They just wont understand, why?

[white knight]

We hear those words often. The trouble is, there is a word in that sentence that doesn’t
fit, it shouldn’t be there. It’s the word “wont”

“Wont” means they have a choice to understand your emotional struggles. It should, in many
cases, be replaced with “don’t” or "cant"

For these people are the people we love and they love us. Would they, make the choice of not understanding? Understanding…what does that entail? Do we expect our partners, children, friends and parents to understand what its like to have our minds as if it’s in a cloud? Or throbbing like a migraine? Or whysome of us sleep for what seems endless hours?  What about when our carer partner has been so long without
love making and their frustration explodes and we chant “you just don’t understand”!!!

I put it to you, that it is us also that doesn’t understand what its like to be a partner of a mentally ill person. In respect to this an article I wrote a long time ago now can be googled- “Topic: who cares for the carer- beyondblue” In that thread I mentioned that if you can walk to the toilet, answer the phone and get yourself something to eat during the day while your partner is at work….you can also greet him/her as they walk in the door, have a cuppa and a chat asking how their day went before you slip back into bed if you must.

Some cant, understandably. But some wont! A choice (note the word “wont”) is made. In
these cases they are hurting the ones they love.

I’m lucky, my wife has depression, it comes and goes. We never say “you wont understand”. We both do understand. However my last partner and before her, my first wife, never understood my struggles. Those days I believed that they chose to not understand. I was wrong. They had little hope of understanding. Why?

Simply  because the other person doesn’t “feel” the effects of the illness. And there might also be the blaming effect to, to blame others through our own expectations of what we are pleading for.

Whatever sooths you and comforts you from your partner – tell them what that is. Think about your needs whether is a daily hug, a hand on the shoulder or an ear with the occasional comment or question. For your partner or loved one likely has no concept of what they can do to help. And that in itself can be agonising.

We should never get the feeling or not being loved mixed up with a lack of ability to help us. It’s not
that they wont understand-its more likely they cant understand so they don’t.

Tony WK

[white knight]

Hi Em

Im happy the education system is filling in the need to cover topics not previously on the radar.

re: Our youth have a DARNED lot of cleaning up to do, left by the messes of previous generations - I hold hope that these generations "did their best" but I've seen too much evidence of the contrary TBH.

I’m 64yo and feel I lived as a teen in the tail end of the “use the earths resources and ruin the earth” mentality. Eg we drove cars without thought about the pollution it created.

For mankind the world was our oyster to use up as man felt its resources was never ending.

Like many things man touches his actions had to get to crisis point before action would be taken. Then action itself is a slow machine (global warming is another example and Covid).

So, my comment to past generations is- they did the best at the time with the knowledge they had and their capabilities based on slow change that couldn’t be sped up. Change meant losing money! Sadly

A lot of the younger generation is blaming baby boomers for their own plight of not being able to purchase a house. I don’t see any person in their 20’s working 3 jobs as I did to get one. I suggested once to one complainer to join the military as I did so after a few years you’d get a home loan “I don’t want to be away from my friends” was his answer.

I don’t think previous generations are to blame for the worlds problems, but it’s just my view.

TonyWK

[Guest_1643]

things are changing in mental health but agree with Josh, very slow

stigma is real. Many people still have to hide their metnal illnesses from friends and employers and it's darned exhausting

update - one of my friends abandoned me when I was in hospital. I asked her recently why she hasn't been in touch for four months. She said she's too overhwhelmed to see any friends. i just saw that she' put on instagram her and her friend reuniting and how happy she is to catch up with her.

I knew her excuses were phony.

She didn't want to see me because she didn't like dealing with me when I wasn't so fun.

So is part of life's challenge weeding these people out?

Does MH struggle in a way bless us with an ability to see who is real and who is not??

Honestly MH struggles help you grow in a way that others don't get to. There are silver linings, although right now it hurts to feel "dumped"

[white knight]

Hi sleepy

re: “So is part of life's challenge weeding these people out?

Does MH struggle in a way bless us with an ability to see who is real and who is not??
Honestly MH struggles help you grow in a way that others don't get to. There are silver linings, although right now it hurts to feel "dumped" “

Yes. Rejection by non commuted friends has a positive in that it exposes their shallowness which although leads to a grief session, fine tunes our friends.

Ive written a lot on this topic. You only need to read the first post of each

use search bar at the top

fortress of survival (also part 2)

rejection is hard to swallow

Depression and toxic people

”normal” people won’t understand

Im tagged a nutter- what about them?

chat soon

TonyWK

[AlwaysForgotten]

Hi Tony,

I am going to challenge you on this as I feel it is important to have alternative perspectives on things.

If a person IS able to do those little things & they also show that they can do things like chatting with "other people", then how can their decision not to do these things with you be anything other than they "wont" do it? It is already established that it is within their capacity to complete the task, there clearly is no physical barrier to prevent them & they demonstrate that they can do these things with other people. The only difference then between chatting with you & chatting with someone else is their PERCEPTION of what that chat means, what they perceive differently between the two people & how they process that difference in perception. You cannot then claim that there is some kind of disorder or issue that only affects chatting to one person but magically disappears when chatting to another. So this comes down to them making a choice & in making a choice they have shown that they "wont" do it.

I believe the same goes for understanding what others are going through. You are correct that some just cant understand (theory of mind not withstanding), as well as some just not understanding, but there is also some people that just dont WANT to understand, that are happier with their perceptions willfully being held as truth because of what they gain in holding those views.

One example that comes to mind is a partner who wants something to be the fault of their spouse, that to them it is in their best interest to keep the spouse to blame for their actions & so they "wont" understand what their spouse is going through because doing so would take away the power they have. So in this instance they clearly "wont" understand & never will because there is intent in their not understanding.

I think this is extremely important to understand, that if we find ourselves in a position saying that someone "wont" understand, it may be an indication of something underlying that isn't obvious.

But I definitely think it is valid to say someone "wont" understand

[white knight]

Hi AF

I am not fully clear about what you are saying but allow me to give it a try.

What you are highlighting is that some people, when they are confronted with a person with a mental illness, choose to not want to understand as opposed to won’t understand.

To me these are two separate topics and this is probably a good opportunity to write a post on same.

This thread was not intended to cover all the possible reasons why some/many people don’t understand- let’s look at the possibles

• Don’t want to understand- as you’ve mentioned that they exercise freedom of choice
• lack of ability to extend themselves to understand - lacking empathy
• lack of ability to extend themselves to understand- immaturity
• lack of ability to extend themselves to understand- they have their own worries

ETC ETC

This post focussed on why, commonly, they won’t understand eg that it’s an illness they cannot see and illnesses that often people are uncomfortable talking about for whatever reason.

To “challenge” me about it is not imo the better word but to “add” to the theme of reasons for others willingly ignoring us with these illnesses would be a better word.

I will look forward to a new post from you explaining why people make such choices not to want to understand. I’ve covered a lot of ground with over 300 topics I’ve written about for over 7 years now.

Regards TonyWK

[AlwaysForgotten]

Hi Tony,

Given that "wont" is really just an abbreviated form of "will not" which shows a clear intention to not do something, I dont see how they are two separate topics.

I hope you dont find this pedantic of me, but looking at your list of 4 things, I also do not believe the last one is a "lack of ability", as having their own worries indicates "lack of capacity" rather than not being able to. The other 2 prior to that in the list are correctly a lack of ability, although I am very cautious about ever using empathy over sympathy as it not only reduces your effectiveness in helping other people, sympathy by definition is the ability to understand what other people are going through without having been through it themselves (and the goal here is to understand is it not?)

I guess the primary reason why I "challenged" you (and I do still see this as a different direction rather than adding to yours), was your initial statement of:

"“Wont” means they have a choice to understand your emotional struggles. It should, in many
cases, be replaced with “don’t” or "cant""

We would not expect someone immature to understand & it would be unreasonable to put that responsibility on those we know are not mature, likewise with empathy. So as you said, this post was focusing on why "commonly" they wont understand, where I believe that this is not really common at all. I believe the most common reason does in fact come down to the other person choosing not to understand, which is also why I felt there needed to be a counter balance to what you have said.

I believe the primary reason why people choose to not understand comes from the "Fundamental Attribution Error" which is a frequent mistake that humans make. This is neither the result of immaturity nor a lack of empathy and in fact few people even know it exists yet make the mistake all the time.

Ultimately I think what is most important is the desire to genuinely understand someone, and it is this which I believe is lacking in the majority of cases. I do think delving into this kind of area is ultimately helpful for everyone and being able to contrast different approaches makes our thoughts more robust, so I appreciate you jumping in there with me to look at it together

[white knight]

Hi

In 4.5 years there has not been any other person that has criticised this post for any reason let alone over basically one word being used that could have been swapped for another eg

” "“Wont” means they have a choice to understand your emotional struggles. It should, in many
cases, be replaced with “don’t” or "cant"" “

I am not interested in taking this discussion further. I prefer to converse with those that desire to wonder why some people act the way they do.

We champions are all here to help others more than getting bogged down on one word. That distract me from my role.

Peer advisers are passing on valuable experiences. High tertiary quals including grammar is not a prerequisite.

I wish to make it clear you haven’t upset me. I’m just more focussed on members that I can assist and they in turn express their gratitude.

TonyWK

[white knight]

Hi Sleepy 21

Ive been wondering how you have been coping with the problems with your friendships.

In life we do not have prior knowledge about a potential friend unless another person has informed us to befriend them or be wary. To have no information about a person we are gambling on that persons character and compatibility.

Often we only know months or years down the track if they fail us.

On the other hand the benefits of a small percentage becoming a friend imo far outweighs the hurt by a poor choice. This is precisely where positive thinking can dominate your life. If you study positive thinking with research/ attending motivation lectures/ turning all negatives into positives (where possible) then all challenges are easier to face and often more enjoyable.

For example- we followed friends half way around Australia. In a very remote area we broke down and they steamed ahead. We rang them when they got in phone range about 100kms further on an requested help. They decided to keep going effectively abandoning us. We had to rely on the help of passing travellers. These friends we’d known for 20 years.

We broke the friendship off. The positive was we would no longer place trust and faith in people that, in time of great need, would abandon us. We could focus on others of better caliber.

So, to clarify, losing a friend that doesn’t prove supportive in the most basic sense of the word is losing someone you had hoped was more supportive than what they proved- but was never a friend in the first place.

TonyWK

[Guest_1643]

Hi Tony

Such a kind post, thank you for sharing.
I read somewhere regarding dating that sometimes lets say a person you've been dating for a little bit shows their true colours - it's not so much the pain that they are not that great for us, but it's more admitting we were wrong! We chose the wrong person! We didn't see it clearly.

Sometimes we are blindsided also if the person offers us something we need at the time.... I was lonely and this friend offered companionship.

I'm struggling a lot losing that friendship but I fully understand what you mean - such a friend was actually never a friend at all - so it's not exactly loss. It's more readjusting my understanding of the world, and seeing how people can be.

I'm actually trying very hard not to return to that friend and am attempting NC for the time being. I hope it will get easier over time. She was someone I considered a close friend but was never 100 percent sure about inside (the gut does know).

I've heard a lot of similar stories like the one's regarding your close friends driving off and abandoning you in your moment of need. I think it can be that people show their true colours to us at those times. Even people say in marriages like that - after many years they have a sudden jolt when the person acts in a way they never would've expected, leading to the end of the marriage.

I like what you said about positive thinking. Giving people a go and hoping for the best.

[white knight]

Hi Sleepy

wondering if like me many years ago, have an attachment problem.

When young I’d feel like I fell in love really quickly but in reflection it was more infatuation... to obsessive levels.

If so it isn’t your fault but certainly something to be aware of and seek adjustment.

In my thread “fortress of survival “ (also part 2), it highlights filters some of us don’t use while the majority do. I used to call it street wisdom.

It is like this- we live in a castle and someone knocks on the gates- we let them in and take them to the lounge where we drink, be merry and share secrets.

The better more common way is to take them to the foyer and converse, during which we assess their honesty, then reject maybe purely in gut feelings. If they pass however you move them to a den and do on, only after many months do you move to the lounge. Even then be ready to eject them from your castle.

Only one or two most trustworthy friends join you in your attic. These friends won’t hear bad words about you, love you unconditionally and lifelong.

One of them is...you

TonyWK