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"How are you?"


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Why is it so hard for people to say "Hello" or "Good Morning"? Why has the default greeting become a question that is not supposed to be answered? Especially, if you know someone is grieving, is it so hard to stop asking the question if you don't want the answer? It's really annoying.

I wonder if thiis was always part of the conversation. I mean, when Adams saw Jefferson, did he say "How ya doin'"?

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The other day I entered Walmart with a smile on my face and met many people who smiled back, many who asked "how are  you" and many I passed in greeting "I'm fine, how are you today?" and walked on past.  I talk to you all about my  problems, my grief.  Tom, can you imagine how many greetings and advice I would get if I stopped and told them, "well, I'm on the way  to the bathroom real fast" or "I am grieving  very hard today" and honestly, and Tom, this comes from just plain ole me:  I don't want to hear what they have to say.  Sometimes if I stop and talk to them they have more problems than I do and damn, I cannot solve my own and my biggest problem has just taken over.  What in the  hell am I supposed to say to them?  I did not want a conversation, just a pleasant passing of the day and walk on.  (I really think I have become grouchy without Billy).  But, he had developed a little road rage, so maybe my age prevents me from wanting to talk with those people.  Now my friend Denise, who I see often, we would have stopped and before I could talk she would tell me about losing her mother and father-in-law within weeks of each other and how her son and his family were doing and then her two daughters.  By that time I would have forgot what I came into the store for.  I think I am just getting to be an old grouch.  I don't think I will smile the next time I go in and wear sunglasses too.

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2 hours ago, TomPB said:

Why is it so hard for people to say "Hello" or "Good Morning"? Why has the default greeting become a question that is not supposed to be answered? Especially, if you know someone is grieving, is it so hard to stop asking the question if you don't want the answer? It's really annoying.

Dear Tom!

I don´t like it too for many reasons.One of them is simple.Many of those people don´t really mean it.If I there´s a stranger who doesn´t care,I let it be;if there´s someone who is interested in conversation,I say the truth.Mostly I ask if they really want to hear the truth and everything is clear after.Anyway it´s not a pleasant feeling when someone ask how are you with such happy grin,though well known about your loss...

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Hugs from Janka

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I read what Marty posted.  I do not know why I am different, but like one of my supervisors told me once, "You really are crazy, but it is a nice crazy."  Being crazy is not so bad as long as you do not hurt other people.  Now, if Wanda (my prayer warrior) and I meet in town,we can talk.  (my friends and I talk on FB messenger anyhow all the time). Somehow, I do not want to bring people down to my grief level.  Wanda knows where all the "bodies are buried" so to speak in my life and lost her own husband after seven years of him being bed bound after a stroke.  And to her credit (he was not in pain), she said she would have kept him as long as humanly possible.  I really did get my feelings hurt, I won't deny it, when I told two couples of his best friends about Billy's passing.  I felt a coldness that surprised me, made me sorta angry, and made me determined not to speak to them again, unless they called me.  You would have to know, these were our very close friends (before we moved out of state).  I came home, thought about it and the one who always had to hug me, he was the most distant.  He is 80, and I have found out he has dementia.  The other man, shortly afterwards had his first stroke and then another and is in the nursing home........waiting.  We were not young people anymore.  Everyone heard the footsteps that were creeping up behind them.  Billy leaving only made the footsteps louder.  I also made the mistake of hugging a neighbor of Billy's folks.  Doubtless he was very surprised.  It was the twin of the neighbor who only a month or so  later passed away himself (the twin). 

So now I share my feelings with my granddaughter, my daughter (who I have to brag on, other than one melt down, she has become my biggest help I could ever hope for) with my sister, and I don't know how that is going to  turn out as she is leaving the detox too soon.  I will take one day at a time.  My mom had no friends.  She had sisters and they all died and then she had the Alzheimer's.  My granddaughter quizzes me often which aggravates me, she wants me to keep my mind sharp.  I kinda like my mind to stay flat and only rise to the occasion.  

I know some won't agree with this but one of my favorite authors, Edward Abbey once said  "When a man's best friend is his dog, that dog has a problem." 

So my kids and I discuss their dad, my son and I the most because my daughter has the idea that he loved her best of all of us, and if it makes her feel good, I am fine with that. 

And for the friends/acquaintances/unknown people, I will always be doing "just fine."  That is all I care to discuss.............except with y'all.   

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I have no problem with being asked "How are you" when it's an actual question. What I really dislike is the formula/script where it's used instead of "Hello" and the expected answer is "Fine".  Yes Marg, I don't want to force a real conversation on a random person who's just using the formula, but I can't bring myself to say "fine" either. So I say "hanging in there" or "day at a time" or most upbeat "OK I guess". A little more negative, "surviving" or "still breathing". When people who know what happened use the formula anyway I've often said "riding the grief roller coaster" and once when really annoyed at an old friend with a big smile on his face "Wish I was dead". I wish people would just say "hello".

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Tom, years ago I learned to not really look at people, I know it was silly, but Billy had a complex against me being too friendly.  He got over it, but because of his family's situation, I learned to understand it.  I did this for years and it got to be a habit.  Thankfully, he got out of this phase, but he was only 20.  We fought through a lot of obstacles in those 54 years and for the last 30 or more years, I had the best friend, most understandable, perfect man I could ever ask for.  But those first years were rough.  I'm so glad we fought to keep it though and sometimes I still go into a place with my face looking toward the floor just out of habit.  I've started holding my head up and smiling now though I feel some qualms about it.  Probably mental abuse at first, but listen, this teenager knew how to measure out my own abuse, so don't ever think I was beat down, I was a handful myself.  Still, unless I know the person very well, I always say "just fine."

That is comical in itself.  When I ask my son on the phone how he is doing, his words are always "just fine" and this Mama can tell the tone of those two words whether he is "just fine" or if something is wrong and I make him tell me.  

I have had friends tell me they saw me at Walmart or Brookshires and I never remember seeing them.  I think I must look through people.  

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Seems 'hanging in there' works the best in my world.  It’s the truth and people don’t get all flustered.  Of course many say they feel the same but I know they mean about their lives going on.  Not about having gone off the rails.  I’ve even stopped asking if they want the truth from people I know.  I hope they would ask now if they are that concerned.  Sadly, I am finding out most aren’t and I’m not going to push it on them.  The further we get into this journey, the more people forget about our empty hours, days and weeks.  I sometimes wonder what people might think i do all evening.  Then I realize they probably don’t think of me at all anymore.  How I miss someone who did.   I’m still waiting on that time heals, at least a little bit.  

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15 hours ago, Marg M said:

"When a man's best friend is his dog, that dog has a problem." 

My dog has a problem then, which I won't deny.

11 hours ago, TomPB said:

I have no problem with being asked "How are you" when it's an actual question. What I really dislike is the formula/script where it's used instead of "Hello" and the expected answer is "Fine".

Some people don't have a problem with that and some people do.  Tom, you sound like you (like me) are literal and truth-telling and hate lying of any kind, no matter how small, how grey.  But I guess this question forces us into it unless we want to just give them the straight scoop and tell them how much tossing/turning we did during the night when we tried to solve the world's problems, or how our spouse died and we feel so alone and miss them...maybe it would make them rethink their question and just nod their head and say "hello" next time!

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Here she is again Gwen, I trusted her to have the experience and understanding.  Rose Kennedy of course. "It has been said that time heals all wounds. ... The wounds remain. Time - the mind, protecting its sanity - covers them with some scar tissue and the pain lessens, but it is never gone."

I don't for a minute doubt that my kids and my granddaughter all worry about my sanity.  I have been through the underlined purple bold above so many times, I believe the mind does protect itself when I cannot.  I have been through so many magical, mystical, miraculous happenings in my life that one line can only explain it.  (I, of course, have to speak for my own mind). 

 

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14 hours ago, TomPB said:

BTW we have a saying for everything in AA and "fine" means Fd up, Insecure, Neurotic and Emotional. So maybe it's not so bad to say I'm fine.

Haha, never heard that one, see, you can say fine!  :D

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  • 2 months later...

Oh yes, this question... I've taken to replying, "I'm okay" or just "Okay.  And you?"  Like you say, no one really wants to know the truth of how I am really feeling.  It's just rote and reflex before moving on to other topics.

A few weeks ago, someone who should know better (lost his spouse 5 years ago) asked me how I was, and of course I said, "Okay."  His response was, "Just 'okay'?  That's not very convincing."  If we had been face to face (vs on the phone), I would have given him a disgusted look and walked away.

And in a week I have to attend a wedding and be around my extended family, none of who have seen me since before Mark passed away.  Every last one will ask me how I am doing.  I have a big, big extended family.  I should just find or make a button or lapel clip that says "I'm okay" and point to it when the inevitable happens.  (Trying to have a sense of humor helps).

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I just usually reply "I'm alive", which is kind of ironic, I guess.  Those are the last two words that Ron spoke. After being transported home to die, the Hospice nurse removed the breathing tube and he sat up and simply said "I'm alive !". He immediately fell back, lapsed into a semi conscious state and took his final breath 19 hours later. It was eerie.

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Karen, there are no words to respond to that...that must have been very hard.

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