The Adventures of the Blind/Low Vision/Visually Impaired (BLOVI) Girl- Volume 50: Why Are So Many People Swimming in the Kiddie Pool (Grow up please)
I did not mean for my 50th blog to be about this topic, but in the last week something happened that made me so angry (warning, this is an angry blog) that I began to reflect on some people’s inability to act like adults and own their behavior. I call these people kiddie pool swimmers and that is the focus of the blog. But first………………………….
My WTF of the week is the thing that began my reflections on kiddie pool swimmers. As you may know from past blogs, I had a person do a very horrible and dysfunctional thing to me just four days after I was home from the hospital from my accident. Basically a woman that had been hanging out with my newly ex-boyfriend, showed up at my house (I had only met her once at a birthday party) and decided that first she needed to see me as weak and did so by bringing me a DVD of a book that I had and still use all the time with clients to suggest that I needed lots of help. She then proceeded to go into detail about how close she was to my ex-boyfriend (note, we had been broken up less than a month), how she had told him it was not fair of him to date me if he did not love me and how much she was hoping to have a long term relationship with him. She also indicated she had been hanging out with him prior to our breakup, knew lots about our issues and was his main confidant. If I was not completely blind, on bed rest and in massive pain, I would have hauled her nasty self out of my house by her hair. My ex-boyfriend denied she was a close friend and was appalled at her behavior and said he did not want to have anything to do with her. I said that if he decided to continue a relationship with her, I would not have any type of communication with him. So now, 15 months later, when my ex and I have an amicable relationship, I find out that he has been seeing this person, but failed to tell me and also that he had talked to this person about that day and decided that she did not have any ill intentions in coming to my house (why are some men so dense). I don’t think I have ever used the F bomb so many times consecutively when I confronted him about their relationship. And now I am no longer speaking to him and I never will again. It is disappointing that someone who claims to be your friend, care about you and have respect for you can engage in such a dysfunctional relationship with someone who intentionally tried to territorial piss on me and kick me when I was down. What has surprised me is how I have lost all positive regard for my ex because of it. Hope they both have fun swimming in the kiddie pool.
This week I can’t get enough of media. First, I saw the movie The Book of Eli (with Denzel Washington). It had a very interesting twist in the end and the twist has something to do with what I deal with every day (hope this is not a spoiler). I will say that the movie confirmed that I can learn to do just about anything. Plus, the music was very cool- a more modern version of Vangelis. I also just saw Two and a Half Men for the first time. Yes, I know it has been on for years, but I don’t watch a lot of network TV. That show is hilarious and I cannot believe what they are getting away with saying on TV. What happened to the censors? Some of it is really dirty. But since I like bawdy humor, I dig the show now and I get why it is so popular. And I would also like to thank Fox for moving House back to its 9pm slot. Lastly I learned that the best way to screen toys is to look at videos of them on YouTube. I checked out informational and instructional videos on some of the things I was going to buy for my daughter for Christmas and the videos really helped me make decisions about what to purchase. I know there is lots of useless stuff on YouTube, but there is also highly informative and educational content (my life coaching tip of the week videos) such as The Kahn Academy. I could spend hours watching the Kahn Academy videos. Watch these and you can both seem and be super smart! I can have an intelligent conversation about mitochondrial DNA.
Lately I have noticed that many people who claim to be adults act like children or adolescents. In general these are people who are insecure, petty, spoiled, don’t take responsibility for their actions, shift blame, tell little white lies, think they are entitled or that the world revolves around them, and do mean and insensitive things to others. All this is adolescent behavior and is not the mark of a person who has learned to own their stuff, play nice with others and be accountable for their actions. I call these people kiddie pool swimmers because they would drown in the deep end of the pool that is real life. I don’t want these people in the adult pool, because they can’t swim and end up trying to hang on to you and bring you under. Kiddie pool swimmers must have shallow enough water because the only way they can keep their head above it is to be able to stand up. When we learn to swim and are good enough to swim in the deep water we can do laps when we want to, float comfortably if we choose and if big waves come at us we know how to roll with them. People in the kiddie pool can only splash others, walk around in circles because the pool is small, and would drown if a wave hit them.
People in the kiddie pool have somehow stalled in their personal growth. They have stalled at times because they have not done the work to figure out how to get past the bill of goods they were sold by their families and separate enough to become their own self. For many of us who had less than perfect childhoods this means doing therapy and getting to the core of your issues and dumping the baggage. As I have said before I have been doing that work for years and literally puked up all the stuff I was holding and discovered my core issues and own them. I think, as a woman and hell, admittedly as a somewhat attractive woman, I got away with adolescent behavior for a while because it was excused by those I dated. Being not right on the inside and being childish and unhealthy in that core place does not serve us well as we get older. This is especially true for women, because in men we label it as a mid-life crisis. I tell my women clients and friends to get to know themselves and explore their issues and take responsibility for their baggage and actions in their late 20’s or early 30’s, because petty, childish behavior looks worse on us as we get older.
As a life coach I enjoy helping people get unstuck and sometimes that means modifying behaviors that keep them in the kiddie pool. I have respect for those who seek guidance in trying to achieve personal growth. But in my personal life I admit to having limited tolerance for kiddie pool swimmers who do not realize they are not swimming in the adult pool, but shift blame and responsibility and anger and whatever else to you because you are not playing their kiddie pool games or live in a false reality that they are swimming in the deep end.
In the end, we deep end swimmers scare the hell out of those in the kiddie pool. Our confidence, competence, strong sense of self and our understanding of accountability give us power and the adolescents are still rebelling and whining. I highly recommend a swim in the adult pool where the water is deep but friendly and inviting. The kiddie pool is just full of pee.
Keep Moving Forward,
Beth (BLOVI) Medlock
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