Tell It Like It Is!

Tell It Like It Is!

Go ahead, make my day: Complain.

Tell me how you feel, what stinks, what bothers you, or how your feelings were hurt. Bring it on!

I sat with a lot of pain recently because I didn’t speak up. I let the hurt fester and spoil until it spewed out of me like hot lava. Not something I’m proud of.

Worse, I directed my anger at the wrong person. Not at the person who had told me I was stupid, but at a true friend who would never talk to me like that.

Isn’t this how it works sometimes?

But it made me think: Why is complaining, telling it like it is, or pointing out, Hey, that was a rotten thing to say, so hard to do?

Was it because, as a child, I was told, “Don’t cry, Janie. Be tough”? Or, as a teen, knowing that if I tell them I don’t like being teased about my nose, it will only lead to more teasing? Or as an adult, hearing “No one wants to know about your neck pain”?

Recently, I felt honored when a friend reached out to share a tough diagnosis with me. It wasn’t life-threatening, but it also wasn’t expected and will lead to lifelong lifestyle changes. Later, she thanked me for listening and added that “problems shared are halved.” I love that and find it to be true.

My role in that exchange was simply to hear her frustration with medical jargon—and, of course, to care about her important news.

That conversation reminded me of how vulnerable I feel when I share my own news, whether MRI results or even a minor ache or pain.

Why is that? Do I feel that people will think less of me if my hip hurts, or if I had to have a tooth pulled, or if that dang bunion on my left foot is about to burst out of my shoe? If so, that’s sad.

Complaining has gotten a bad rap. I have a friend who didn’t grow up here. She thinks it’s all about that “Midwest nice” thing—that Midwesterners value being “nice” to people and don’t want anyone to be uncomfortable, so they avoid telling the raw truth or complaining.

I think she’s right in saying that we resist telling it like it is. But I also think many people don’t want to hear it like it is. I myself have given up trying to tell people the hard stuff. I find it too heartbreaking when it’s apparent the person isn’t listening, doesn’t care, or is simply too uncomfortable to hear it.

Recently, in Nick Cave’s free newsletter, The Red Hand Files, he spoke highly about a book called This Is the Door: Notes from a Body in Pain, by Darcey Steinke. I ordered the book and, while I haven’t read it yet, I did find a fascinating interview with the author in which she spoke about how pain reveals our humanity. She mentioned that now, after experiencing 10 months of excruciating pain, she looks at a person with a limp differently. Her experience, she claims, has made her a better, more empathetic person.

Steinke also says that sharing only our joys seems superficial to her. I’d have to agree. The trick for me is taking chances at sharing the hard things, knowing that most people don’t want to hear about the ugly parts of your life.

Of course, there’s more to it than just talking about the hard stuff. While problems shared are halved, joys shared are doubled!

So bring it on, I say, both the good and the bad. Go ahead and complain. Make my day by telling it like it is. I’ll listen. Will you?