Anyone enjoy being miserable and unhappy?

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ElsaFlowers
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14 Sep 2015, 2:49 am

On Friday my mother in law stated that I enjoy being miserable and unhappy. Several things had happened over the past couple of days which built up and caused me to have a meltdown. I find it very hurtful that someone who is supposed to care about me would say this. I am sure that there is no one on this earth who enjoys being miserable and unhappy but if I'm wrong I'd be interested to hear about such people. To me this seems a ridiculous statement to make and it serves no purpose other than to make me angry because the people around me have no idea what it's like to be in my head and they don't even try to understand, they just prefer to make ridiculous comments about why everything that happens to me is my fault.

I really feel that 99% of my stress is caused by other people's actions and what they say. I could deal with the remaining 1% if I wasn't surrounded by morons. Does anyone else feel like this?



Earthling
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14 Sep 2015, 3:04 am

Self-pity and pity from others feels good. It feels good when it gets better.
Don't think anyone enjoys feeling miserable in and of itself.
Or it's a fetish. Sometimes I like to suffer from heat in the summer because it makes me feel strong.



cheryll
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14 Sep 2015, 3:20 am

I'm frequently miserable and unhappy but I don't enjoy being that way - I just find a lot of things stressful. It has been said to me that it seems like I look for things to be miserable about.



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14 Sep 2015, 4:09 am

Well I'm not going to say I enjoy being miserable.
I don't.
I did have a bit of a victim complex going for a while there.
When I say 'a bit' I mean 'a lot'.
Being the victim meant I could be self-righteous.
That was my pay-off.
It made me better than them because they were doing all those horrible things to 'poor little me' and that made me right and them wrong.
Except I was 'the victim' and when you get into that role it can be difficult to get out of it.
It just perpetuated my misery.
That may be what they mean by "You enjoy being miserable and unhappy."
Not that you enjoy being miserable exactly, but you may put yourself in that state as a way to give yourself some form of vindication.
To outside observers, it seems as though you are purposefully making yourself miserable.

Of course, I may be wrong.
This is just what I found in my case.


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14 Sep 2015, 4:12 am

I don't think it's possible for anyone to enjoy feeling genuinely "miserable" and "unhappy". Probably she meant that you were being a "drama queen" or an "attention seeker", which implies that she thought that you were faking misery and unhappiness. She was just trying to dismiss your feelings. She very obviously doesn't understand your feelings at all. And I think she did mean to make you angry by saying that. I think we, autistic people, tend to receive that kind of comment because people grossly misinterpret/misunderstand our words and actions. It's very frustrating.



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14 Sep 2015, 4:18 am

NTs are such a***holes!
Tell your mother-in law that she deserves to burn in hell for eternity! :evil: :evil: :evil:


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14 Sep 2015, 4:29 am

Most of the population have precious little understanding about autism or any other mental condition. They see it as different, and different = a threat. We can only adjust to this to a certain extent; yet few NTs are prepared to make a similar adjustment.

As for feeling miserable, this is nothing new. Melancholia has affected those who do not conform to the mainstream since the beginning of time. That's why Van Gogh cut his ear off, why Nietzsche went insane ... the list is a long one.

There's a certain, perverse comfort in melancholy.



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14 Sep 2015, 5:19 am

I have yet to meet anyone who geniunely enjoys being miserable. It's your mother-in-law's tactless way of venting her frustration about something she doesn't understand. It's easier for some people to dismiss rather than try to comprehend something they've never experienced. How much does she know about your autism?


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14 Sep 2015, 8:21 am

Yes...there is the artistic/creative notion of melancholy.

Sometimes, I wish I though of melancholy in that sense. It would make me a better writer.

But I don't. I think of being sad as quite depressing.



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14 Sep 2015, 12:57 pm

It can be enjoyed in the sense, that giving in to it and going through it can bring release, so you can get on with your life.
It´s a healthy and ok thing to do, so the pain doesn´t get stuck in there.


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existentialterror
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14 Sep 2015, 2:15 pm

It is fallacious to claim that anyone 'enjoys' being miserable and unhappy. By definition, a person that is miserable is simply that.... miserable ! !



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14 Sep 2015, 5:28 pm

That wasn´t my intention and I forgot quotation signs.


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15 Sep 2015, 6:15 am

Oddly enough I encountered this bizarre reality arguing with an NT family member. She brought up all her issues, I repeatedly offered solutions or alternative points of view that fixed her problems or offered a better slant on the actions of others, until her arguments fell apart, and when they did she started attacking me. I finally argued her into admitting that she did not want to be happy, and deliberately cultivated her circumstances to ensure she wouldn't be.
There ARE people who love conflict, and nastiness, and want to have arguments with others and stew over imagined slights and bad intentions. They enjoy it. Its a form of entertainment. If there is nothing wrong, they will invent something completely disconnected from reality. I didn't understand at my constant striving to make things better for her was actually detrimental to her worldview.
I'm by no means saying you're like this, but yes some people are. Best to just let them enjoy their misery.


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15 Sep 2015, 6:24 am

You're mother law is just freaking ignorant about mental health. There is nothing else to discuss.


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15 Sep 2015, 7:48 pm

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Apple_in_my_Eye
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16 Sep 2015, 12:28 am

It's another example of how literal, psychic-level empathy is a myth. It's a nonsensical statement that comes from not being able to comprehend the other person's reality and that you don't care to understand it.

I'm sure a lot of people with Assison's and Parkinson's diseases heard that when the conditions were thought to be purely psychological (at least until they died).

It's easy to try to simulate some condition in your head, but it's hard to image correctly the real-world complications. And, it's even hard to know sometimes why things work they way they do.

Before I had a correct diagnosis for a physical problem I couldn't explain why I would have trouble with A and not B. When I found out my heart was not working right it made sense. But before then people just thought I was making excuses up arbitrarily, and "wanted to be miserable."