Think Before You Rant

Relationship problems. We all have them. Or have dealt with them. Most relationship problems are your garden variety, "Why didn't you take out the trash/You always hog the remote/You want me to put that WHERE??" type of disputes. But every serious relationship has gone through or will go through at least one Big Problem. The type of problem that has you wondering if you've made a mistake by even being with this person and whether you want to continue with that mistake. They are perfectly normal, and most of the time you work through them and live happily ever after.

But what about that time period between wondering and happily ever after? That time period when you are wrestling with your feelings and thoughts and doubts and fears and anger and sadness? Many of us make the mistake of turning to our friends. But you ask, isn't that what friend are there for? To support you and help you through your troubles? Well.... yes and no.

The mistake people make is by telling their friends every single sordid detail about their dispute with their mate. You do an emotional dump and just get all that nasty stuff off of your chest. Your friend makes you feel better; takes your side, validates you, tells you that you are right and that asshole/bitch was wrong and who the fugg needs 'em anyway?? And then you decide to work through your problems with your mate and everything is sunshine and kittens once again.

But, remember how you told your homeboy about how your lady slapped your momma and then made out with your third cousin? Or how you told your homegirl that your dude took your car and was spotted joyriding with scallywags on 38th Street? Yea, you may have forgave and forgotten, but your friend didn't. They didn't have the Power of the Poon/Peen benefit of in depth communication between the parties in interest to change their perspective on the situation. And the last thing your friend remembers is your vehement arguments as to why your mate is a piece of shit. However, now all of the sudden these friends are expected to act like nothing happened. It's like asking a court reporter to strike testimony or evidence from the record that the jury has already heard; it doesn't work in the courtroom, and it doesn't work in life either.

Most friends do play along with the legal/life fiction that nothing happened, and chalk it up to it just being typical relationship shit, because we have all been on both the giving and receiving end of this scenario. Nevertheless, the reality is that friends are placed in an awkward situation when you dump your relationship problems on them. Their loyalty as your friend is to you, and it is only natural that they don't want to see you hurt. By telling them about all of the details of your dispute with your mate, you are positioning your mate in your friend's mind as the Enemy, that person that made you hurt and cry. Friends aren't there for the make-up sex and reconciliation; they are there when you are at your worst, and that is what they remember. Even if your friends go along as if nothing happened just as you are, you have still made your mate seem like a horrible person to them, and that memory lingers. And in a way, you also make yourself look like an idiot fool for going back to them. Either way, it's just not a good look for anyone involved.

So, unless you have retained an attorney and are drawing up the divorce papers, don't tell your friends about every argument and craptastic thing your mate has done to you. And even then, people get back together (I recently had a friend do that, and the first time I saw her out with her no-longer-estranged husband was kind of aw-kward). Better yet, it is probably best to just keep it to yourself, because you don't know what is going to happen a day or week or month later, and most likely it'll be that you two will kiss and make up. Your friends can still be there for you for emotional support, but keep it generic. They can know that you are going through it with your ladyfriend/gentleman lover without having to know EVERYTHING. Also, pick and choose to whom you tell what. Some friends just know when you are talking shit or being irrational and have no problems telling you so, while others will take everything you say to heart and be ready to ride out on a bitch declare your mate Public Enemy No. 1. It is called discretion, and we all need to exercise more of it (and I won't even get started on Twitter and Facebook.... some people treat that as their personal open forum relationship therapy sharing session; we don't need to know all that about you and your boo).

Yes, the urge to relationship rant is strong, and we all succumb to it at times, and as human beings and social creatures we will continue to give it and receive it. However, next time you have to urge to get something off of your chest, just think about where that something goes, and what it does when it gets there.

"Did you see my Tweet about.......?"

So yes, loved ones, I know I've been seriously slacking on the blogging front. But it's really been for legitimate reason, I swear...... ok, maybe not swear, but that's my present argument. But for real, part of the reason is that this blog originally was to be about my "adventures" going through and post-divorce, and one very fruitful source of inspiration is the world of dating.

Well, I'm not dating.

Yes, loved ones, I've been officially boo'd up for quite some time now, so there is much less tom- and kimfoolery to write about.

Except.... there really is.

However, since I would like to remain outside of the world of dating, I can't write about all the issues I think about and deal with in the day to day world of relationships. Ok, so there are many benign topics I could write about if I would quit being lazy and actually sit down to a keyboard to type something other than a Tweet but anyone with a relationship-themed blog who is actually IN a relationship knows that this is a veritable minefield of potential drama (which means that the most open and honest relationship blogs come from those people who AREN'T in relationships..... hmmm, think about that for a minute, loved ones). And as a person who tends to not trip about many things that normal human beings trip about, thus leading me directly to these mines, my inclination has just been to avoid the field altogether as not to inadvertently cause an explosion by being asked to explain and justify what I meant or get grilled about the ulterior motives of my post. And I'm not falling into the trap of "Say whatever is on your mind..... I won't get mad."

*long Napoleon Dynamite-esq sigh*

Anyway, one thing I have noticed is not only how blogging has an impact on relationships (or rather, relationships have an impact on blogging) but also another relatively recent social networking phenomenon: Twitter. As the saying goes, you're nobody til somebody Tweets you..... ok, maybe not, but my point is that it seems EVERYONE is on Twitter these days, and most likely if you're on Twitter, your boo-thang is on Twitter, too. And of course you follow each other. The result of this is that you are privy to your love muffin's thoughts and experiences all day.

Cute and special, right? It's great that you know that your hunny got a speeding ticket the very MOMENT it happens (because true Twitter heads would be Tweeting the news while they are waiting for the cop to finish writing out the ticket), verdad?

Sure..... and no.

Of course you can e-interact with your boo with an @ reply, or even a direct message, which is almost, but not quite, the same thing as talking to them about it (I'm a believer that text messaging and e-mails and the like are valid forms of communication.... I'm a modern girl). The conundrum arises when you get home. Because your boo already knows that you got a speeding ticket, ate maque choux at Yats for lunch, found out your BFF is pregnant, and think your co-worker is a moron.... what is there left to talk about? I frequently find myself starting off conversations with "Did you see my Tweet about......?" Of course, I usually didn't go into the entire situation in 140 characters or less so I do have SOMETHING to talk about, but I've just noticed that Twitter has had a definite influence in my verbal communications, whether that's an assumption that he already knows what I'm talking about and has some frame of reference, or that the matter was so inconsequential that 140 characters was sufficient to address it and it doesn't need to be discussed again.

Two ways to look at this: (1) Twitter hinders conversation because you've already talked about what you were going to talk about so there's no need to talk about it again for fear of being redundant, or (2) Twitter filters out the BS chatter so you're not subject to it after a long day of work (more of a bonus for men who complain that their girls talk too damn much, but I'm not one of those type of women anyway). I guess this really depends on what type of Tweeter you are, whether you are like me and Tweet about the mundane minutia of the day, or whether you only Tweet about major life occurrences. It also depends on what kind of verbal communicator you are.... whether you feel the need to share, or want to hear, every single little detail of your or your boo-thang's day.

For me personally, I don't think it's a problem. Sometime Tweets are actually a conversation starter: "So what did you mean when you Tweeted........?" and you can further elaborate on those 137 characters you wrote at 1:22pm. On the flipside, though, on a particularly boring day there's really not much more than what was written in the day's Tweets, so there's really not much more to say.

So....... has anyone else noticed Twitter's impact on relationships and communication? Good, bad, indifferent?

Oh, and follow me on.

A Lesson in Privilege

Attorney-client privilege is a legal concept that protects communications between a client and his or her attorney and keeps those communications confidential.

The policy underlying this privilege is that of encouraging open and honest communication between clients and attorneys, which is thought to promote obedience to law and reduce the chance of illegal behavior, whether intentional or inadvertent. As such, the attorney-client privilege is considered as one of the strongest privileges available under law.

(thanks, Wikipedia!)

This past weekend I went to go visit my best friend from law school in DC.... just to run away from my problems get away and hang out and because I missed her and didn't get to come out for the Inauguration. I finally got to meet her partner boyfriend gentleman caller dude who'd been eagerly awaiting to meet me for the past 2 years because I am the Best Friend.... he'd met everyone else in her inner circle but me and our other close friend. So today were were having our daily e-mail convo and turns out that our beaus tried to have the exact same convo starting off with this question:

"So what did y'all talk about and say about me??"

And this, loved ones, is where the next law-inspired lesson comes in..... the concept of privilege.

First of all, I may have to burst you men's bubbles and say that we don't talk about you constantly like you see in the movies and on TV....we are not all relationship crazed, obsessive, can't breathe or live without you chicks. At least, my friends aren't. We have other interests, other aspects of our lives. But even when we do have our discussions, these conversations are subject to privilige similar to the aformentioned attorney-client privilege..... we are not going to tell you everything that was said and discussed, nor should we be expected to or have to. Conversations between close friends should be non-discoverable (i.e. we should not be asked to produce evidence of them or repeat their substance) for many of the same reasons that conversations between attorneys and clients should be privileged.

Everyone needs a confidant.... someone they can share all their deepest, darkest thoughts and feelings with without fear of repercussions or being judged. It's necessary to get those things out and sort through them, and it's even more helpful when you have a sounding board and can get feedback from someone who knows you and cares about you. You need to have someone you can get totally raw with.... someone you can vent to. And sometimes you need someone who you can be totally irreverent and flippant with, but because they know you and know where you're coming from, they know where your heart and mind are really at. Knowing that such conversations may be discoverable (in the legal sense of the word, meaning that you have to produce them if requested) hinders open communication. This is why the attorney client privilege is so strong..... the policy is to make sure people can be totally open and honest so that they can get the best representation/help possible.

There are just things you say to friends and a way of saying such things to friends that are only appropriate for friends and are not fit to be repeated. While this may seem like this is how you TRULY feel, I say you are only getting a fraction of the picture from it. Think about it.... how often have you heard a man bitch and moan about his wife, but loves her to pieces? Or heard a friend completely go OFF about her dude and the next week they are closer than.... well, I was gonna say Bobby and Whitney over a crack pipe, but that's a little dated. Anyway, this goes for men AND women..... I really don't care to know what you and your boys said about me, harmless or not. If you care to disclose it (waiver of privilege) then fine, but I'm not going to petition the court for an in camera review and force you to share it with me. I treat conversations with close friends like a diary.... it's not for my eyes, and you may say things in that situation that you wouldn't say otherwise.

So with that said..... don't bother asking your SO to repeat a conversation that may or may not have occurred about you. It's against the friendship privilege, and you will get an objection that has no other option than to be sustained.

Case dismissed.

(I am not a litigator, BTW *shudder*)

(oh, and corollary to this concept is don't bother asking your SO's friend for information.... you are not going to get a straight answer. Like a good attorney, friends are not allowed to waive the privilege on another person's behalf. Serious ethical violation, loved ones.)