How does one know when to reach for help? More importantly, how does one open the eyes of the one who desperately needs it? As the cliche goes, "communication is key." There are things that, once said, can not be taken back. Especially if the things said have been turned from private problems to public propaganda. When life goes from personal to the internet's version of the Jersey Shore (with less VD, worse abs and roughly the same amount of subterfuge) one is building and destroying sides, friendships and alliances. This could stem from someone's lack of knowing how to communicate properly, extreme stress, medication or a chemical imbalance. Or it could be more on top of all that. When someone goes from crying in your arms one night, to telling you to STFU and driving off in a huff rather than communicate the next night, it's time for help of some kind.
If help can be established from friends or family, so much the better. When your suggestions of seeking counsel are shrugged off, trying to incorporate the assistance of those closest around the one that needs help is a definite plus. Intervene. If they can be proven to that there are boundaries that have been crossed and it may be caused by chemical imbalance or another X factor and seeking help is the only way to improve this situation, half of the battle for the mind, body and spirit of the one you care for is accomplished. Sadly, many times those people would like to remain removed from the situation to maintain the status quo. That status quo will never remain the same once one publicizes personal information like it's the latest scoop from TMZ. Even if an arrangement for treatment has been established and the primary relationship is on its way to being mended, the hearts of those that broke for the one effected by the other may be hard to sway back.
"Think Before You Speak", has been a credo for hundreds of years, to choose your words in your mind before using your voice. Unfortunately, "Think Before You Type", has not been much enforced or encouraged. Many use the internet to vent and complain or seek opinions from someone they don't know or know if they can trust, simply because it separates them from having to make contact with another human being, especially one they know personally. Most of these people are known as insecure teenagers, but many times it's adults who don't act like adults. It's difficult to reach out to friends or family at that age because you are afraid of their response or the way they will think of you afterwards. Or it is simply just too difficult to vocalize the way that you feel, and putting it out there for the world to see in a digital diary seems to be a cry for help from whoever may find your situation interesting. Some people start to feel entitled to certain things just because they were in a relationship for a period of time and can demand their way because of it. Or project their inadequacies on the other to get their way. That's not the way the law works. Calling the shots and playing the other person off of mutual friends who says one thing and do another. Some are legitimately trying to help and others are merely baiting to get information for the other. I wouldn't be surprised if most major networks start producing shows based off of the lives of those type of people, trolled from the web.
Using your words to say one thing and your fingers to say another is the way of it these days my friends. Sometimes it is worth trying to figure out what's going on in someone's mind, but more importantly, how they came to that conclusion. You may have to worry that the spoken, "I Love You", is a cry for help that becomes a typed, "I'm losing it, why doesn't my loved one know exactly how I feel and help me fix it, even if I say I can take care of it myself. Another test failed." On the other hand it could merely be a stalling tactic until they can figure a way out. Finding a new place to live, to save up enough money to run, so on and so forth. Signs to watch out for. This may put the other person in a position of, "is it worth it?" Even with years invested, friendships co-mingled, home and holidays shared, how will those things be affected after a major abuse of trust? Questions worth asking my little ones. I'd like to believe love is worth is, but it needs to be tended like two gardeners maintaining the same field. Not one gardener working diligently, spending their time and money on the shared field and the another eying a path to a greener field when the plowing becomes to difficult or not as interesting. BULLYING should never be tolerated. Remember that.
I'd like to hear your thoughts on this, you strangers and web browsers. I desire the opinions of those I may have never met or those who I see on a daily basis but retain their anonymity with an online alias.
I end with a quote that is not mine, but one I have loved and tried to live by for many a year...
"Be Just and Fear Not"
