or good feeling, and that can stand up to rejection and depression. In other words, you want to “be there” for your patient, but you don’t want to be the only thing between him and oblivion. Don’t beget a Bob.

STATEMENT:
Our relationship has been positive, but it’s important for you to manage negative beliefs, despair, and anger when you’re not feeling closely supported, and our stopping treatment gives you just such an opportunity. You have the capacity to form a positive relationship, so I’m confident you’ll do well in shopping around for a new therapist. Meanwhile, it’s good for you to focus more on the ideas than on the individual, because it’s your own ideas and the way you use them that will give you strength to manage yourself. I’m confident that this will work out well.”

I have a new patient who’s a young woman, college freshman, who was sent to therapy by her parents after her roommate turned her in for cutting her arms and drinking too much. After a fair amount of discussion, I started her on a medication trial and explained to her that these pills take a while to work (if they work at all), but it didn’t sink in, because after a week she’d had enough with feeling tired and hungry, especially because she still felt depressed and anxious. Not long after that, she declared that therapy in general was a waste of her time and she could stop drinking and self-mutilating on her own. Part of me thinks that it’s not my job, or anyone’s job, to sell her on treatment if she’s not ready, but I admit, there’s a softy side of me that doesn’t want to let her off the hook just so that she can really hurt herself or get kicked out of school. My goal is to get this kid to give treatment one more chance.

It’s tempting to tell a young woman with obvious problems that she should stay in treatment, but don’t. This is not the time to listen to your softer side. Of course you wish she would feel better and stay positive, but first, you and she must accept your lack of control.

If psychiatric treatment—medication or psychotherapy—were more reliable and effective, maybe it would be worthwhile to give such advice. More often than not, however, the first trial of treatment doesn’t work or causes side effects and patients who are already angry and disappointed about their life expectations are then quick to feel that their negative beliefs have been redeemed.

Your goal isn’t to get her to stay in treatment; it’s to give her tools to make rational and positive decisions about treatment. You don’t want her treatment decisions to depend on her positive relationship with you (see: above Bob) or an initial positive result. You want them to depend on her own ability to weigh risks and benefits and do what’s right.

It’s easier to help her think realistically about treatment if you crush false hope up front. You are obviously well aware that treatments of any kind rarely bring about a “cure.” I’m often reminded, when patients cite a pharmaceutical add touting a particular medication as “effective,” that the scientific meaning of the word is the opposite of its meaning in plain English.

In the language of science, effective means “better than nothing,” not “helpful most of the time.” Life is tough and so are most psychiatric problems. Unfortunately, so is your patient’s attitude.

Ultimately, you want her to know that, while you don’t care which decision she makes, you do care a great deal that you make she makes that decision rationally. Being soft won’t work, so be hard, or really, be honest, not emotional or sentimental.

STATEMENT:
Here’s a speech for encouraging her to take good care of herself and use treatment appropriately. “I wish I could tell you that treatment will ease your pain, but it often doesn’t. Given the fact that depressive feelings often come from genes and that we don’t have a cure, it’s not surprising that they tend to come and go and then return, even when a medication or other treatment has been very helpful. So the main goal of treatment isn’t to make you feel better, but to make you stronger and better able to tolerate your condition, much as if it were diabetes. You can get stronger by choosing the right psychotherapist or therapy or 12 step group and also appropriate friends and readings, because the right choice can make you stronger, and the wrong choice won’t. Medication is worth trying if your symptoms are hurting or threatening to get you canned. There’s a risk that each medication will cause side effects or won’t work, but you don’t want to make a choice about meds because you love or hate them. You want to weigh the risks of not taking them and the possible benefit of their working. If I were in your position, I’d definitely be trying them, but it’s your call.”

My ex-wife was never that solid, but even I was surprised when she left me for her yoga instructor, who’s also a total fuck-up. I agreed to joint custody because our daughter deserves to know her mother, no matter how stupid her mother is, but my wife’s visitation falls on the same days as our daughter’s ballet classes, and, wouldn’t you know, my ex- doesn’t have a car (her boyfriend crashed the one she got from me), so she tells me, in front of our daughter, that I’m selfish if I don’t drive the two of them to ballet and back, on her visitation day. It makes me nuts, because I can’t figure out a way to say “no” without disappointing my daughter and looking like a meanie. My goal is to stop my ex-wife from using our daughter to manipulate me.

Attempting to stop your ex-wife’s visitation blackmail is never a good goal; it makes you reactive to her ability to make you feel guilty and/or look bad, rather than to your own ideas about what constitutes an appropriate sacrifice for your child’s welfare.

Besides, you can’t stop her from using your worries about your daughter to push you around. Basically, your ex-wife can fart in your face whenever she wants, even when you’re behind the wheel. She’s already stunk up your marriage.

If you accept and ignore humiliation (and bad smells), however, you can focus on the more important goal you’ve already embraced, which is doing what’s necessary for your daughter’s well-being.

No, that doesn’t mean you should do whatever your ex-wife persuades your daughter to ask you for. Don’t be guilted by your daughter’s pleading or your ex-wife’s attitude. When your ex has visitation, she has responsibility, and you don’t.

Ask yourself what’s the worst that will happen if you don’t bail out your ex. If she isn’t a total loser, she should be able to arrange a ride. On the other hand, if she can’t, you may want to help out on the day of a dress rehearsal.

Decide for yourself whether the fight is worth it. You have a right to spend your off-visitation times on other needs, and it may be good for your wife and daughter to know that you feel no guilt in doing so.

On the other hand, you may decide it’s worth protecting your daughter from your wife’s incompetence. It’s your call, but no matter what, if you’ve thought it through, you needn’t feel guilty.

Do what you think is right. If you help out, it may feel like caving in, but it isn’t, not if you’ve followed procedures and made up your own mind. Besides, if the stress has really got you down, there’s always yoga. Clearly, it’s taken her far.

STATEMENT:
Write a statement you could give your ex. “During your visitation days, it’s your responsibility, not mine, to deal with transportation problems. I have other obligations and may need to be away or unavailable. You’re free, however, to ask for my help (or anyone else’s) and I’ll be happy to let you know what I can do and under what circumstances.”

One of the first things that attracted me to my husband was his sense of humor; he’s a smart, sarcastic guy. Unfortunately, that sense of humor doesn’t translate well to our kids, who, as far as I can tell, are hurt by the same dark, sarcastic tone I so enjoy. I’ve asked him to lighten up because the kids are sensitive, but he acts like I’m telling him he’s a bad parent and then he tells me I’m not doing such a good job myself. I don’t like where this is going, but I’m worried about the harm he can do the kids. My goal is to protect the kids and get my husband to back off without antagonizing him.

Sure, you can get your husband to change his parenting style. Talking to him about it is a great idea, and you should do it lots of times. Then, while you’re at it, you should figure out how to cure cancer and run cars on old twinkie wrappers.

OK, now that we’ve done using some of your husband’s patented sarcasm, you’ve got to accept that your husband will be sarcastic and the kids will have to learn how to deal with it.

On the other hand, you can help everyone take your husband’s style less personally if you begin by accepting it yourself. Yes, you may well feel worried and angry, but keep your feelings to yourself.

Your goal isn’t to express yourself, it’s to help your family manage your husband’s sarcasm. Instead of telling your husband to stop, decide when it’s necessary to speak up and have a response ready.

For instance, step in if the kids seem upset and/or your husband has implied, intentionally or not, that they’ve been bad, stupid, or ludicrous. You can spoil his joke without implying that he’s bad, stupid, or ludicrous, just by telling him gently to make fun of the kids all he likes, but you think they’re being normal kids and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Then everybody gets kisses, nobody’s feelings are hurt, and everyone lives happily ever after. Suuuuure.

STATEMENT:
Prepare a non-blaming response if he accuses you of undermining or humiliating him in front of the kids. “I enjoy your humor and think the kids will, too, as they grow older, but right now it sometimes hurts and mystifies them and gets a bad reaction, even when you’re trying to help them by pointing out something they need to know. When I think they’re too sensitive to take your meaning properly, I’ll urge them not to take your criticism personally, hoping it will help them separate the sting of your tone from the value of your ideas.”

I’m a 58-year-old gay man and it’s a long time since life has been any fun. I’ve been single for some time (with no real prospects of a relationship), my friends don’t seem to have time for me, and at the end of a hard day’s work running my own business, I’ve barely broken even and have nothing to look forward to but spending the evening alone. That’s when the depression closes in and I can’t stand living. I write all this because I know that I’m a miserable failure, and that facts, not depression or any other mental illness, are behind my reasoning. I mean, when I tell my few close friends how I feel, they tell me I’m being too hard on myself, but if you’re almost 60, alone, and a financial mess, doesn’t that mean you’re a loser? My goal is to be real about myself.

Sounds like your goal isn’t to be real about yourself, it’s to be mean to yourself because you’re in a bad mood. If you were to reread the above paragraph when your mood wasn’t so shitty, you’d see your treating “facts” with the same care as Bill O’Reilly.

So, to quote Bill, Shut up, I don’t want to hear it. You wouldn’t talk like that to a friend, or even probably your worst enemy, so don’t do it to yourself.

Sure, the pain in your life is real, but there’s a monster in most of us that speaks up when we’re hungry or poor or lonely and says, “Look what a mess you got yourself into, you worthless piece of shit.”

If you’re smart and have high standards and a well-developed sense of style, the monster will comment on the bad clothes, dull conversation, and depressing colors; it’s very specific and discerning, because it’s the meanest side of yourself. It will give meaning to your pain, alright, by telling you that it means a lot and it’s your fault.

It’s your job to keep that monster from influencing your values. I assume you’re working hard on your own business, because you care about being independent and self-supporting.

I also assume you have old friends, because you care about friendship and maintaining relationships, regardless of whether someone is wealthy, clever, or stylish. You haven’t mentioned doing anything wrong; you’ve just described the kind of bad luck that often happens to everyone at one time or another, with or without depression, or a partner, or a great job.

If you have good values, be prepared to use them. If you want to talk “facts,” remind yourself how hard you work at your job and your friendships. Your goal isn’t to get me or anyone else to confirm that you deserve to feel bad; it’s to keep your perspective and not let the negative thinking of loneliness and bad luck undermine your sense of pride.

STATEMENT:
“My life sucks right now, but I respect what I’m doing. I work hard and stand by my friends when all my efforts are relatively unrewarding and, on top of that, I’m fuckin’ depressed. I can’t wait for my luck to turn but, until it does, I wouldn’t want to do anything differently, and that’s what counts.”

I have struggled with bipolar disorder for almost ten years now, but sometimes I can’t see the point. The last time I was admitted to a hospital, I was actually raped by another patient, and the whole experience left me with fears and nightmares I just can’t get over. I’ll never let my family or a psychiatrist put me in a hospital again. My goal is to find a psychiatrist who will give me the support I need so that I will never, ever have to go into a hospital.

If you had diabetes and got the best possible supportive care from the best physician in the world—you could even marry her—you might still need hospital treatment if you got an infection, overdosed on peeps, or just fell into a manhole.

So, while you have every right to feel traumatized by your assault, don’t paint yourself into a corner because of it. When it comes to this anti-hospital stance, (or pro I-need-to-be-nurtured-very-carefully-or-else), you have to shut yourself up.

Thinking about the risks logically, it becomes clear that you probably wouldn’t get raped a second time, and there would be steps you could take to make it more unlikely. So, in reality, you aren’t facing a choice of rape vs. death, but rather terror vs. death.

Terror or death is a decision most of us face every morning before we get on the subway; that’s life. There would be no other choice.

Unfortunately, you can’t change the way rape gave you nightmares, and you can’t avoid the possibility that you’ll find yourself in the same neighborhood. What you can do, however, is bear the terror—the fear of fear—so that you can promise yourself the best possible care and manage yourself as carefully and respectfully as possible.

Your goal shouldn’t depend on finding the kindest or most available psychiatrist, or extracting promises about what he or she would never allow to happen. Your goal should depend instead on your own ability to ignore fear while benefiting from your bad experiences to make good treatment decisions.

Yes, bad things might still happen, but you can be sure you will have done everything to protect yourself while taking the risks necessary to manage a bad illness. If you go to the hospital, something bad might happen, but if you need care and you don’t go, something bad is guaranteed.

STATEMENT:
I may never be able to shake the rape nightmares or promise myself that a mood swing won’t become catastrophic and push me into a loony bin. I can swear, however, that I’ll take reasonable care of myself and that, when I’m well, I’ll try to focus on living life, caring about friends, and ignoring pain, regardless of whether I can get it to go away.

My husband always saw himself as the righteous protector of our daughter and, after our divorce, he got into the habit of dragging me into court to force me to pay for some super-costly treatment or schooling that was always no more than a little bit better than what was available for free, but he’d look like a hero to our daughter and the court and the social worker, and I’d look like a miserly shit, and I’d complain bitterly, which just got everyone more on his side, and I was screwed. My daughter bought the bullshit, which meant she and her father shared a tight bond based on hating me, the Scrooge. But I thought the court assaults would stop when she turned 18, until yesterday, when I learned he’s suing me, once again, this time to pay for our daughter’s college tuition, even though she never asked me, she’s over 18, and, with her history of alcohol abuse (and no attempt to get sober), paying for her to go to college without going to rehab first is a waste of money. I think they’re both just scraping the barrel for reasons to drag me into court and I’m getting flashbacks about being raped by the judge. I don’t have any illusion about all of us getting along, but I think it’s fair to want this craziness to stop.

Like it or not, it’s your ex’s legal right to haul you into court at his whim, force you to hire a lawyer, and make you look like a creep. As a reward, you get to give him a good chunk of your savings to pay for something you don’t believe in, to someone who’s out to ruin your life.

Say what you will about justice, but most of the time, it isn’t very fair.

There’s no way you can avoid feeling helpless and outraged, and there’s no shower long or hot enough to make the violated feeling walk away. If, however, your goal is to stop this from happening again by repeatedly venting your outrage, you’ll actually make it worse.

You’ve described the process well; when you’re angry, you look like a monster, not a victim. Your ex has got the knack for pushing your buttons down so well, you shouldn’t be surprised that he treats you like an ATM.

Instead of fighting back again and again then, accept the fact that he’s got you nailed, and shut up. (If you don’t like being told that, remember, I’m not the one who told you to marry him.)

Don’t mistake a Jerry Springer shouting match as the best way to stand up to someone. Remember, no matter how cleansing the venting is on Springer, nobody walked away from that show without looking like an asshole. If you can get yourself to shut up and keep your rage to yourself, you can start to work on a more effective defense. You’ve collected lots of good facts and they can speak for themselves…if you don’t drown them out with your feelings.

Put the facts together, forget your ex-husband’s allegations, and respond to the issues like a caring parent. Then sit back, shut up and be patient. Initially, people will believe him because he believes himself, but if the facts don’t check out, they’ll come around to your point of view.

Don’t pursue your daughter or the Tag Team of Educational Virtue will punish you with her silence. Make it clear that you care by taking your parental responsibilities seriously and articulating that it would be better for her to cultivate her own relationship with you. Beyond that, however, you can only respect her choice, and hope those facts, not blustery emotions, lead her to the light.

The legal process isn’t very fair, but as we often point out on this site, not much is, so it’s better to keep your mouth shut. If you don’t want to remain tied up in the courts forever, stay quiet until your ex has enough rope to hang himself.

STATEMENT:
Put your response in writing and edit out your rage. For example: “You and I both want our daughter to get a good education and I am more than willing to help financially if it looks like she is ready. I wish I knew how she’s been doing for the past 6 months, but I can’t say because she hasn’t kept in touch. Before that, as you know, she had several drug-related legal problems and hasn’t finished a course. As much as I share your desire to help, I don’t have any reason, as yet, to believe that she could make use of college. Asking the court to mandate me to pay her tuition does her a disservice and wastes a large portion of my remaining resources in legal fees. I would advise her to get sober first, get some work habits going, take a course or two, and then she’d have a better chance of success. Talking to me herself would also give her an opportunity to let me know what she’s accomplished and benefit from my input.”

I don’t think she beats him up, but my son can’t seem to stand up to his crazy wife, no matter what she does. She gets furious with him over nothing and then anything goes. She’s thrown away his model airplane collection, screamed at him in front of friends, and locked him out of the house. The grandkids are always nervous. She always has to have the last word and insists that he apologize for things he hasn’t done. I wish he could stand up for himself and let her know that she’s got to stop. She wouldn’t act like this if he were stronger. All he does is keep quiet, look sad, and try to make her happy, which allows her to act like a jerk. My goal is to protect him or teach him how to stand up for himself.

If standing up to someone means out-intimidating them, it’s seldom a good goal, particularly when you’re up against someone who seems to believe they’re as infallible as the Pope.

Go toe to toe with her holiness and you’ll get a slugfest that not only scares the kids, but draws police like flies. It’s tempting to believe that toughness will carry the day and straighten out the bad guys, but that’s only in the movies. Everyone wants it to happen, which is why you can sell tickets, because nobody ever sees it off the screen.

On the other hand, you don’t want your son to feel responsible for the anger and unhappiness of his crazy wife. It’s nice that he’s caring and nurturing, but this is the evil flip side of being overly-sensitive.

If you push him to confront her, he’ll feel more responsible for her feelings and you’ll quickly see his backside (as I’m sure you’ve already discovered); you’re actually making him more responsible for her feelings by suggesting that he could get her to act better if he was firmer.

He thinks he’s upset her, you think he hasn’t upset her enough, and you’re both making him responsible for her. The Pope/wife remains without fault. Holy shitstorm.

A better goal is to help your son develop a better boundary, and this doesn’t require confrontation or hostility. By a boundary, I mean not allowing an excessive feeling of responsibility for his wife’s unhappiness to get in the way of his doing what he thinks is right.

He wouldn’t fight back, he just wouldn’t take such a hard hit every time she attacks. Then eventually, please Jesus, he’d also ask for a divorce.

STATEMENT:
Show him how he can reject blame without attacking her. “I think we’ve got a good thing going and that it would be better if you could manage your anger. I want you to be happy but you’re right, after all is said and done, I don’t necessarily agree with you about what you feel I’ve done wrong. If you yell or try to punish me, it makes things worse. I am who I am. So my idea about how to make the best of things is to back away from confrontation. I’ll always listen to new suggestions but I won’t stay in the room with yelling or physical intimidation.”

I’m in my mid-30s, about to have my first child with my husband of about a year. My husband is a solid guy—he’s steady, and very caring—but deep down, I know a big reason I married him is because I wasn’t getting any younger and wanted to start a family. I dated a guy in law school that I was really in love with, but he was a lot older, made it clear he never wanted kids, and was your basic passionate, unavailable nightmare. I admit, I’m hormonal, which means my husband’s been getting on my nerves a lot lately, which just makes me obsess more and more about how I’ve settled for a life without love. My goal is to figure out how to get through the next stage of my life and live with my decision.

Don’t get superficial and compare the Valentine’s Day smiles at the next bistro table to your current mood and nostalgic memories of past lovers. In my experience, finding the love of your life isn’t too difficult, but finding a good partner is a real pain in the ass.

By “good partner,” I don’t mean someone you’re crazy about, under any and all circumstances, forever and ever, amen. I mean someone who is strong, easy to live and work with, accepts you during your weaker and less likeable moments, communicates on your wavelength, and picks up the load when you can’t. As well as someone whom you can put up with most of the time.

If you think two Harvard degrees have made me too selective (or obnoxious) to encounter lots of likely candidates, my patients tell me the same thing, including those with friendly, engaging personalities and dazzling beauty (they still have to see a shrink, after all).

As I’ve said before to other people seeking romantic advice, don’t yearn for someone you can talk to or someone who makes you feel special; those needs can be met by a good hairdresser. You describe your husband as “steady” and “caring,” which is worth more than the best of hair days.

Just as positive feelings can make you lose sight of what’s important in a relationship, negative feelings become dangerous when they cause you to devalue an otherwise good partnership. You can get negative because you’re a grump, or hormonal, or irritated by your partner’s less-than-perfect behavior, or because you ate too many turnips. Having those feelings, however, doesn’t mean you have to take them seriously.

If you think your relationship has become empty and meaningless because you can’t find a twinge of love, then negative feelings have made you forget what’s important. What’s important is not romantic advice, because romance is not what partnership is about. As you begin this next stage of life, that will become abundantly clear.

STATEMENT:
Here’s a reminder to help you fight the love-sick, sick love, Valentine’s Day blues. “As much as I love love, my goal is a family that has emotional and financial security. I’ve chosen carefully and we’re off to a good start. I wish there was more positive feeling and less bickering today, but I think we’ll be good at working and living together and managing the challenges of raising kids and dealing with setbacks, so we’re on the right course.”

I know my girlfriend’s a little unstable, believe me—I’m the one she stabbed twice with a steak knife (seriously). We broke up for a while, but after she came to me a few weeks after the incident full of remorse and apology, I had to take her back, because, even though she can be a freak, I have more fun with her than any other person alive. She’s the most exciting, dynamic woman, so, even though she sometimes flips out, I put up with it for all the times she’s just being a blast and making me stupid happy. I told my mom I was thinking of asking her to marry me, and my mom almost had a heart attack. I know we’re young (I’m 19) and that she really went overboard that one time, but I love the crazy bitch. My goal is to get the girl of my dreams, even if she sort of tried to kill me.

I’m not going to tell you that you’re crazy, or make waking-up-with-missing-anatomy jokes, because that’s what all your friends are doing, and maybe it’s not the way love feels to you.

Love can feel unselfish, like the joy of giving and helping and making a better world and having sex all mixed together, so it may feel meaningful to you, rather than just one big thrill.

On the other hand, I may be overestimating you. You may be the sort of guy who just wants to be stupid happy. That common expression is a most apt term in this case, and boy, will you be both (although more “stupid” than “happy” in the long run.

Maybe you think love will cure her problems. Unfortunately, love’s power is in what it makes people feel, not in changing their characters. It won’t make your girlfriend’s temper go away, at least not for long.

If anything, love makes needy people worse. It’s like heroin; the more they get, the more they need, the more they’re convinced you’ll never give them enough, the more they hate you for controlling them.

Maybe you want to believe that she wouldn’t get crazy if you could be more available, find the right words, and demonstrate your true love. That might be the plot of at least a couple of Drew Barrymore’s mid-career films, but it’s not what’s going to happen to you or any poor sucker in real life.

The good news is that love will make you very happy. The bad news is that you’ll be lucky to get away without third degree burns.

The other good news, while you may not take comfort in it, is that young men like you have been drawn to unstable women for centuries (a few of whom have written in the past). These unions aren’t totally without worth; after all, if it weren’t for gullible male/temperamental female pairings, we wouldn’t have tattoo removal technology, reality television stars, or so many girls named Amber.

Listen to your mom, however, and avoid being a part of that breeding statistic and put aside your wishful thinking. If love makes her crazy, ask yourself whether your love is really doing her a favor, and if this is a favor you want to commit to for the rest of your life.

STATEMENT:
Here’s a statement you’d be wise to deliver. “Our love feels wonderful and there are times when it brings out the best in both of us, but I think it also stirs up feelings that can’t be controlled and that could ruin our lives. What’s most important to me is not how good it feels to be with you, but what will do you and me the most good in the long run, and that’s why we need to walk away.”

I’m fine now (I’m 14), but I’m trying to figure out how to deal with a crazy father who physically abused me until a couple of years ago—that’s when my mother finally figured out what was happening and had me come live with her. The trouble is, I guess you could say my father doesn’t see reality the way other people do and he never remembers hitting me. In his mind, when he’d hit me, it was because I was trying to destroy him, so what he tells the judge is that he loves me and that my mother is a raging alcoholic who has brainwashed me to hate him (my mother stopped drinking after the divorce, years ago) and he really believes what he says. My goal is to get him to stay away from me and convince others that his version of reality isn’t real.

Kids aren’t the only ones who have trouble accepting the fact that we often can’t protect ourselves from scary crazy boogeymen, particularly when the craziness isn’t obvious, and the boogeymen are family.

We’ve said it here before: certain crazy people are not obviously crazy and are particularly good at persuading other people to see them as injured victims because they truly, truly believe they are, no matter what really happened. It’s a kind of sickness for which no one has the cure, and nobody feels sicker than the victims in the wake of these sickos, who don’t necessarily feel sick at all.

So cops, judges and social workers often can’t figure out who is telling the truth for a long time. Meanwhile, they often make mistakes and put restrictions on kids and families that hurt everyone and cost more money than the family can afford. It’s a sad fact of life, but they’re trying to do the right thing.

The system usually works to try and protect the weakest party, and when you’re aggressive, even if you’re just aggressively trying to get people to see the truth, you make sickos look that much more weak and innocent. It’s unfair, but pushing hard to express the truth will often push it underground.

So Dr. Lastname’s advice for kids is the same as for adults: don’t think that expressing your emotions sincerely and eloquently will solve the problem. If your father is sincere and has a good lawyer, he’ll persuade the judge that you have, possibly, been brainwashed by your mom, and they’ll treat you like a poor, emotional kid who deserves pity but doesn’t really know his own mind. Then everyone will spend lots of time visiting shrinks. Thanks for the business, but no thanks for the bullshit.

First things first, give up on the goal of convincing others, and try instead to make positive sense of this experience and prepare a statement that you could, if necessary, read to your father.

The less anger and fear you put in your statement, the more it will help others get at the truth. I’m not saying you shouldn’t have negative feelings—of course, they are what they are—but the goal of your statement is to keep out the negative feelings without in any way holding back on the facts of what really happened.

You might not make his sickness go away or get people to see the truth, but being clear, honest, and emotionless is the best protection against the boogeyman.

STATEMENT:
Here’s an example. “I think it’s a bad idea for us to spend time together. I know you care about me and want to see me, but I think you forget about the bad things that happen when you get upset and lose your temper. You forget about (put in details, including bruises and dates). I don’t want to hurt you and I want you to be happy but I don’t think we should spend time together until I’m old enough to protect myself from your temper. Sincerely.

I’d like to get help for my wife’s younger sister because she drives the family crazy. Simply put, she’s a lying drug-addict, and my wife’s parents are always trying to help her in a way that ruins things for the rest of us—they give her money, pressure my wife and me to accept her at family events, and then make us feel guilty if we don’t want to see her. She’s totally poisonous as she is, but I know she can’t help herself, and I’d like to get her real help, not just hand-outs and pretending everything’s OK, so we don’t have to continue like this.

Your goal is just as bad as your wife’s parents’ goal, because you’re both assuming that your sister-in-law can be helped when all the evidence points the other way. They’re throwing their money away at her directly, you’d be throwing your money away at “real help” she isn’t ready for. It’s a lose/lose.

Really, everyone wishes your sister-in-law could be helped, but proceeding on that assumption when it’s not true is a good way to make things worse, and that’s exactly what you’re complaining about.

The sad fact is, treatment is often hopeless. You know that’s true for lots of medical problems, from cancer to Crohn’s disease, so why not accept the fact that it’s equally true for everything else.

Instead, stick with the realistic hope that she’ll change someday, and that you (and others) will have an opportunity to help. It might happen, but it’s not something that you can make happen or are responsible for.

In the meantime, don’t blame her, because there’s a good chance she has as little control over the problem as you do, even though it’s her body and her problem. Blame life, it sucks more reliably than anyone or anything else.

Now that you’ve listened to me and given up on your goal of getting help for your sister-in-law, realistic thinking suggests some positive things for you to do. Since you’re not responsible for saving your sister-in-law or protecting your parents-in-law, you can bow out of family events you don’t really want to go to.

Ignore feelings of guilt or responsibility. You’d help if you could, but you can’t, and there are other important priorities, like going on with your life and enjoying time with those you love.

STATEMENT:
Prepare a statement that responds to the most guilt-provoking accusations you can imagine. “I’m concerned about my sister-in-law and take full responsibility for helping her whenever possible. One thing I’ve learned, though, from watching her parents do a wonderful job of trying to help her is that, for the time being, it’s just not possible. When it’s not possible, we do more good by distancing ourselves from her problems so as to limit their harm and provide her with more incentive to change. Distancing ourselves from her problems does not mean distancing ourselves from her. The better we protect ourselves, the more welcoming we will be if and when she begins recovery.”

Please note: There will be no new post on Thursday, 12/24, due to the holiday. Please continue to write in, however, because there will be a new post on 12/28. Thanks, and happy holidays!

My ex-wife was always a wild outlaw in high school, (I got the kids), she’d show up from time to time, but rarely when she said she would, and you never knew when she’d be high, so the court imposed supervised visitation. I want my kids to have a mom though, but when she no-shows, the kids are crushed. Of course, the kids want to see her, particularly for Christmas, but what they don’t know is that she and her current boyfriend were caught on video robbing a liquor store, so if she’s going anywhere, it’s probably straight to jail. . My goal is to figure out a way to break this to my kids so that they don’t hate their mother (even though I sort of think they should).

You can’t protect your kids from the hurt of loving an outlaw mother, any more than you could protect yourself for falling for her years ago. Telling your kids that she’s a bad person inflicts a worse kind of hurt, because it devalues the love you and the kids have given her (which, as you know, you can’t get back).

Even if you can’t protect them from hurt, you still can and should protect the value of their love for her and whatever is meaningful about hers for them.

To begin with, don’t buy the idea that outlaws are regular people who make bad choices. That’s one of those stupid, false-hope ideas that assumes that everyone has the choice to be good or bad and can redeem themselves by making better choices. It’s sort of a hybrid of Milton’s “Paradise Lost” and Santa’s “Naughty/Nice” list…and it’s bullshit.

As someone who’s counseled a lot of bad people and their innocent bystanders (like you), I can tell you that people who do bad things don’t have the same control that you or I do.

Maybe their control was weakened by childhood trauma, or addiction, or maybe they were born that way, but it doesn’t matter. Life isn’t fair and some people are fucking weak in ways that cause all kinds of trouble (and some of that trouble gets caught by the crook cam).

So think about which is better: to think of mother as a self-made asshole who chose to neglect her kids because she didn’t care and the people who loved her couldn’t get through to her; or, to think of her as having a fucked-up nervous system that made her unreliable and vulnerable to drug addiction and criminal behavior in spite of all her good impulses and the good love of people who cared for her.

Don’t tell me that saying that your wife was fucked-up lets her off the hook or tells the kids that crime is OK; they know that crime isn’t OK because her life and relationships are fucked and there’s pain everywhere. Nobody’s off the hook here, except maybe for you.

Tell your kids the truth—Mom can’t help it, but she loves you—and Christmas will not be lost. If Santa had a heart, he’d give her presents in prison because, with the gifts she’s lacking for good judgment and impulse control, she doesn’t stand a chance.

STATEMENT:
Write out a statement you could share with the kids. “There’s something wrong with your mother and you have to be careful with her, no matter how much you love her. Most of the time, she can’t meet your needs or anyone else’s needs or even her own needs, other than the need to feel good right away. Recently she stole something and got caught and she’ll probably get put in prison for a while, so I don’t think you’ll see her this Christmas. She probably didn’t mean to hurt anyone, but she certainly hurt the people who love her and need her and she hurt herself. But that’s the way your mother is. You’ll never know, when you hear from her, whether she will keep her promises or get you in trouble. But I’ll teach you how to be careful so you can keep in touch with her as much as possible. And maybe someday she’ll get more control of herself and you’ll be able to trust her as much as you love her.”

My alcoholic father and whiny, always-in-trouble younger brother were asshole buddies who always felt neglected by selfish, got-it-together me and they took great delight in cutting me and my kids out of my father’s will. I was angry for a long time after my father died, but when my brother reached out to me recently (he explained that he’s on medication now, although he didn’t offer to give me any of the inheritance), I was happy to meet and socialize. But now he wants my grown-up kids to be part of his one-happy-family-at-Christmas reunion, and the kids, who are now grown, aren’t interested. Their memories of him are negative but they’re not mad, they just don’t care. My brother genuinely does not understand why they’re cold to him and don’t respond to his calls or emails and he asks me to intervene. My goal is to get my brother to back off without reopening the rift.

Don’t let yourself get sentimental about a Christmas reunion. You might yearn for a re-unionable brother, but you don’t have one and never will (especially now that you’re father’s gone).

Your brother will always be a high risk earthquake zone, so don’t make yourself responsible for avoiding a rift or you’ll find yourself triggering one. His dangerous expectations could easily cause a natural disaster, no matter what you do.

Medication may have made him more even-tempered, but you have no reason to believe his attitude has changed. He’s probably following the 12-step shuffle and doing gracious forgiveness now, but then, when the kids don’t respond, he’ll think he has the right to feel wounded by your neglect all over again. Of course, he’s more likely to feel that way if you say something negative about his past behavior.

So your goal isn’t to prevent a rift, but to make sure you and the kids aren’t responsible for it; not in his eyes, of course, but in your own. Make the best of the tentative, fragile, potentially explosive relationship that you have, and that means putting caution ahead of sentimentality.

Stay calm, don’t bring up the past, and remind your brother that Christmas with just the two of you isn’t so bad. Just don’t get carried away by your fucking Christmas spirit, and hopefully he won’t get carried away, either.

STATEMENT:
Prepare a statement in response to his Christmas expectations (and yours). “It’s nice to get together, forget about past conflict, and share Christmas as brothers. Life is complicated now that the kids are grown and have lives of their own and we can seldom get everyone together at once, and they probably expected me to tell you that they wouldn’t be able to join us because they consider me responsible for brother-to-brother communication. I don’t pressure them because I respect their other priorities. I look forward to seeing you.”

I consider myself to be a pretty thoughtful gift-giver—I pay attention to what other people need, things they don’t even know they need, their birthdays, their anniversaries, and I usually get it right. My husband, on the other hand, isn’t sentimental at all about birthdays or anniversaries and doesn’t remember them, so he’s a lousy gift-giver and, I can’t help it, it really gets to me. After I knock myself out to get him a good birthday present, he either forgets mine, or gets flowers at the last moment, or thinks of getting me something and then doesn’t follow through. We have a wonderful marriage but every year around Christmas, his lazy, lousy gifting really gets on my nerves (particularly since I can’t help doing a good job with his gifts). It’s humiliating. My goal is to find a good way to address this problem so I won’t resent him this Christmas.

There’s not one, but two good reasons why it’s a bad idea to address the problem of unequal gift giving with your husband, and the first, it’s a safe bet, is that you’ve done it before and it turned out badly. I’m right, am I not? (It’s important for me to be right, given my Harvard background).

You reproach your husband for neglecting your Christmas needs, he gets defensive, tells you how he knocks himself out for you, maybe goes further and remembers the time you didn’t do your share, and then you have to tell him how he got the facts wrong.

Meanwhile, both of you are drifting further away from any spirit of Christmas giving, other than that old staple of gift-giving everywhere, the Christmas Earful.

If you don’t address this issue, it will fester, but if you do, it will explode. Take your pick, but don’t believe for a moment that there’s any solution that will make your husband a truly satisfying, gift-giving mirror of yourself. For that you don’t a husband, but a wife.

It’s frustrating to need a certain kind of thoughtful attention and know you’re not going to get it from your husband, even if you get lots of other things from him. You have a right to hurt, but that’s life, and there are other, more important kinds of support, like help with money, kids and illness, so keep your priorities straight. A good marriage is not just about feelings.

Then there’s the second reason you shouldn’t address the problem: doing so makes it more personal. I know, the normal human response to being forgotten is to feel unloved, neglected, and disrespected, particularly when you care about a person and give him more than you get.

It’s likely here, however, and in most cases, that the lack of response isn’t personal. Your husband is probably a poor gift-giver by nature and would be that way, given the opportunity, for any of his wives, including ones he loves very much.

So ignore your feelings, and ask yourself whether he’s a good husband, regardless of his low gifting IQ and, if he is, figure out what you want to do with this sad area of congenital weakness.

If it’s worth the trouble, and he’s not truly un-giving, you can get yourself the gift and charge it to him (what you always wanted!). Your goal, however, isn’t to get him to be a good gift-giver or to get a good gift, it’s to prevent his gifting disability from devaluing your relationship.

STATEMENT:
Compose a statement to deflect disrespect. “You’re a giving husband but you’re not as good as I am with gifts. We have a good marriage because we give to one another but sometimes it’s in different ways, or not exactly what the other person needs, and that sometimes causes hurt and frustration. But what matters is that, regardless of the disappointment, we know we love one another and are good partners to one another.”

My father was a nasty drunk and my mother got so depressed she hardly noticed, so, as the oldest, I ended up raising my younger sister. I’m a dad now, and my parents are long gone, but my wife has always noticed how quiet and sulky I get during the holidays, and she thinks I should deal with all the pent up feelings that come from being raised by alcoholics and being a substitute parent all my life. I don’t really know what my wife means or how to begin going about dealing with all that stuff, but maybe it’s worth it. My goal is to confront those feelings so I can get over them.

You might think that spending time with your childhood sorrows will free you from them, but that’s not what usually happens. Often, the more you remember how sad your past Christmases were, the sadder you get, which makes your family sad and ruins Christmases Present and Yet To Be.

Unlike Scrooge, you probably won’t rediscover memories of good people whose love you rejected. You’ll recall ugly and frightening scenes when everyone was scared and you were obliged to assume adult responsibilities.

You don’t deserve to feel blue and it’s not fair that you do, but between the impact of Christmas trauma and inheriting your mother’s depressive genes, you may not have a choice.

However, there’s a good goal for you after you give up on trying to feel better. It’s to acknowledge the good things that were done when times were hard.

You’ll never know how much choice your parents had over their weaknesses; we like to say that everyone has choices, but that’s bullshit.

Many drunks don’t see the harm they’re doing or, if they do, can’t stop. And many people with depression are too far gone into despair or are simply too symptomatic to carry their load. They were fucked, you were fucked, but look at what you did with it.

Celebrate the strength and courage of the boy who took care of his sister. Perhaps there were times when your parents acted like parents and did tough things in spite of their weaknesses, so take pride in your ability to create a better partnership and do better for your children. You may never feel great; but what you’ve done is all the greater.

STATEMENT:
Compose a statement to wall off sad feelings from proud fact. “My parents were impaired, but I’m proud of the way I carried my load, and perhaps my parents did some good things too, in spite of their impairments. There was seldom a happy holiday, but that didn’t stop me from trying to protect my sister and eventually create a better family of my own. And that’s what I’ve done. So if I can’t feel Christmas joy, too bad. I’ve made a much better Christmas for my wife and kids than I ever had, and that’s what I was always after.”

You said before that everybody hates the holidays, and I think most people hate seeing their families. Well, I hate the holidays, but it’s because I don’t have a family; my parents still drink too much, one brother is in jail and the other I don’t trust around my kids, and so every time the holidays roll around I get depressed that I don’t have anyone because the people I should be happy to see are the ones who made me the crazy mess I am today (honestly—I’m bipolar, but on medication). I’m sick of basically being guaranteed to hate myself and life all winter just because of what my family did. My goal is to find a way to feel better no matter what time of year it is.

There’s a simple answer to why it’s a bad idea to expect to get over the sorrow of a bad, abusive family; because usually, it simply can’t be done.

Focusing on your pain and waiting for it to go away will spoil your holidays even more than they’re already spoiled. Talk about a turd in the cranberry sauce.

Maybe you think it’s a holiday right and tradition to vent/celebrate your sad feelings with a shrink. Well, this shrink says forget it. I’m not interested, and neither should you be.

Sure, venting might give you a moment of relief, like a good emotional barf. On the other hand, you’ve shared your feelings before, you know where they come from, it hasn’t made them go away. If anything, they’ve probably made you feel even sadder and more pre-occupied than usual, which has made you the life of every holiday party you attend.

Please, don’t tell me that expressing your pain in psychotherapy will give you eventual relief and freedom. I can’t prove that it won’t, per se, but A, I did go to Harvard, and B, most people who seek my advice have cried themselves a river with more than one shrink, and their tears are still going strong.

So either they haven’t yet found the right shrink, or shrinks often don’t have the antidote to childhood sorrow. Take your pick.

Once you realize that getting rid of your pain is a dumb goal, then you’re free to focus on something much more constructive: how to have a meaningful holiday anyway. Aside from feeling happy, your holiday goal is to forge meaningful relationships and celebrate the values of that holiday, and pain doesn’t have to stop you, even if you can’t stop it.

My guess is that you have some long-term friends with whom you like to share holidays and that there is real hope that, over the years, you and your friends will come to share the kind of love and support for one another that families do.

Perhaps, in time, this love will ease your pain, or maybe it won’t, but either way, that part is beyond your control. Your urge to vent, however, isn’t. Keep it in check, try to ignore the negative, and pass the gravy boat.

STATEMENT:
Compose a statement that will help you shut up about your pain and focus on your determination to create the kind of holiday celebration and relationships that you missed as a kid. “I treasure the kind of friends who can get together regularly over many years and provide the commitment and support of caring family, particularly since I missed having that kind of love first time around. So I’ll do my best to find and build such friendships. And if I do, despite the sorrow I carry in my heart, I’ll have greater respect for my efforts and take pride in the meaning of what I’m trying to achieve.”

I’m a pretty generous person, so I’m never shocked when I find out someone’s taken advantage of me, even though it’s always painful, especially when I have to cut ties with them and move on. Without getting into too much detail, that’s exactly what happened with my brother 11 years ago, and I haven’t spoken to him since. It’s been painful, especially painful during the holiday season when I know he’s out there but we can’t all have Thanksgiving together like we used to, and like we should. My goal is to forget about his absence and get through Thanksgiving without having to suffer.

One thing I’ve observed about generous people, especially my fellow clinicians who like to make other people feel better (and including clergy, who are almost all closet therapists); we get really, really pissed after we’ve done a whole lot of giving and get nothing back.

There may be such a thing as selfless giving, but most of us like that giving feeling and have a dark side that gets triggered when we feel used. Giving, if nothing else, feels good; it’s the Christian drug of choice. It’s a good thing, of course, when it actually does some good and/or doesn’t lead to gift misuse or giver depletion.

Man alive though, do we givers get mad when what we get back is shit, even when the fecal return delivery was entirely predictable and so clearly isn’t personal.

What you need to do then, O jilted giver, is ask yourself carefully whether you’ve written off your brother because he’s an asshole who would ruin your holiday celebration by barfing all over the turkey/Christmas tree, or because you’re very, very angry.

Your goal isn’t to express anger—that would be a violation of the fuckin’ holiday spirit—but to do what you think is right and best for you and your family in the long run.

What’s right for families in the long run, I believe, is to hang together if it’s not absolutely toxic. Add up the pluses and minuses yourself without giving too high a score to the dramatic thrill of reconciliation.

Being kind to family, even bad family, is good for your self-esteem (as long as you keep a safe distance from the snakes). Showing kids how you accept faults and make the best of strengths is a good lesson in doing what’s meaningful, rather than what makes you happy. Looking out for one another helps everyone survive hard times.

Add whatever you want to the list as long as it’s not about feelings, just what’s meaningful or helpful in the long run. Then you can either reconsider your brother’s standing, or have a solid list of reassuring reasons why he should not be around.

STATEMENT:
Write a statement that will help you ignore your anger as you consider which course is more meaningful and consistent with your values. “I have good reason to be angry at my brother and it’s always reasonable to protect myself from abuse. But I won’t let anger make my decision for me as I decide whether it’s best to reach out and re-establish contact. It doesn’t matter whether this requires me to eat shit along with my turkey if the long-term result is better for my family.”

My mother is a drama queen– she thrives on family conflict and gossip and needs to control every step of my life. She has her nose in everyone’s business, talks badly about most people, and also has a violent temper (at 79 years old, she still throws things and flips people [like me] the bird out of anger). Several events happened that finally made me so angry with her that I literally told her off and have cut ties with her for over a year, but during this year I have suffered from terrible guilt and shame for turning my back on my elderly mother. Believe me, I feel better and more relaxed without her constant turmoil, but there are nights that I wake up from a dream where I am shunned at her funeral as “the daughter who abandoned her mother”. I have tried, in the past, to talk sense into her and explain my feelings but she creeps back to her same troubling ways. My goal is to get over the guilt that I feel about cutting my mother out of my life.

Anger is never a good reason for doing anything, and particularly not for cutting off ties with your mother; after all, anger’s a feeling, and you know that’s a dirty word. It’s not that you don’t have good reasons for being angry, just not for letting anger make your decisions.

As you’ve now realized, once you let anger take over, it’s very hard to protect yourself against guilt, which is where your major problem lies now. The only good, healthy defense against guilt, other than drowning your neurotransmitters in alcohol, is to know you’ve done the right thing, regardless of how unhappy you’ve made someone feel or how badly they’re suffering while you’re the one standing watch.

In this instance, unfortunately, you haven’t done the right thing, so guilt has become your master.

It’s not so bad to tell your mother off, but you’ve kept the bad feelings alive by cutting her off and letting her know that she’s at fault. That’s where you’ve assumed a share of responsibility for the conflict between you, and that’s not just a guilty feeling, that’s real guilt.

You have good reason to want to punish your mother and avoid the pain of her abuse, but that goal has two major flaws. First of all, your mother doesn’t deserve to be punished, because she can’t help being who she is, and there’s no point in punishing an asshole for being an asshole any more than punishing a snake for being a snake. You’ll wind up feeling guilty and responsible for the pain you’ve caused because the snake had no choice, but you did.

Second, that goal creates more conflict and commits more of your attention and energy to the worst part of your mother and your relationship with her, and that’s simply not what you want, because that will make both of you more miserable and part of your misery will be, you guessed it, guilt.

And you won’t just be tortured by the guilty feeling aroused by your mother’s accusing look and defiant digit—a guilty feeling you can tell yourself you don’t deserve—but by the real guilt of causing pain you could have prevented.

A better goal is to protect yourself from your mother’s anger, and your own guilt, while making the most of whatever good you can find in her. If there’s no good there, and she really lacks any redeeming features that you may someday recollect with fondness, admiration, or even bitter laughter, she may well be someone with that rarest of psychiatric DSMIV diagnoses, a “perfect asshole.”

Well, come to think of it, she already meets criteria for being a perfect asshole, because she always sees her nastiness as merely a reaction to other people’s faults, and that’s why there’s no point in reasoning with or trying to get through to her. On the other hand, she may also be an irredeemable asshole who is perfect all the time, which would be remarkable because few human beings are perfect, even in that way. But perfection rarely flashes the middle finger.

Yes, it may seem disrespectful or disloyal to say “my mother is an asshole” but, really, it’s the only way to make it not personal. It’s a scientific fact that being an asshole is not an obstacle to getting married and having children, and may even help in those pursuits. So, without any offense intended, you’re the child of an asshole and it’s your job to deal with it getting shit on (so to speak).

So don’t try to “talk sense into her” or “explain your feelings.” You’re not going to change her and trying is a waste of time, an invitation to more trouble, and an aggravation to your mother. It will also lead to your assuming more responsibility for the bad feelings that happen next.

Surely you’ve done business with people who had their nasty side but could be pleasant if you caught them on a good day and treated them carefully; as long as you didn’t try to hold them accountable, correct their behavior, or offer them lip. So do the same with your mother and treat her like an asshole who has, at times, taken good care of you and probably done some other good things (like given you life).

You know the drill. Talk about nothing personal, go with a friend when you see her, meet in public, keep it short, and leave quickly and politely if her inner demon appears.

And yes, you’ll feel better in the short run if you tell her that she’s an asshole and refuse to talk to her until she apologizes and attends assholes anonymous. As if an asshole would ever settle for anonymity.

In the long run, however, you will come closer to living by your values and protecting yourself from guilt if you suck up your pain and humiliation and maintain some kind of polite (on your side) relationship. She’ll never do right by you on your terms, but if you do right by her on your terms, you can tame your guilt and reclaim your life.

STATEMENT:
Since you’re not going to confront your mother, prepare a statement to answer someone who says “how can you take that abusive shit lying down without seeing yourself as a total victim and wuss?” “My mother has never had much control over her inner ass-hole which makes her a giant pain in my ass. But fighting her is pointless and makes me act nasty, which is the opposite of what I want to do and is worse than the humiliation she occasionally throws my way. I don’t need to prove I can stand up to her. What’s more important to me is to try to act decently regardless of the shit she throws at me.”

After 10 years of marriage, 8 of them fairly miserable, I finally got a divorce from my husband. We have a daughter together, which is why we tried to stick it out so long, but he was a really terrible partner; rarely worked, often angry, and not even that available to our kid. Now that we’re over, however, things aren’t much better in that he’s become this cloying, pathetic presence who’s always lurking around, fishing for pity and reconciliation. When we were married, I was pretty good at keeping my anger to myself, but now that we’re divorced, I have no patience for his bullshit and find myself really digging into him all the time. I try not to do it around our child, but his behavior brings out a really mean side of me to the point where I almost feel guilty for the way I treat him, even though he’s a pain in the ass who’s never done one nice thing for me aside from give me my little girl. My goal is to stop feeling bad about treating this asshole so badly.

Sadly, when you make your goal to feel better about treating an asshole badly, you’re actually hoping to become an asshole yourself. Only assholes can torment without guilt, just ask your ex-asshole. I mean, -husband.

So if you back up and think about it, your goal is actually to stop acting like an asshole and stop treating your ex- badly, so your guilty feeling doesn’t become the real thing. And the best way to do that is to have less of a chance to act around/react to your ex, period.

If your pathetic-acting ex- succeeds in making you feel guilty, you’re more likely to act mean, which will allow your guilty feeling to cause you to act badly, which will leave you with real guilt, which will confirm your ex-partner’s reality.

So another major reason for your loss of control may be your inability, because of your guilty feelings, to create a boundary and shut off your contact with your ex- when he starts to drive you crazy. If you’re feeling guilty, you may bend over backwards and spend too much time listening to him. Which will then get you irritated and mean. Rinse, repeat.

So your goal isn’t to stop feeling guilty, but to tolerate guilty feelings while acting reasonably, and the first reasonable thing you can do to protect yourself from your ex-husband’s neediness is to create a boundary that defines what you talk about, and excludes everything else.

It’s OK to talk about anything child-related, but not to express feelings other than admiration for the children, the weather and/or your favorite baseball team. If your ex- tends to ramble, sigh, or otherwise emote, politely leave the conversation and give him your email for dealing with any left-over child-care issues.

Cut it off before anyone gets a chance to be an asshole, and you’ll have nothing to feel bad about.

STATEMENT:
Prepare a statement to respond to any protest he might lodge against your lack of empathy or respect. “We both deserve respect and it’s important that we treat one another with respect. I believe the best way to do that is to avoid expressing negative feelings about our marriage or lives or discussing issues that used to cause us conflict. Instead, let’s focus on informing one another about our kid and making arrangements to care for her. If I stop a conversation or appear abrupt, it will be to keep the conversation away from bad topics and focused on good topics. It will not be intended to express disrespect.”