Category Archives for "Questions"

0 What to do when a parent compliments other kids.

MartyK asks: I’ve been blessed with a nice face according to society. And I was content with it. But today my mom was praising one of my friend’s good looks. To my mom, she’s perfect. I won’t lie. It hurt me. I don’t know why it did. I was insecure about myself for a long time but I was content. I know I’m good-looking but the way my mom talks about her, I don’t think she’ll ever talk about me like that. She says my friend has the potential of modeling and that she has a nice body and skin and hair and has a smart face. I just wish she’d sometimes call me pretty or talk about me like that. After all, I am her daughter. And to me, my mom’s opinion matters a lot. What is your opinion?

Hi MartyK –

Well, as you know, I don’t have a great sense of who’s good-looking or not; I just react to how I see people act. The most attractive human in the world to me, of course, is the one I call Handsome, and I don’t even know what you humans would think of his looks. I’m just crazy about everything about him, and don’t think about it past that. So as far as your looks go, if I met you I’d be absolutely thrilled – but I wouldn’t be able to tell you whether you belong on the cover of Vogue or not. Just not the way a doggy brain works.

But boy do I relate to your question! I’ll be walking along with Handsome, perfectly happy, and he’ll see some scruffy puppy with one ear sticking out, and say “That is the cutest puppy I’ve ever seen!” And I’m just heartsick! I thought I had been the cutest puppy he’d ever seen! What’s going on?!

I think there are three possibilities. And it could be one of them, or two, or all three.

First, sometimes our parents (or human companions) are a little Continue reading

0 Why do people suddenly drop out of text conversations?

Prettyndsweet12 asks: Sometimes when I’m texting certain people (boys specifically), we’ll text for a good bit and then suddenly they don’t respond for more than a day. I understand people have lives and things going on but I get worried and feel the need to keep texting. I know a lot of that comes from my attachment issues but my question is when is it just time to say forget it and give up on them?

Hi Prettyndsweet12 –

I have a lot of problems with texts. And here’s my biggest one:  we dogs don’t understand most of the words you humans say to us – we grasp a few (sit, stay, come, maybe walk or squirrel) but at the same time we do a great job of understanding what you’re expressing to us.  How?  By the tones in your voices.

You might say to me the words “Hey you goofy dog.”  What do they mean?  Perhaps you’re saying how lovable you find my nose.  Or to get out of the trash can.  Or that you’re furious that I chewed up the couch.  Or that last night my love was the one thing that kept you from hating yourself, and you appreciate me more than ever before.

Your words don’t mean a thing.  It’s all about how you say it.

And texts never have tones!  They might try to make up for it with CAPITALIZING or with emoticons ;-), but even those don’t carry the same subtle nuance (big words for a pooch, I know!) that tone does.

So while I understand why texts are convenient, I really prefer direct speech – even over a telephone.

Which leads to my answer… of course, prettyndsweet12, I have Continue reading

0 How to contact a friend long after you should have

Sarah asks: Since I started college I’ve drifted away from my number one supporter – my high school counselor. She supported me throughout high school when I had issues at home with my mom, and she was one of my main supporters when I ran for two pageants. I feel so ungrateful for not keeping her up-to-date with what is going on in college or even calling her to talk about my problems. I remember her telling me don’t take forever to call and talk to her because she’ll get mad – and I did the complete opposite by not calling her at all. I feel so bad. I really want to talk to her but I feel as though she wouldn’t want to talk to me. I need her support right now and I need her to guide me with what I am dealing with in college. How can I gain back that bond with her?

Hi Sarah –

What a great question this is.  I have an answer for you, but first I want to tell you a joke that was very popular a few years ago.  The question was how to tell if your marriage is better than your relationship with your dog.  The answer was to lock your wife and your dog in the trunk of your car for a few hours, and when you open it, see which one’s happy to see you.

Of course, the dog will be overjoyed.  Why?  Because he’s not thinking about how awful you were to lock him in there, he’s just so happy to get out and see his best friend.  While your wife, who has a bigger brain, is only thinking about what a jerk you were to lock her in there.

Now I’m not suggesting that your counselor has the same size brain I do, but there is a certain similarity here.

It’s all about Continue reading

2 Why a person feels numb

Wooff asks: All my actions are based on what the worst is going to happen if I don’t do it. For example, if I don’t do this for my mom, I’ll regret it when she dies. My every action is based on death. I should have fun now so that I don’t regret my life when I die or before I die. Is this good thinking? If not, how do I change it? I think I’m asking you this because this isn’t normal thinking. Also, I’ve observed I’m emotionally numb most of the time. I think I’ve trained myself to feel this way. I got hurt by several persons two years ago. Shouldn’t I be okay after all this time? What do you think? How is it possible I can’t like someone?

Hi Wooff –

I’m not a psychotherapist, but my human friend Handsome is, and he says you sound a lot like you’re a victim of trauma.

There’s nothing particularly wrong with basing your actions on pessimism. All sorts of committees depend on someone being in the room who looks at the worst-case-scenarios (to balance discussions against crazy optimists like me!). In the world of investment, people like that are called Bears – they predict markets will go down, and invest accordingly, and so do well when all the optimistic “Bulls” are losing their shirts.

And I’d far rather have you thinking you want to have fun before you die, rather than not care about what you do. (You might even have some sort of psychic gift that you won’t live as long as some others. The great composer George Gershwin thought the way you do, obsessively, and that actually helped him complete his amazing output of music before he fell ill and died at the age of 38. On the other hand, the more recent songwriter Bob Dylan seems to have had the same obsession all his life, and he’s doing just fine at 74!)

What concerns me more is the numbness you report, and how you connect it with some bad things that happened to you. Numbness is a common reaction to a horrible Continue reading

0 What to do after stopping cutting

Kali asks: I took your advice and stopped cutting. I did submit a question last year about my cutting and depression, and once you gave me your advice, I immediately went to my mother and told her everything. She took notice on how bad my depression was and how much I was damaging my own skin, so she took me to a therapist. And I’ve been clean for a year and a few months. But, my depression only worsened. When I moved on to middle school for 7th grade, which was a few weeks ago, I already started to get bullied. I was actually used to getting bullied, because I was bullied since pre-school and up, but this was worse. The people who were bullying me actually wanted to fight me, to cause me physical damage. So, with me being the stubborn, naïve girl I am, I took up one of my bullies offers to fight. I waited for her and her boyfriend outside of school but they never came, so I left. And the next day I found out they were hiding because they were planning on jumping me. I told my mom and she immediately took me out of school, having me now being home-schooled. But now I’m thinking, ‘Should my mom really be doing this for me?’ I’ve asked her countless times about this and every time she’s answered with, ‘I’m tired of you always waking up in the morning, being afraid of what’s going to happen at school, I’m tired of you being in constant fear of going though the day at school, and I’m tired of you always worrying about what’s going to happen the next day.’ This has made me more depressed, and even more suicidal, but I’ve still never touched a razor, knife, or piece of glass to slash at my skin, nor have I done anything to get that sensation back. I just really need help, since I’m not seeing a therapist anymore and I would feel very uncomfortable talking to them about this situation. Do you think you could possibly help me?

Hi Kali –

I’m so glad you’ve been able to keep yourself from cutting! You’ve made my day, Kali!

But the big question is what you should do now.  And you can probably guess what I’m going to say – two things.

First, yes yes yes, I’d love you to see a therapist.  It’s great that your earlier work with one helped you gain the strength to stop cutting; there’s nothing I’d wish for more.  But the thing about cutting (or drinking, drugs, or lots of other addictive behaviors) is that they slightly cover up the pain a person is suffering.  So now that you’re not cutting anymore, those feelings are guaranteed to come up.  And when you add the rotten awful terrible experience of bullying starting right when you begin a new school, that’ll just make it worse.

And although it’s clear your mother is doing everything she can to protect you, and is acting completely out of love, and although I could never argue that what she’s doing isn’t the best idea… still, her taking you out of school can’t feel good, and is very likely to add to the depression you were already suffering!

So I’m going to throw something at you that might sound just awful.  Believe me, I’m always against bullying, and don’t agree with the people who do it. But there’s got to be something about you that made those jerks pick you out, out of all the students at the school.  Maybe it’s that you’ve been bullied so many times in the past, so you carry some fear (That’s often what makes us dogs bark at strange people – we pick up that they’re afraid of us – and our barking just seems to prove their fears right!).  Or maybe it’s something else.  But whatever it is, I want you to get Continue reading

0 How to keep a romance secret

DogLover101 asks: How do I keep my relationship with a new boyfriend secret from everyone, and stay happy together? It’s kinda like a forbidden love, and my friends are starting to get suspicious!

Hi DogLover101 –

So this is cool!  I love keeping secrets, especially since I’m really bad at it.  Like I’ll try to sneak up and grab a lamb chop off of someone’s plate at dinner without them noticing, but they almost always do.

What’s great about this secret is that no one’s being hurt by it – it’s just the two of you keeping what’s special between you.

The first thing I’ll recommend is that you both Continue reading

0 How to handle friends who listen to mean liars

sarah asks: This is going to be my second year in college. My college is very small. There’s this one girl who is very outspoken but evil. She works her way through people, and makes them believe whatever she says. She has caused a lot of people that were once my friends to turn against me. How do I let people see the real me, and be attracted to me and not her?

Hi sarah –

I usually hear about girls doing this at younger ages – this behavior’s very common around 14 years old – so it disturbs me to hear about it happening in a college. Not that I don’t know of adults who do such things, but just that I’d have hoped the other students wouldn’t be as susceptible to her manipulations.

But I then have to think – oh, that just means she’s reeeeeeally good at it.

And frankly, if she’s that talented, I don’t know that I can give you a great answer on how to beat her at this game. Eventually, we can be sure, she’ll alienate enough people that they start to see her the way you do. And when that happens, she’ll move from being liked and trusted to being despised and shunned.

But that’s later, and up to the hands of fate; not now, in any way you can control.

So my invitation to you is to try to look at this in a very different way – as a Continue reading

0 How to deal with failure

Meggz asks: I only managed to complete two of my exams at 16, which were English and Maths, and I ended up doing really badly. This was because I was battling depression and I was unable to put myself through more stress of doing it. I hadn’t gone to school since year 9 and so I was teaching myself. Have I ruined the rest of my life?

Hi Meggz –

I’m really sorry you didn’t do well on the tests. I know those subjects can be extremely hard. But my quick answer to you is No. Nope. Absolutely not. No way, no how, nopity nope nope nope.

Somewhere in this world is someone who never did badly at anything. I have never met them.

The stories of great ‘failures’ are endless. Albert Einstein failing his college entrance math exams, Michael Jordan being kicked off a basketball team for not being good enough, movie studios rejecting Fred Astaire and E.T. and all sorts of things.

But that’s not to say the tests don’t matter. They do. It all comes down to one question: Continue reading

0 Why keep a journal

Wooff asks: I plan on being a writer. Writers are people who are changing the world. They fascinate me. But you see, my thoughts go all over the place and I lose the main point and… aghh, it’s all a mess. And I am a very lazy person, which is bad because I spend most of the time on the computer. I want to write on my diary. Do you think I should keep a journal? How do I pursue my passion?

Hi Wooff –

You ask me so many great questions, and I usually give you long, complex answers. Here’s an exception: Should you keep a journal?

Yes.

I have a few reasons.

First, since your thoughts “go all over the place,” a journal is a great way to keep things simple and straightforward. Write down the things that you did, or that happened to you, every day, and your thoughts about them. It shouldn’t take more than fifteen to thirty minutes, except when you have a whole lot to say. This way you’ll get lots of great experience in writing, with no concerns about what teachers or audiences or even your friends think about it.

Second, writers often talk about wanting to develop a Continue reading

0 What is Anxiety?

prettyndsweet12 asks: Lately I have been suffering from mild depression. I’ll get upset about one thing and then my mind will make up more problems. For example, if I’m upset because I don’t think I’ll do well on a test, the feeling of being nervous about the test will become feelings that I will never be good at anything and I won’t be successful in life. My mom takes it as me stressing myself out over something small, but there are actual feelings that my mind is forcing on me and I have absolutely no control over it. Should?I see a doctor or is it just my hormones?

Hi prettyndsweet12 –

Actually, it sounds to me like what you’re suffering from isn’t depression as much as Anxiety. Depression (in adults anyway) tends to come with exhaustion, some sadness, hopelessness, and an overall dreariness. Anxiety means you just worry about everything, especially things that aren’t really worth worrying about. And worst of all, worrying not only about what’s going on right now, but about the future (which no one can control at all, so there’s no use in worrying about it).

Sound familiar?

Now when you ask me if it’s a medical condition, or if it involves hormones, I have no remote answer for you. It might be good to check with a really good doctor, just to make sure.

But if your doctor tells you there’s nothing physically wrong with you, I don’t want you to think you’re crazy or anything. Anxiety is a normal human condition – especially in these fast-moving days.

Here’s the deal about anxiety. All animals, from you brilliant humans to us soulful dogs, down to beings as low as insects and even cats (heh heh!) – all of us have a built-in instinct of Continue reading