I know this title is cliche or perhaps it just makes you sing that Jessie J song (good tune, no complaints here) but I thought it was the most succinct title for what I want to say in this post.
Like everyone, I’ve been through some stuff in my lifetime, stuff that wasn’t much fun but that was out of my control and has shaped who I am today. I think because of this, and perhaps because of my job, I don’t know, but people often come to me for advice or just a listening ear when they are going through hard times. I would like to state now, for anyone who knows me, that I am completely fine with this and I want you all to always feel I am someone you can come to, forever, this is not about to be a post about how I wished people wouldn’t. In fact the point is just that I am in a position of ‘advice giver’ or ‘shoulder to cry on’ quite often and as a result, I’ve awarded myself authority to speak on the subject.
People need, and give, different advice and I know that finding the right words to say isn’t always easy, but there is one thing that people are told time and time again that I completely loathe and that is ‘Just. Be. Strong’.
What an incredibly insensitive and unhealthy thing to say to someone who is at their lowest point coming to you for help and comfort. To my mind, that is the same as telling someone with clinical depression to just be happy, or someone with a terminal disease to just get better (and I’ve heard it said to people experiencing both). Being strong is not that fucking easy, in fact some people don’t always have it in them, and you know what? That is 100% okay. Who exactly are we supposed to be being strong for? That one guy at work that can’t even remember your name but occasionally asks how you are and might not know what to do with himself if you tell him things have been better. Your friends who invite you round because they know things are tough right now, but you feel too embarrassed when they ask how you’re coping to tell them that you aren’t. Your Auntie who says ‘anything I can do?’ but if you asked her to come round and clean your house because you can barely manage getting out of bed right now, would probably be quite affronted that you would take her up on her hollow offer.
You do not need to be strong for those people if you aren’t feeling it, it’s unhealthy, it’s going to catch up on you and those people won’t be the ones left with your tired unstable remains, you will.
If people ask how you are they should be prepared for the honest answer, you do not have to lie to yourself by forcing a smile if you are sad, you don’t have to get up and go to work if what you really need is a day under your duvet crying.
The people who truly care about us want to help. Sick as it sounds, they want to see us cry and they want to hold us while we do so and they want to put their snot soaked jumpers in the wash immediately after we leave! People want to see honesty and they want to feel they’ve helped, so why not let them, why pretend you’re okay when you aren’t?
I heard someone say the other day that they felt weak for needing help with something when other people are strong enough to deal with (insert problem here) without any help. It made me sadder than I’ve felt in a while. My immediate response was so what? So what if they are strong and you are weak. Is weak really the worst thing a person can be? Maybe you are weak, maybe you can’t deal with this as easily as some people do, but maybe you’re kind, maybe you’re generous too, maybe you feel things very deeply but that gives you great empathy and maybe that’s a wonderful thing. Being weak, needing help, not being okay are all perfectly natural and we need to stop telling people to ignore these feelings and force themselves into artificial coping mechanisms.
We seem so scared to just admit to people in crappy situations that their situations are crappy. Like why do we have to tell people that things could be worse? ‘Oh that’s a shame, but at least..’ NO stop at ‘oh that’s a shame’, we should acknowledge things are shitty and that people feel shitty sometimes and not make them feel bad about having admitted it to another living being.
My advice to anyone going through a tough time is when you feel weak, be weak. Ask for help. Lean on people. Cry. Show everyone your human side and set a good example to rest of the human race that everyone feels beat sometimes.
I’m not saying cry relentlessly for a year or stay in bed all day everyday, but you can be weak and still pull yourself to get to work when you have to, but then don’t feel obliged to go for drinks afterwards and engage in fake smiles and polite conversation. (etc etc, catch my drift and that all)
What I’m trying to say is: What’s better? Everyone going through life pretending they are okay and never really dealing with anything so that when someone around them isn’t okay they can’t help them out because they never really got over that bad thing that happened all that time ago and so that person had to pretend to be okay as well and the cycle continues. OR we could cry when we are sad, we can feel weak when things aren’t going well and lean on people who are strong, we then build up genuine strength and human connections and so when someone close to us starts feeling weak we can use our strength and our support network to help them and build them up? It’s no brainer for me.
I want this post to be read by people who find themselves saying ‘stay strong’ without thinking and if it makes you think next time before you offer that advice then great; but mostly I want this post to be read and received by people going through hard times who are being told to ‘be strong’ and are worried they can’t be, people being told ‘you’ll be okay’, who then panic a month later when they still don’t feel okay.
I’ll say it. This is shit and you might need help to get through it. It might be shit for ages but it will eventually pass. It will happen without you noticing, day by day, week by week or year by year, there is no correct timescale, however long it takes you, but eventually little things will change, little moments will bring you joy, things will be a tiny bit easier, the future will look at little bit brighter and one day you’ll realise that you haven’t even thought about that thing. and that you’ve smiled, you’ve sincerely smiled and from this journey, from all those tears, from this long exhausting fight, you will of gained strength and you WILL. BE. STRONG. in your own time and without having to pretend.
Stay strong folks
….
Just kidding 😉
Take care,
Holly
Holly Jane 