Raising the Happiness Bar

[Stigmata]

-- Cheers, Hap. To make a short story long....LOL. Bear with me. Head full of octagonal red traffic signs and general brain overclocking causing me to flood gate open/brain stream lately...

Hmm, what are the "stop" signs in UK? Last time I was in London I only remember always turning my head to watch for traffic and always getting it backwards. Look right--car zooms by from left. Look left at next crossing, lorrie barreling from my right. Bollocks! Bloody hell....

H is not happy – hasn’t been happy in many a long year and for many a long year has been trying to make it my problem that he is not happy. I have gone along with this in my Mrs Fixit mode and spent a lot of time and effort wondering how he can be happy.

-- Why is he unhappy? And, no, can't be you. If we're not happy with ourselves we'll never display/encourage our mates to be happy.

What are his short/mid/long term goals? Hopes? Dreams? Have you asked?

If he had 10 million GBPounds dropped into his lap this weekend what would he choose to do with the rest of his life to be fulfilled? Besides holiday? Is he passionate about anything? Where this money would be put to fulfilling use?

He could start with the basics
Stop drinking too much
Eat more healthily
Get some exercise

-- How's your communication? No, he doesn't like being nagged, I'm sure, as you probably agree. The booze will be the last and toughest. Maybe he can scale it back a bit for now?

Tried changing your diets slowly? Start cooking fresh veggies? Fruits. Lean meats. Cut out refined sugars, white flour, starch, coconut/palm oils?

BTW, I had your fish n chips served in a newspaper over there. Blech! It's okay for food to have flavor! (and don't get me started on bangers n mash.)

Maybe you could encourage him to exercise first? Proven depression fighter. Only need 30 min. to start. Walk. Lift weights. That's it.

He could then move on to quitting the negative self-talk, not taking everything personally etc etc.

-- He may be depressed. He needs to read affirming stuff. Get that voice in his head to be positive, energized and build himself/his goals/hopes up.

Sounds insecure. Why? Low self-image/worth? Was he overly criticized as a child? Is he in a rut? Hate his job? What makes him laugh?

Is he against taking an prescribed AD? Or, a supplement? SJWort? (which I've taken/plan to take soon again). Dang Germans are all on it.

Gotta raise his mood somehow.

All this would be good. But all this is NOT MY PROBLEM and I have to train myself to believe it is not my problem and to stay happy regardless of his moods. Since I began DBing I have been working on not criticising, detaching and GAL, but there is and always has been resentment on his part when I appear to continue blithely on with my life “ignoring” is problems and not letting his misery get to me.

--GEL hit all of these nicely. Nuff said.

I am a naturally happy person (just lucky that way).

-- Yes you are. I'm not. Have to work VERY hard to keep the shadows at bay. I'm envious

Still, very good for your H. Misery loves company but you're projecting light to his shadow.

“glass half full” become “self-satisfied”
“Strong” become “over-bearing” or “insensitive”
“See the positive” become “over-optimistic or simplistic”
“Seeing the good in people” become “bad judge of character”
“Seeing the funny side” become “flippant"

-- Signs of a depressive. Constant contrarian. Scrooge to the Cratchetts. And he says you are sometimes "insensitive?" I'll bet he's hypersensitive to an extreme.

Do you validate him even if it feels like work? I know, it sucks. But he sounds like he needs his ego stroked, bolstered, encouraged. Doesn't sound like he gets any of that from within. What regular praise do you give him?


How is it that you can purport to empathise with someone, care about them, even love them if you cannot get into their misery. If their misery has to be theirs to own and theirs to live with/fix. I feel that in the last few years since I have been detaching it is like we live our lives on two parallel tracks. I am on the sunny side of the street and he is on the shady side. Do I just carry on regardless on the sunny side and hope one day he will have the sense to cross the street? The more I try to do that it seems the angrier he becomes, notices that I am living a separate life and accusing me of not giving a sh!t about him.

--That last sentence tells all. Insecurity. Fear. Of what? Success? Failure? Is he sometimes clingy/needy/smothering as to getting attention from you?

And, careful, Hap. GALing full throttle may not be best method in this dynamic. H will feel like he's being left behind. Rejected. Will sulk. Sorry for self. Withdraw further in pity-party way. Forgive his selfishness until he can burn the black clouds away.

Like I said, it SUCKS but you have to bolster his ego and self worth. What are his LLs? WOA sounds like a biggie.

I want to raise the happiness bar for both of us, but if I can’t do that I sure as hell don’t want him lowering my happiness bar.

--Or lowering yours any further than it already is, right? That 2 sides of street analogy. Scary rumblings to me. Your GALing and positivity is very good. But it can also become a balloon that causes you to float away from helpless H. More distance. Soon less in common. Boredom. Frustration sets in...

...and I bet office guy was fresh-faced breeze to enter your life at a vulnerable time, eh? Sun/charm/humor opposed to H gray clouds of no humor, neediness, lack of confidence? Tempting to be sure. Glad you saw it for what it was. No fix. Temporary escape. Worst reason on Earth to destroy deep bonds of an M and all of that early happiness/EC before normal drudgery sets in everyone faces.

Hang in there. He needs you. He's wobbly in the self worth department and he needs you to help him get his balance and walk tall. Maybe if he reads success stories similar to his own interests?

But get him to get the blood flowing. Some sunlight. (oh, wait, this is London. No such thing as a sun)

What would he do if you were to suddenly jump on him as he was sitting there on the sofa in a funk and started gleefully tickling him? If he'd laugh I'd try that. Gets all kinds of "fun" brain chemicals buzzing...not to mention a good hurting belly laugh works wonders on clearing the clouded mind.

-Stigmata-