Hey, Mano--I got the H1N1 as well. Then after that got the regular flu! It was awful. But haven't been sick since. I'm not sure if it is b/c of my Omega 3 diet or what. I do wash my hands with soap a lot more often and I don't eat too many sweets or processed foods. Plus I think the flu so far has been under control this past fall and winter so far. Maybe its because I'm on here and have less stress, not sure.
Well, I have something I would like to talk about. I at first brought it up on another thread, but felt what if this person came on here and saw that I was discussing her problem. I now realize the likely hood of that happening is nil. We have helped a woman who lost her husband to suicide. She is living in a relatives home rent free. She lost her home due to her husband not having life insurance. So no income to pay for the large estate they were living in. Anyway, she is very needy and has not made any progress since we moved her several months ago. She stays pretty much in the house watching TV and not getting out help her with her grief.
All suggestions are refused, and yet she expects or needs our help. She also seems to work my husband and me against eachother. If we talk to her when she calls, it will become a very long phone call and mostly a repeat of what she has told us in the past. We know her story and we've discussed things at length to comfort her, so I will be a little bit firm and challenge her a little bit on her belief system. Such she can't go to somewhere b/c she doesn't have a dress, or she doesn't look right, or there is some reason why she can't go and do something. Even turned down free therapy from a top notch Psychologist.
I feel the AD's aren't really working for her as I've been on the kind she is on and quickly got off. They make you tired and want to eat and gain weight. I suggested she try a different kind...doesn't like that idea.
Then I suggest that she get the internet as she did have it at the house but we took it away to use elsewhere since she was saying she didn't need it.
But she does need it as she will talk about going to college or taking classes. I finally told her that many people are doing that and their classes are online. I suggest to her that she should get out and volunteer to get in the public and start feeling good about her self. She puts that idea down. Anything I say, she is going to find a reason not to do it. There is a lot of resistance, but then after we're discussing her financial situation and not having much, she wants to order a non essential part for her pick up so that she feels better driving it. But she doesn't have to be driving it, she has another car.
Her belongings are stored at my property, so it is taking up half of our garage, where we are unable to store our own things. She also has her stuff in a covered trailer of ours and hasn't looked at it for 10 months. Also she has stuff in another garage and storage area as well as a flat bed trailer. She has nice furniture and stuff that she could sell if she were on the computer or more productive.
I understand her anxiety and grief as I lost my son to suicide and a year later lost my mother and then had to care for my aging father when he had cancer and I had to pack up his house and clear it up for a real estate transaction to happen. And I was grieving all kinds of things at this time. It wasn't pleasant...my heart was broken and I was under tremendous stress.
I have given this woman all sorts of leeway and understanding, but when she complains to my husband about the "way" I talked to her on the phone, when what I was saying was nice. There was one phone call where I could no longer contain my frustration at her lack of "helping herself" as I had expected her to be more productive after we helped her move out of her bad situation. B/C that is all she would talk about is how productive she use to be and how she could do things and all.
I talked to my Psychiartrist about her and he sort of said in so many words that people that get helped out, get use to being helpless and sometimes it takes a push to get them moving as they are "comfortable" in their situation not having to face the world. When her husband committed suicide, he was not a nice guy, their marriage was already in ruins due to his bad habits.
So he was a real creep about it and left her devastated...but she might not have the original lifestyle she once had, but she has a lot of belongings and property she could sell or even live in.
I just have the problem w/ my husband wanting me to do things for this woman as she tells him stuff he wants to hear and then when I start actually suggesting we go do the things she says she wants to do, she puts in her heels and starts to back step. Then she calls him up to complain or vent and I become the bad guy. Which I knew she wouldn't do the things she says she would do as I've seen this behavior before in other people.
I want to be Christian like, but I also want this woman to do a be more to help herself and not be so dependent on us. Another thing is that DH found Lucinda's program in the stuff that had been packed up. I debated to give it to her as she might come on here, but since she refused the help with the Internet, I knew that wasn't going to happen. So finally I told her about the program we found and that I have it too and I've been online and got help from everyone on here.
She told me that she got that from a friend of a friend who got it for her son and he didn't want to use it. So the friend gave it to her to use. She barely used it...and I suggested that she could start working on it and we could help each other out. This is when she says ( and this is her M.O.) is I think this is something we do on our own. I go well, probably for journal work, but they wouldn't have a website if people weren't interested in getting help from others or working their problems together.
So anyway, I'll deliver the program to her, it is old, but unused. But still beneficial, the Carry Along cards says the same thing and other things are the same.
Well, Mano I hope you don't mind me posting on here. I just needed some friendly faces to see this that understand what we go through with our anxiety and such and how we are working through life and its problems. I have great sympathy for this woman or we wouldn't have done all the help we've given her so far. As it has really taken our time and energy to do so, not to mention our financial help.
He won't go see the Dr, I wish he would so that other things could be checked out.