On Unsolicited Advice

Part II, Chapter 11

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Chapter 11: On Unsolicited Advice

July 6, 2021

Tuesday

7:40am

Yesterday was one of the worst days I can remember in a while. My gut was in horrible shape. Suicidal thoughts came back. Especially in the shower. “What if I just slipped and fell? Wouldn’t that be so nice, not to have to choose?” I was having what almost felt like heartburn. Bloating, burping. I did an enema and got celery juice. I felt better for a bit but then it got bad again. I took all the pills. I took a Nystatin. I’m feeling okay right now though I hear the air moving in there. I’m so discouraged and sad and frustrated.

July 12, 2021

Monday

8:28am

This isn’t romantic [with the girl from the dog park]. We had a very nice time cooking yesterday and walking around downtown. She’s a very special woman. It’s just not romantic. She told me “You should just look at your health issues differently” and “It’s just emotional” and “Other people have it worse” and “You should see a nutritionist.” It was not cool, honestly. Why do people think they’re gonna find the solution in 30 seconds of me telling them about my issues. I got frustrated but stayed pretty calm. But she felt that I was very upset with her. It was classic nonconsensual service. “I’m just trying to help” stuff. I don’t want for things like this to feel like such an axe chop to connection. I don’t think it’s unequivocally wrong or immoral (do I???).

My body is feeling okay. I definitely ate too many cherries last night.

I feel excited about my life. The magic swirl around me is so strong. It’s only getting stronger.

I’m no stranger to holding the discomfort of others around my illness. I see the pattern so clearly. Someone asks me how I am. I answer honestly: not good. They go into fix-it mode, trying to solve a problem they know nothing about, without permission. I just want to be heard, held, but their discomfort is too strong to sit still. They have to try to help.

I have a full team of medical professionals, but somehow people can’t resist. Have you tried meditating? Switching to green tea from coffee? Eat more olive oil. Stop eating olive oil. Do you exercise? I regret snapping at her the way I did [for giving unsolicited advice]. I recognize people are trying to help, to make me feel better. But helping the way you want to help as opposed to the way I need help is not really consensual. The help is really more about your discomfort than mine. On bad days, I’m astonished by the hubris it takes to think you could have the answers—that in two minutes of brainstorming, you’d find the solution that doctors have spent years trying to find, that I’ve spent years researching.

Unsolicited advice is often judgment in disguise. Helping people when they haven’t asked for it typically addresses the helper’s need and not the recipient’s, and therefore lacks empathy. If that raises some hairs and tugs at you, maybe sit with it and ask yourself what unmet need of yours causes you to try to fix things for others, even when they’re not asking for that kind of help.

A lot of times people just want to vent. Sometimes when we try to solve other people’s problems, we deprive them of the opportunity to learn from their mistakes. We’re saying “I know better than you” or “do it my way” and we undermine their autonomy and judgment. When someone begins sharing a problem with you, you can say “Are you venting or would you like to hear my thoughts?” and then make sure you’re open to the possibility that they don’t want to hear your thoughts. The desire to help can’t be more important than the other person’s desire not to be helped.

But even I wonder sometimes if my illness is providing something to hide behind—something to keep me small, something to assuage the fear of success more than the fear of failure. I wonder if it’s ancestral, in my head, emotional. I wonder if illness is a part of my identity I cling to, making me special and giving me an excuse not to go to the party.

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