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I have an 88yo mother living with me, what is your wildest guess on how I handle negative crap??

I have´t read the whole of the thread so forgive me if I´m off topic or this has been said before.

At the risk of being condemned, I will be honest and say that I do believe there are many people here who are emotionally unstable, some to a much higher degree than others. This is the nature of the game here, in RL, it´s not so difficult to spot, but here, unless one observes over a long period, and I have I can tell you!, it is not so easy. I have thought many people here are great fun, normal etc etc, only to read something later which truly shocks me. Then I realise why they are here!

Emotionally unstable people have just as much right to find a significant other, be happy and hopefully heal, but it must be more difficult for them in RL to convince others, or appear stable for a long period of time, which is why inventing another persona, behind a computer screen is an easier option.

I consider myself a "normal" person, who fortunately has not suffered any great trauma in my life, I do not recognise the horror stories about addictions, extreme abuse etc, it has never been a part of my life, but I do recognise that these experiences have a great impact and often are the cause of a lack of emotional stability.

I do sympathise and I have worked and helped such people in RL, but I do not wish to get involved with such a person only to find out later, and totally unprepared, the extent of his instability. I´m too old, I want an easy life without drama.

I´m not perfect by any means, I joined here when I first moved to Spain and was feeling a little lonely after a long marriage. I now have a good life and great friends here, yet I stay, albeit sporadically, because it is a place to let off steam, have interesting, and sometimes off the wall, communication with good people in the knowledge that it can never affect my life in the real world. I can´t truly hurt anybody here because I will never meet said person, the same may be said in reverse, nobody can hurt me to a serious degree. Some of the things that have been said here would have serious implications for real life friendships.

Off my soapbox, thankyou for reading!

It certainly helped me to learn patience.

But I thought it was important for us senile old guys to know what pleases a woman???

Tell me about it!!

My dear young lady, being honest and sharing an honest opinion should hardly be considered being on a soapbox..

Ah, Jan, hello. You believe that there are more unstable people around?

I prefer the term emotionally traumatised, my mother being one of them, severly abused as a child which did not come out until much later in life and she was shunned for that, still alive but living in a world created by her own stability, which in notmal terms we would view as very unstable, still I prefer to leave her int aht world as she can cope better.

I too am fairly normal, I have a good life, am fairly together most of the time, have a nice relationship going with a man who is very like minded, we have long talks about many things and life on the whole is pretty good.

As for being condemmed I have to state that I see no reason why at all, you have given a healthy contribution to what has been a good discussion.

I do tend to agree with some of your points, s'ecially about the online stuff, I ahve said this before, it is like a wall that we all hide behind in the hope that we can meet a person.

Good post Jan and I hope you are well.

Oh dear, do we need to have a chat Pat?

Thanks Pat

Well, I think feeling exactly the same way all the time would be rather absurd, and not an ideal at all. Different emotions seem entirely appropriate - if not inescapably attached - to different circumstances. Would you truly not wish to experience the special joy of (say) a wonderful lovemaking session, a hike to the top of a gorgeous mountain, or an exhilarating ski run - as opposed to the emotions generated by being stuck in traffic, dragging yourself out of bed Monday morning, or enduring the death of a close friend?

Stability cannot sensibly refer to a "monotonal" emotional state - that would be the province of zombies.

Exactly.

so ... only zombies are emotionally stable

Ah, you have been succint there Jeff, and you raise good points.

I am an emotional person, in that I feel, so joy, passion, smiling, being happy is part of my daily life, I am that way, so in that I glean enjoyment from something as simple as walking down the street, sadness and upset are part of that day as well, all of the emotions that I feel, I embrace, none of them are bad emotions to me, they are part of life, my life.

So when I say, I am the same, it is not monotonal, it is the way I am, I feel and hurt like the next person, it is just that I am tooled enough to be able to deal with them.

If a person cries, feels sadness, then does that make them emotionally unstable?

No.

There is nothing unstable about showing any kind of emotion, nothing at all.

LOTS of people love drama. More accurately, they like its positive elements (for instance, falling in love is almost always dramatic), but don't like it's negative consequences.

If by "stable" one means "emotionally invariant."

Right, Sommer, and that's what I assumed was the case - much like what Laura was saying.

You're mixing meat-a-phors

It is dramatic yes and a feeling that we become addicted to.

I have learnt from the negatives from my marriage and my last long relationship, because it was something that I knew I had played my part in.

Which takes me back to acceptance, accepting that any relationship is not usually the fault of one party, it takes two to make a relationship work and two to make one fail.

My ex husband left me for woman ten years younger than me, I could have sat in that misery for years, emotional stability and intelligence made me face up to the part I played in that break up and it did, it was not all of his fault, he ran to another for comfort and I stayed alone. Because I knew I had to, to recover. I did. But I hold no issue with him and his partner now, we are quite the nuclear family with us all getting along nicely.

That is emotional stability, acceptance. Being tooled enough to know that we can and will recover. The negatives are there when it goes wrong, but we need to feel the negatives to learn and recover.

Yes, Laura was right, there are no wrong or right answers are there Jeff? Only views, opinions and experience.