Posted by headachequeen on October 26, 2004, at 18:55:01
In reply to Re: topamx, posted by stresser on October 26, 2004, at 8:36:28
> We did try the Genteal eye gel for M, and she says her eyes feel better this morning after using it last night before bed. That's a relief. She is taking accutane as well a topamax (small dosage of accutane) and that tends to be drying for her eyes also. Thanks so much for the recomendations for the gel. Kat-you don't even realize how much I value your knowledge, and I'm feel very fortunate to have stumbled across this board. My husband and I have really tried many different aproaches to this disorder. We have tried being tough, sympathetic, encouraging, indifferent, etc. and nothing is really working long term. He is really stubborn, and engineer, and with him it's either black or white. Do you know the type? Drives me BONKERS!!! You would think encouragement would help, but it doesn't at all. I do go to talk with her pdoc. tomorrow, and I hope that helps me to know how to react. I also know how it feels to grow up not being noticed. May parents were divorced when I was 12, my dad hardley knew I was alive, but yet my brother got enormous amounts of attention. I have ALWAYS known that I was and still am, not good enough for my mother. Isn't that sad that many of us are in the same situation. I feel that maybe I am passing that off to M, but how do I stop when that's all I know? I have tried to act as if I don't care about many things with her, and that really doesn't seem to work either. I'm either controlling or not caring enough. I'm stuck in a tought spot and cannot get out, so now I'm looking to all of you once again for advice. -L
L, it is easy to relate... I could - and did - bring home 100s in algebra and geometry, only to be asked why the papers weren't tidier or the penmanship better... whereas my grandfather when he saw the marks would ask what I planned to do after that, after all one hundred was hard to beat..
I was a perfectionist even then but it was not enough... my father was an engineering type and my mother a perfectionist in her own way as I have mentioned. My grandfather was an engineer also, but he never let it interfere with his people skills; when I told him that I had accomplished the highest English lit or French lit mark, he was pleased and encouraging to their wondering why the mark was not higher, and never compared me to anyone else... my mother's favourite trick was to compare me with her dead brother... the sainted paragon... he had done no wrong EVER... even when he ran off and enlisted underage...
From my grandfather I learned so much that I have tempered my control freak nature with his people skills. I spent every school holiday with him and my grandmother, lived with them the last two years of high school for that matter -- and they noticed my weight... .. he always had time for me, no matter how demanding his job was of his time and energy. I would meet him at his office around lunch time and we would talk about things that mattered as he finished his rounds of the plant, we would drive together on those summer days as he toured from his headquarters to the other plants he controlled...I remember one day when I was about seven wandering through the plant with him when he discovered a man asleep on the job.
He took his notebook out of his pocket. There was always a notebook in his pocket... and I always carry a notebook with me, something I learned from him... to capture important thoughts and ideas, this time he wrote in the notebook, tore off the page and carefully stuck it in the man's shirt pocket, all the while signalling to me to keep quiet.
We tiptoed away so as not to disturb the man's sleep.
I had heard about courts martial and I had heard about men being put on report and being thrown in the brig and about my father's temper and I knew his temper first hand. I was expecting my grandfather to explode as my father would have in the circumstances.
I was shocked at his response and I learned a lot when I learned that he had written,
' I hope you enjoyed your nap. Your next will be your last here' with his signature at the bottom.
There are better ways of dealing with people than yelling and shouting and demanding things of them...
calm expectations, positive reinforcement...
all these go so far to help ...if M is sure that she has support and loving support from both of you no matter what, then that is the first step...
trust me...I gained weight for two reasons... one was the meds that caused weight gain and the other was because I didn't feel like losing it...
sort of an anti-Barbie thing... accept me for my mind not for my looks...
my husband told me he didn't care how I looked or what I weighed; he loved me for who I am and what I could do and what I had done and weight didn't matter...
it may not have pushed me to the dieting and weight loss or exercise urges but it helped me to accept me as who I am, exactly what I wanted the world to do...
for too long I had been forced to be something to someone who fit the standard that was set for me and now I was fighting back, here was someone who cared who didn't set any standards and who loved me as I was...
it was important...I remember when I first met him... he always tells people that when he met me he felt sorry for me and proposed for me because someone had to take me home and feed me LOL...
wherever I was singing or performing, he and some one or ones from his family (and it is a HUGE family) would be present to encourage me... with my ego I really didn't need encouragement in that way, but it was nice to they cared and that I mattered... if I made a mess of my music, entrance, lines, whatever, they didn't care... they were just there for me...
looking around, it was seldom that one saw my parents there... interesting contrast...
support and no demands...
it helps...Part of the reason I train and use the positive reinforcement as a method of training is because I see the effect it has on dog and on owner... I really like the effect it has on the self esteem of the teen-agers in the family (I insist on the entire family being involved ... no point in one person training the dog and the rest undoing what is done)..
watched one badly overweight girl whose dog was going to be put down work determinedly with her dog, a mixed breed, every day... she got up at five to practise with him and met me at the school every afternoon and lunchtime and the difference in her was phenomenal...
the guidance counsellor had asked me to help either explain about euthanasia or help her with the dog that was totally out of control... what could I do but say yes????
in ten days her head was up and she looked people in the eye; she was a positive person and was losing weight... no wonder as she was doing agility with the dog and it is work believe, so is basic obedience for that matter,...
but she had done wonders with her dog, and she knew it...
her parents were amazed and thrilled with her accomplishments and told the world what she had done and best of all kept telling her...
her head kept getting higher...
it is so exciting and I keep thinking I should give these kids cookies the same as we give the dogs... praise... instance praise and reward for the dogs and I praise the client too...and then there is the unconditional love from the dog... well we have to give unconditional love to the kid involved... no strings attached...
just love with nothing asked in return...
it is sooooo hard...
just love for who she is...
and that means who she is today....
it works for the dog...
and when the dog loves us unconditionally it works for us so I figure it works for the kids...
and I keep using it whenever I can...
with people I mean <g>
kat
poster:headachequeen
thread:5053
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20041024/msgs/407637.html