D.R. Graham's Blog, page 8
October 5, 2012
You Can’t Save ‘Em – Rescuing Rescuers
My husband played professional football with a guy who was famous for his one-line locker room wisdoms. The two that I remember were, “You can’t save ‘em” and “Give ‘em what they need, not what they want”. I’m pretty sure he was referring to groupies in both instances, but the sentiments are actually applicable to all sorts of situations.
For this article I will focus on, “You can’t save ‘em”. This should be the mantra of every person who has been the rescuer in a relationship. You know who you are.
Women rescuers are the ones who go for the misunderstood delinquent or the poor broken-hearted abused guy. They either try to save the troubled but sensitive bad boy from his own self-destruction, or they try to repair the wounds of the nice guy who has been battered and unfairly beat down by life.
Men also rescue. They do the knight in shining armour thing for a delicate and fragile damsel in distress type. They purposely choose women who have low self-esteem or are anxious to the point that they can’t function independently.
Although everyone likes to have someone take care of them and help them in times of need, and everyone likes how it feels to be the hero who saves someone, rescuing is not love. The two are often mistaken because rescuing does feel good at first and the response from others is very positive, but these good feelings shouldn’t be confused for love.
Rescuing is not healthy in relationships because it requires that the other person stay in a state of neediness. Because the rescuer connects their self worth to being needed, they purposely take on people who are down trodden. The problem is that rescuing requires controlling which keeps the other person weak, dependent, and unable to solve problems on their own.
Rescuing behaviour is not just about people who play the victim role. It is ultimately about the rescuer’s own desire to be seen as the sacrificing saviour or the protective hero. If a hero-victim relationship matures with a power imbalance, the rescuer will start to feel drained and unappreciated for all of the efforts they have contributed – especially if they go unreciprocated, or the rescuer tires of being controlled. Ultimately, the relationship will deteriorate under the resentment and often the person who was playing the role of the victim leaves to gain independence. Without a helpless victim or a lost cause, the rescuer ends up not quite knowing what to do with him or herself.
If you have rescuing tendencies, be careful because there is no shortage of new victims out there. All rescuers can spot a vulnerable person in the crowd. It’s usually an instant attraction – the hero senses someone in need and the needy person is drawn to the hero who will protect, defend, and do for them.
If you are a rescuer by nature and you are tired of exhausting everything you have to help someone who can’t be helped, or if you’ve got burned when your fragile bird got its wings and left you, you might want to rescue yourself. Jumping into another hero-victim relationship is going to have the same results.
The phrase “Can’t save ‘em” might be the simple grunts of a football player putting his jock strap on, but the meaning is poignant. If someone needs to be rescued, they have to do it themselves. You can help them and encourage them, but you can’t save them. Save yourself then enter into a reciprocal relationship with someone who is your equal.
September 26, 2012
Greece, Italy, France, Croatia, Germany
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September 25, 2012
Drink up — The Importance of Hydration
I’ve spent decades dehydrated. I didn’t know I was so severely parched until I started hydrating properly. The main reason that I didn’t realize how bad it was is because I very rarely feel thirsty. I’ve since learned that my body expresses dehydration through less obvious symptoms than thirst. Instead of thirst, I get a racing heart, dizziness, and I have difficulty recalling certain words when I’m talking. The symptoms go away immediately after I hydrate. Now, I just try to stay hydrated so my body doesn’t have to go through the stress.
The human body is more than fifty percent water – the brain is closer to seventy-five percent and the blood and kidneys are around eighty percent. We constantly lose water through breathing, sweating, and going to the bathroom. Without sufficient replenishment, muscles fatigue and cramp; skin dries out; toxins build up in all tissues; the body can’t regulate temperature through sweating; nutrients including oxygen are not transported properly through the blood; the bowels get sluggish; and the brain and kidneys can’t function properly. Basically, we can’t function well.
The kidneys in particular like to soak up the H2O. They regulate electrolytes, filter toxins out of the blood, and regulate blood pressure. Without sufficient water, sodium, potassium, and other minerals needed for muscle and nerve function, we become unbalanced. Toxins build up and cause infections and illness. In addition, low blood volume due to dehydration causes the heart to work harder to circulate the thick blood. Ultimately, people who don’t drink enough water can experience symptoms beyond thirst which include dizziness, fatigue, irritability, headaches, cognitive fuzziness, and decreased coordination.
It is usually athletes who are most concerned about staying hydrated, but young children and the elderly are also at an increased risk to suffer from symptoms of dehydration. In these populations, several seemingly unrelated symptoms such as, confusion, crankiness, sleepiness, heart palpitations, and constipation are overlooked as a symptom of dehydration.
One other seemingly unrelated symptom of dehydration is the sensation of hunger. The body will send a craving message for food because it is desperate for any type of fluid and doesn’t care if it gets it through a food source. Many people think they need to eat, but in fact what they need to do is drink. For people who experience thirst this way, the sensation of hunger goes away when they drink. Drinking water before a meal is often suggested as a way to aid in weight loss.
The best way to determine whether a person is dehydrated is the colour of their urine. Light or colourless urine is good. Dark yellow urine is an indicator of dehydration (note: vitamin B supplements will make urine turn more yellow).
I realize that the summer is almost over and some people will wonder why I’m mentioning hydration now. The reason is because we are usually good at hydrating when it’s hot out. It’s the rest of the time that we forget. Out of all the clients who come to see me at my office for counselling, approximately seventy-percent do not eat or hydrate properly, which makes them less resilient to the effects of stress. If you are currently going through a transition or dealing with a problem, it is even more important to take care of your body. Physical health and emotional health are intertwined.
Try whenever possible to encourage children to hydrate with water and avoid drinks that have caffeine. Caffeine is a diuretic that pulls water away from the cells and has a dehydrating effect. A lot of people complain that they don’t like the taste of water, but that’s because they drink too much sugar. You can try to put a little lime or lemon in the water if you are weaning off sugar. Eventually, even the most sugar addicted person will start to like the taste of water again if they drink enough of it. We have some of the best water in the world, so turn the tap on and fill your glass, your granny’s glass, and your kid’s glass.
September 17, 2012
August 21, 2012
New books by D.R. Graham coming soon…
81
After eighteen-year-old Tienne Desrochers’ father is murdered, she leaves behind her biker boyfriend and the dangerous world of outlaw motorcycle gangs that she grew up in. She creates a new life with her aunt and starts dating a country-club corporate guy. When her brother is found dead, she has no choice but to go back into the underworld to take care of family business and come to terms with the consequences of loving the very people she’s terrified of.
The Handler
While searching for the outlaw biker who murdered his dad and set his mom on fire in front of his little sister, nineteen-year-old Cain Allen scores a job as a handler for pop star Lincoln Todd. When the bikers come after Lincoln, Cain enters the biker world and discovers the person he’s willing to become to protect the people he loves.
Interned
When Japan attacks Pearl Harbour, the war reaches Mayne Island and tears eighteen-year-old Hayden Pierce and seventeen-year-old Chidori Setoguchi apart. The Setoguchis are sent to an internment camp. Hayden is shipped off to war where he fights as a Spitfire pilot until he is shot down over enemy occupied territory and forced into the brutal conditions of a prisoner of war camp. The thought of going home to Chidori and the three-year-old son he’s never met is the one thing that keeps Hayden fighting for his life. What he doesn’t know is that even if he makes it out alive, the home he knew no longer exists.
Looking For Orion
Seventeen-year-old Mike Carter doesn’t want to become a cliche screw-up just because his parents are divorcing, but his mom is drinking out of control and threatening suicide; his dad is MIA; his thirteen-year-old sister is cutting and experimenting with drugs; his straight-A grades are tanking at the high performance school; his scholarship offers are fading after getting kicked off the select soccer team; and his girlfriend Beth is shutting him out because he can’t tell her the truth about anything.For the first time in Mike’s perfect life, he’s making all the wrong choices and everything that used to come easily to him is sliding out of reach. He realizes that he needs to fight to get what’s important back before it’s too late.
Brampton Beach Series
Put It Out There
Seventeen-year-old, glitchy psychic, Derian Lafleur sets an intention to get her nineteen-year-old neighbour Trevor Maverty to stop treating her like his kid sister and start treating her like his girlfriend. It seems to be working until Mason Cartwright transfers to her school and Trevor moves away to train at a Search and Rescue facility in Iceland. When Trevor finally comes home to Brampton Beach, Derian takes a risk and puts it out there. Unfortunately, it doesn’t go exactly as planned.
What Are the Chances?
Eighteen-year-old Derian Lafleur and twenty-year-old Trevor Maverty are more than just friends, but he’s dating someone else and she’s fallen for Mason Cartwright. When Trevor’s special needs sister goes missing because of something Derian did, she has to take the chance of losing both Trevor and Mason to find Kailyn. The problem is that she can’t will her psychic visions and time is running out.
And Then What?
When nineteen-year-old Derian Lafleur and her best friend Sophie take off on a last-minute trip to Mexico for spring break, they accompany Mason Cartwright to the humanitarian project camp he’s been working at. When Derian inadvertently reveals Mason’s wealthy family background, a violent drug cartel comes after them. They flee into the remote mountains in the Guerrero State. Derian’s glitchy premonitions are the only hope they have of making it out alive, but she’s been shot and the only visions she’s having are of Trevor being lost.
Currently Available on Amazon.com for Kindle and iBooks
Hit That And You’re Dead
August 12, 2012
August 1, 2012
This One’s a Fighter
I often wish there was a soundtrack to life. If there was, we could have songs playing around us that reflect our moods, motivate us, and make everything more fun. My soundtrack would include the gamut from country, rap, top forty, and heavy metal. Sometimes I meet someone who needs a song on their soundtrack to help them pick themself up off the floor and brush away the dust. Here are a few of my favourite inspirational lyrics that I would add to the soundtrack for anyone who is going through a rough time.
Every time you fall it’s only making your chin strong…Gonna live life ’til we’re dead. Give me scars, give me pain. Then they’ll say to me, say to me, say to me, there goes the fighter, there goes the fighter. Here comes the fighter. That’s what they’ll say to me, say to me, say to me, this one’s a fighter. (The Fighter – Gym Class Heroes)
Pretty, pretty please, don’t you ever, ever feel like you’re less than, less than perfect. Pretty, pretty please, if you ever, ever feel like you’re nothing, you are perfect to me. (Pink – Pretty)
The days and nights are long. When you think you’ve had too much of this life to hang on, well, everybody hurts sometimes. Everybody cries. And everybody hurts sometimes…So, hold on, hold on. (REM – Everybody Hurts)
Don’t worry ’bout a thing, ’cause every little thing gonna be all right. (Bob Marley- Three Little Birds)
…Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth; oh never mind; you will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they have faded. But trust me, in 20 years you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked….You’re not as fat as you
imagine. Don’t worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubblegum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind; the kind that blindside you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday. Do one thing everyday that scares you. Sing. Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts, don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours. Floss. Don’t waste your time on jealousy; sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind…the race is long, and in the end, it’s only with yourself. Remember the compliments you receive, forget the insults; if you succeed in doing this, tell me how. Keep your old love letters; throw away your old bank statements. Stretch…Dance…even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room. Read the directions, even if you don’t follow them. Do NOT read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly. Get to know your parents; you never know when they’ll be gone for good. Be nice to your siblings; they are the best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future… (Baz Luhrmann – Everybody’s Free to Wear Sunscreen)
You can do side bends or sit-ups, but please don’t lose that butt…So Cosmo says you’re fat, well I ain’t down with that! (Sir Mix-A-Lot – Baby Got Back)
When the night has been too lonely, and the road has been too long, and you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong, just remember in the winter, far beneath the bitter snow, lies the seed that with the sun’s love, in the spring becomes the rose. (Amanda McBroom – The Rose)
Speaking words of wisdom, let it be. (The Beatles – Let It Be)
I’m starting with the man in the mirror. I’m asking him to change his ways.
And no message could have been any clearer. If you wanna make the world a better place, take a look at yourself, and then make a change. (Michael Jackson – The Man in The Mirror)
Tough, you think you’ve got the stuff. You’re telling me and anyone, you’re hard enough.
You don’t have to put up a fight. You don’t have to always be right. Let me take some of the punches for you tonight. Listen to me now. I need to let you know, you don’t have to go it alone. (U2 – Sometimes You Can’t Make It On Your Own)
Fat bottomed girls you make the rockin’ world go round. (Queen – Fat Bottomed Girls)
Rock on.
-D.R. Graham
July 11, 2012
Hit That And You’re Dead is now available on Amazon.com for Kindle and iBooks
Available now through Amazon.com for Kindle and iBooks: Hit That And You’re Dead
The family boat is trashed; sixteen-year-old Matt Mahony has a phone in his pocket that doesn’t belong to him; thirteen-year-old Sinclair Mahony is lying in a hospital bed refusing to tell what happened; their dad is sitting in the dark drinking whiskey; and someone is definitely lying. The only thing Matt knows for sure is that when a Mahony brother says, “Hit That and You’re Dead”, it’s a guarantee.
Coming Soon…
81
After eighteen-year-old Tienne Desrochers’ father is murdered, she leaves behind her biker boyfriend and the dangerous world of outlaw motorcycle gangs that she grew up in. She creates a new life with her aunt and starts dating a country-club corporate guy. When her brother is found dead, she has no choice but to go back into the underworld to take care of family business and come to terms with the consequences of loving the very people she’s terrified of.
The Handler
While searching for the outlaw biker who murdered his dad and set his mom on fire in front of his little sister, nineteen-year-old Cain Allen scores a job as a handler for pop star Lincoln Todd. When the bikers come after Lincoln, Cain enters the biker world and discovers the person he’s willing to become to protect the people he loves.
Interned
When Japan attacks Pearl Harbour, the war reaches Mayne Island and tears eighteen-year-old Hayden Pierce and seventeen-year-old Chidori Setoguchi apart. The Setoguchis are sent to an internment camp. Hayden is shipped off to war where he fights as a Spitfire pilot until he is shot down over enemy occupied territory and forced into the brutal conditions of a prisoner of war camp. The thought of going home to Chidori and the three-year-old son he’s never met is the one thing that keeps Hayden fighting for his life, but what he doesn’t know is that the home he knew no longer exists.
Looking For Orion
Seventeen-year-old Mike Carter doesn’t want to become a cliche screw-up just because his parents are divorcing, but his mom is drinking out of control and threatening suicide; his dad is MIA; his thirteen-year-old sister is cutting and experimenting with drugs; his straight-A grades are tanking at the high performance school; his scholarship offers are fading after getting kicked off the select soccer team; and his girlfriend Beth is shutting him out because he can’t tell her the truth about anything.For the first time in Mike’s perfect life, he’s making all the wrong choices and everything that used to come easily to him is sliding out of reach. He realizes that he needs to fight to get what’s important back before it’s too late.
Brampton Beach Series
Put It Out There
Seventeen-year-old Derian Lafleur sets an intention to get her nineteen-year-old neighbour Trevor Maverty to stop treating her like his kid sister and start treating her like his girlfriend. It seems to be working until Mason Cartwright transfers to her school and Trevor moves away to train at a Search and Rescue facility in Iceland. When Trevor finally comes home to Brampton Beach, Derian takes a risk and puts it out there. Unfortunately, it doesn’t go exactly as planned.
What Are the Chances?
Eighteen-year-old Derian Lafleur and twenty-year-old Trevor Maverty are more than just friends, but he’s dating someone else and she’s fallen for Mason Cartwright. She wants both of them in her life, but it’s not that simple. She has to choose or risk losing both of them.
And Then What?
When nineteen-year-old Derian Lafleur and her best friend Sophie take off on a last-minute trip to Mexico for spring break, they accompany Mason Cartwright to the humanitarian project camp he’s been working at. When Derian inadvertently reveals Mason’s wealthy family background, a violent drug cartel comes after them. They flee into the remote mountains in the Guerrero State. Derian is the only hope they have of making it out alive, but she’s been shot and might not make it.
July 8, 2012
So Rude
I recently visited a country where it seemed like the people had no manners. After cleaning up someone else’s garbage so I could sit down at the airport and getting smacked in the face by a door that someone didn’t hold open, I started to wonder if I was just expecting too much. Maybe I have old-fashioned Victorian ideals or maybe I’m just too Canadian, but I do expect people to show some common courtesy such as letting others off the elevator before entering.
The definition of rude is to be rough, unfinished, crude, ignorant, uncouth, discourteous, uncivilized, vulgar, or occurring abruptly. It covers a lot of behaviours including etiquette, decorum, and proper conversational skills. At its very simplest, it means being inconsiderate towards others. The problem is, we don’t all agree what is inconsiderate because we subscribe to different sets of manners that are based on our heritage, family values, and personalities.
What do you consider rude? If an anxious person doesn’t look you in the eye when you meet; if a straight shooter tells you the brutal truth; if a teenager who doesn’t have a more sophisticated way to communicate rolls his eyes; if a busy corporate person doesn’t respond to your FYI e-mail that didn’t require a response – are they being rude? I don’t think so. Then again, I’ve been accused of being rude.
To figure out what is truly rude we may need to ask ourselves whether the seemingly rude behaviour is based on ignorance, obliviousness, different values, or contempt. If someone with out-of-province plates is driving in a confused way searching for road signs and realizes at the last minute that they must budge to get on the off-ramp, is that the same as someone who cuts in line just because they think they shouldn’t have to wait like everybody else?
Rudeness isn’t all bad. It can be a mechanism for shaping appropriate behaviour. For example, if a teenager tells a friend to “shut up” or “move”, it’s not necessarily the speaker who is rude. It’s often the recipient who has transgressed perhaps by interrupting or over-stepping a boundary and is being corrected because they missed the cues – the shake of the head, sarcastic tone, and silent treatment – that signalled what is and isn’t acceptable.
So, what is and isn’t acceptable?
I could say things like cover your mouth when you cough or sneeze, take your shoes off in someone’s home, knock before you enter a closed door, say please and thank-you, and don’t touch people or their things without asking, but not everyone would agree. Although we could probably all agree that throwing dirty baby diapers in someone’s bushes and knocking over little old ladies is rude, the rest is debatable. It’s probably more prudent to say that it’s polite to respect that everyone is different and we all find different behaviours offensive. We have to take the time to learn about each other if we really want to avoid being rude or being the recipient of rudeness.
You can treat people the way you would like to be treated, but it might not always ensure that they will think you are considerate. Observe the cues a person is giving and ask questions if you’re not sure how they like to be treated. If someone expresses that they are uncomfortable, annoyed, or unhappy by something that you’re doing, simply don’t do it - whether you personally think it’s rude or not doesn’t matter. If a person repeatedly ignores polite requests and only responds after others become less polite with them, who is the one being inconsiderate and rude?
In conclusion, be a good listener, be tolerant, be helpful, and be honest. Caring about others is all that matters.
-D.R. Graham
June 7, 2012
Expressing Emotions
Or, do you avoid confronting someone who has hurt your feelings? Not react when something is upsetting? Feel nothing even when you know you should?
Feelings are complicated, but we all have them and they are an extremely important aspect of being a human being. Understanding them is vital. The four main emotions are anger, sadness, fear, and joy. They motivate us, they protect us, they bond us, but they can tear us apart if not managed properly.
Most people feel uncomfortable around three of the four strong emotions. This discomfort is partly because the expression of a strong emotion usually means something is wrong and needs to be addressed. It is also partly due to the fact that many people were never taught how to express or manage strong emotions.
When something makes us uncomfortable and we don’t know what to do about it we will either avoid it or suppress it. Unfortunately, avoiding and suppressing emotions both have detrimental effects on relationships and physical health. Those who avoid and suppress strong emotions may think they are dodging the problem, but by shutting off their feelings they can eventually end up with other issues such as stomach problems, heart conditions, eating disorders, depression, anxiety, relationship difficulties, or self-harming habits.
It might be a surprise for emotion suppressors to know that they are not fooling anyone. Bottled up emotions may be tucked away festering inside, but that doesn’t mean others can’t tell. The people around a suppressor can feel the tension that it takes to hold the emotion back and that tension shuts down communication. In addition, emotions are faster than thoughts and before a suppressor’s mind is able to shut off a reaction, their facial expression and body language has already given them away for a brief instant. Because it’s obvious to others that suppressors aren’t being completely honest when they say, “I’m fine. Nothing’s wrong”, the people around the suppressor feel shut out and they become confused and uneasy since they can’t read the emotion properly or predict the reaction.
Expressing emotions is good for a person and their relationships, but it’s easier said than done for these reasons.
A) Anger has a bad rap for being negative and people think they shouldn’t feel it. They especially dislike this emotion if they grew up with violence around them. I would like to clarify that anger is a normal human emotion that is designed to protect us and our loved ones from harm – we need it to survive. Although it is wrong to express anger in a violent or destructive way, there is nothing wrong with the emotion of anger. There is no need to be afraid of it if it’s being expressed in an appropriate way.
B) Most people were never taught how to express anger in an appropriate way. It is best expressed physically, so if you are feeling angry you should go for a walk or run, smash a tennis ball around, or chop some wood or something. Once the physical energy is released then you can express the emotion though art, journalling, music, or talking.
C) Most people have trouble identifying and labelling sensations in their body in order to communicate them as feelings. Half the time they don’t know that their heart rate is up, they’re flushed and sweating, and their muscles are locked up like steel rods. Even when they do know that they are feeling anger, frustration, sadness, or worry about an everyday thing, they don’t realize there is always a deeper feeling that has nothing to do with the everyday thing. I’ll make it simple; the deeper feeling is always hurt or fear. If you can be aware of, admit to, then talk about that underlying feeling of hurt or fear and what caused it, it will go away.
To summarize:
Emotions are transient if you express them. They will cause deferred problems if you suppress them.
The goal is not to be happy all the time or to never rock the boat, it’s to be comfortable with all emotions and appreciate the message they are sending us.
All the I statements in the world won’t help you communicate your emotions if you don’t know how you’re really feeling, so take the time to check.
-D.R. Graham
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