Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Stumblin' Thru Disney

We just got back from Disney World, a last minute jaunt planned during the cabin fever days of a February snowstorm. With a princess-obsessed little girl and a Splash Mountain-loving son, it seemed the perfect time to go. But I get the impression that other families do Disney better – or at least more intensely – than we do.

Most families get the package deal with multiple days in multiple parks, stay in Disney hotels, fill up on the meal plans with their refillable cups, attend character breakfasts/lunches/dinners, and know the perfect viewing spots for the nightly fireworks. They navigate the park expertly from “land” to “land” obtaining fast passes for the most popular rides while waiting in line for the others and never doubling back. They have full Disney wardrobes, with Minnie dresses and Buzz Lightyear backpacks.

We are not most families. We stay off campus, fumble our way through public transportation, wander indirectly from ride to ride, and leave after a few hours. Somehow, we make it work, though I haven’t quite figured out if we win or lose in our attempts to outsmart the Disney marketing conspiracy and their comparison-resistant all-inclusive plans.

This time we opted to stay a mile from Downtown Disney, so close that it seemed easy to get to and from the park if our schedules didn’t match the few and far-between shuttles from our hotel. But it turned out to be a little more complicated than we thought. I’ll spare you the details but suffice it to say that our hour-plus trips back and forth played out like “Planes, Trains, and Automobiles” just renamed “Buses, Monorails, and Cabs”. I started to suspect that Disney discouraged any travel outside its realm. Point Disney.

We were just staying two days and our hotel served breakfast, so we opted out of meal plans and chose to focus on just the Magic Kingdom. All of the character meals were sold out by the time we planned our trip, but we waited on a five minute line to meet Mickey instead, and that was enough for everyone. The kids saw Mickey, I got a picture, and my husband saved about $200 on food expenses. Point us!

We had a vision of getting an early start and staying late into the night, but our kids maxed out after four hours. On day two, it was a battle to get them out of the hotel. They didn’t care that they hadn’t seen Ariel yet or gone in the Haunted Mansion. They didn’t want a souvenir. They certainly didn’t care about maximizing the value of our very expensive two-day tickets. They were just tired of walking.

Not that there weren’t other kids who were ready to leave, mind you. By my observation, around 4:30 pm the “happiest place on earth” fills with tears as boys with pirate faces and girls in pastel gowns and glittered hair demonstrate their fatigue with full-out tantrums. Their parents look pretty worn out as well, as they bribe their kids with pretzels and Mickey pops to keep them going until their dinner with Cinderella.

But I’m pretty sure that we were the only family whose kids were begging to leave the park by 5 pm so they didn’t miss the free chips and slurpees at our hotel’s complimentary happy hour. Seriously, $100 a day for tickets and you want to get back for free tortilla chips?

“Well, we could always come back later,” we thought, but instead, we ordered room service and crashed – forget the fireworks. Point Disney? (Or does free drinks mean the point goes to us?)

Of course, despite all efforts to avoid the costly Disney traps, we did get suckered once. The new attraction “Enchanted Tales with Belle” gives the kids the chance to act out a scene with Belle from Beauty and the Beast. My daughter was cast as the little cup “Chip” and for some reason I was also cast, as an armored guard. It was very cute, and on the way out we were given an online access code to view photos taken by a Disney photographer. When I saw the cost of purchasing these photos, it dawned on me that I was probably cast so I wouldn’t take my own photos. (I may have been fiddling with my camera when they picked me). I’m not making any accusations, just saying that would be a smart move. I mean, who’s not going to buy a photo of their child acting with Belle (I’ll admit it’s hard enough to pass up the photo of me acting with Belle!) Point Disney.

So, we may not be the most efficient family at Disney World, but we still had a great time. The kids enjoyed the rides, parades, and characters as we stumbled upon them. And we even got a lovely couple to take the required family shot in front of Cinderella’s castle.

Wait, Christmas card photo done, in March?! We win!

Get Help for Domestic Violence


As a therapist, I regularly work with perpetrators and victims of domestic violence. Recently within our community I have heard, overheard, and read comments regarding domestic violence that range from concerned to judgmental to misinformed. So many have involved common questions and misperceptions about domestic violence and its consequences that I wanted to take advantage of this opportunity to share some of what I have learned over years of working in this arena.

While both men and women experience domestic abuse, statistics show women are the vast majority of victims (approximately 85%), and they suffer significantly more physical damage from abuse than men. Domestic violence is experienced by 1 in 4 women, is the leading cause of injury to women (1 out of 3 women’s emergency room visits), and resulted in almost 180 deaths in Connecticut alone from 2000-2011. It occurs among women of all ages, races, and income levels.

As highlighted in the 2/21/13 Darien Times editorial, domestic violence is one of the most underreported crimes. Male victims often do not report abuse due to societal pressures and gender expectations, but women significantly underreport as well. It is estimated that only 25% of physical assaults against women by intimate partners are reported. Reasons for not reporting include fear of retaliation or judgment, desire to protect the offender or avoid police contact, and feelings of embarrassment, guilt, or shame.

Some ask why an abused partner doesn’t just leave the relationship. This speaks to the complex nature of domestic violence. When emotions, families, and interdependence are involved, it is not easy to walk away. A woman may stay because she doesn’t want to break up the family, because she thinks she can change things, because she is dependent on her partner’s support (emotionally, financially, physically), because he threatened to kill or “ruin” her if she leaves, because she loves him and he promised to change.

Some say, “When I was growing up, conflicts in the family were handled in the family. It was nobody else’s business.” or “My parents always fought, and nobody ever called the police.” But that’s just not true anymore. Recent decades have seen dramatic changes in domestic violence laws in response to the severity of domestic violence incidents. And outside observers are more likely to make a call.

“But it was just an argument, it didn’t get physical,” clients say. Many are surprised to learn that the definition of domestic violence includes emotional and verbal abuse as well as physical violence. Arguments that involve raised voices, aggressive tones, name-calling, cursing, or smashing things create an environment of intimidation. Yes, most couples argue sometimes. But most arguments do not escalate to the point where somebody (inside or out of the house) feels fearful enough to call the police. If one does, then it might just be that police involvement stopped “just an argument” from becoming something more.

After an arrest, one may wonder about the need for a protective order. After all, “…it was just one time” or “…the victim asked for it to be removed or changed” or “…it’s so hard on the children.” The reality is that no judge can predict without fail whether an offender will commit another violent act, or whether a victim has recanted accusations out of guilt or fear, so the court errs on the side of safety. Of course, not everybody will comply with an order of protection (it is estimated that 50% don’t), but many may be deterred by it. It may force a necessary cooling off period for both sides, and likely has protected further violence in many cases.

Often perpetrators of domestic abuse will point at the victim. “She made me do it,” “She pushed my buttons,” or “What else could I do?” are common excuses, but the truth is that using violence is a personal choice, and never the only option. It is also often a choice made when our judgment is clouded by anger or stress, or compromised by alcohol or drug use.

Many clients say that they were never taught skills to build healthy relationships and manage conflict in a non-violent way. That is a major focus of my counseling work with couples and individuals. To learn to communicate clearly and respectfully, manage frustration while staying calm, and be tolerant of disagreement. To identify “red flags” in one’s own or another’s behavior that indicate significant differences in values, expectations, and conflict-resolution styles. To learn how to recognize abuse of power, how to walk away, how to ask for help.

No relationship will be conflict-free at all times. But the bottom line is that everyone has a right to feel safe in their homes. Seek counseling or crisis services if you need them, and be supportive, not judgmental of others who are in need.

Monday, March 4, 2013

Assume Nothing

According to a popular saying, there are three sides to every story: your side, my side, and the truth.

I was reminded of this while watching one of those reality television shows starring supposed “ordinary” people living out-of-the-ordinary lives which seem to involve an awful lot of catty fighting.

This particular episode offered an interesting opportunity to view an actual argument and then get each participant’s viewpoint on what happened. I was fascinated by the inconsistencies as I watched each woman misquote their adversary and also themselves, draw faulty conclusions about the other’s thoughts and intentions, and broadly label the other’s whole personality based on this one exchange (“juvenile”, “conceited”, “self-centered”, “insane”).

Then I wondered how often I have ascribed unintentional meaning to a statement spoken to me, how much I have exaggerated when repeating stories of conflict to my friends, how many words I have misquoted to reflect what I heard more than what may have actually been said. When recounting a story with a flippant, “I can’t remember the exact words, but the gist was…..”, how often may the actual words have revealed a different intent than the “gist” I got?

My father used to say, “I know you know exactly what you think I said, but what you think I said is not what I meant.” I have been using this phrase a lot in my counseling work recently, because I am often told the details of what someone’s partner did or said editorialized with the listener’s interpretation (presented as fact) of why she did or said it. There is plenty of room for error here on the side of both the listener (misinterpreting the meaning) and the speaker (poorly delivering the message), and identifying these communication errors is critical to improving relationships.

How often do we mistake the words, or more often, the intention, put forth by partners, friends, colleagues? For example, perusing a spouse’s cellphone may be done out of “nosiness” or “jealousy”, but also out of fear or entitlement. A snippy tone directed your way may be “because he hates me” or may be the result of a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. A “nag” may just be feeling ignored.

While most people do not purposely twist words and make false assumptions, it’s not very surprising that this occurs, especially in difficult situations. After all, in the heat of battle, our emotions are heightened and our natural instinct is to defend, so we may detect weapons when there are none.

Additionally, our expectations of how people will treat us can shape our view of how they actually do treat us. How many of us can laugh off a personal comment made by a close friend (“they know us so well”), while the same comment may be viewed as a personal attack by a competitive colleague (“How dare they say that!”)? Who hasn’t noticed that on days when we’re feeling happy, we are less bothered by the attitudes of those with whom we interact, be they positive or negative?

The women in the aforementioned television show had earlier concluded that they weren’t on the same wavelength and were never going to be friends, and so their every interaction contributed to the prevention of a friendship.

Finally, when we repeat our exchange to another uninvolved (though perhaps not unbiased) party, we are usually asking for confirmation of our assumptions, agreement with our conclusions, and empathy towards our reactions. So maybe we overstate the venomous tone of our opponent’s voice, or the nastiness of the words, or the frightening volume. And maybe we understate our own – just a bit.

It is possible to keep miscommunications from ruining our relationships by simply double-checking our conclusions, “asking” instead of “assuming”. When something we hear hits a chord, stop and think about what may be causing the reaction. Did they really mean what we heard? Are we making assumptions about what they said or why they said it that may not be true? Might they be under stress or have some misinformation that is causing them to react with an overabundance of emotion? Ask them. The question can be as simple as, “Excuse me, what did you say?” Or it can be more complex, like “It sounds like you said this. Is that what you meant?” It is only after we know that we have understood each other that we can respond fairly. (Of course, we can still over- or under-react, but at least we know we are reacting to the right input.)

We may never truly eliminate the third side of the story – that’s part of the nature of human interaction – but with a few questions, we can achieve a little more overlap and a lot more understanding.

Laugh Out Loud

The Snapple fact on the cap of my lunchtime tea stated: “The average 6-year-old laughs 300 times per day. The average adult: 15 to 100.”

Oh, wise Snapple writers, thank you for bringing attention to a serious problem infiltrating households everywhere: Humorlessness. While the actual research varies on the specific daily laugh number (some studies report kids as high as 400 and adults as low as 4), it has repeatedly been proven that children laugh a great deal more than adults. Researchers could have saved a lot of time and money if they just spoke to moms, at least the ones I know, who frequently complain about this loss of humor, often tied to the bigger overall loss of our pre-parenting identity.

We all remember a time when we were fun, even funny, back when we had few responsibilities beyond caring for ourselves. Before our days were filled with other people’s needs, schedules, illnesses, activities and messes on top of our own. Now many of us find ourselves spending so much of our time shouting orders, making repeated requests (I refuse to use the word “nagging”), and hurrying things along, that we have difficulty accessing our old amusing selves. Our carefree laughter is often replaced with a different kind of humor, one that is self-deprecating or sarcastic. And that’s not funny for anyone.

There is nothing like the sound of a child laughing. Baby laughs are adorable, but children’s laughs are hearty and heart-felt. They are honestly amused and reacting in the purest way.

We seem to lose this as adults, or at least the occasions for such pure unadulterated laughter are minimized. Not only because we are more laden with stressors and responsibilities, but because we are socialized to censor ourselves. We get more self-conscious, more “proper”, more “politically correct”. We feel responsible for being role models for our kids and don’t want to be caught laughing at something that might be offensive or inappropriate. We even discourage laughing with our children if they are misbehaving, no matter how cute, to avoid encouraging continued mischief.

According to Dr. William Fry of Stanford University Medical School, a pioneer in the field of laughter research, laughter has many of the benefits of physical exercise. It lowers your blood pressure and heart rate, improves lung capacity, massages internal organs, increases memory and alertness, reduces pain, improves digestion, lowers stress hormones, exercises muscles in your chest and abdomen, and even benefits other muscles not directly involved. Dr. Fry said that laughing 100-200 times per day provides as much cardiovascular exercise as rowing for 10 minutes! (And requires no special equipment or clothing.)

PBS host and youth educator Michael Pritchard puts it more succinctly, stating, “You don’t stop laughing because you grow old, you grow old because you stop laughing.”

When I need a quick laugh, I have a few go-tos. Sometimes I’ll watch America’s Funniest Videos with my son, whose gut-busting guffaws at the slapstick humor are much more entertaining than the videos themselves. I might view a short clip of my 4-year-old singing Disney songs to delight in her sincere operatic delivery of misunderstood words. Maybe I’ll text a college friend who never fails to deliver on an old private joke. Or check out my Twitter feed in which local and national news sources are interspersed with humorists who always supply a funny one-liner or two (try The Honest Toddler or The Onion).

Once in a long while something strikes me so funny that I literally can’t stop laughing. It’s not always an obvious joke (in fact, it usually isn’t), and it’s not always in an appropriate spot (again, often not), but nonetheless, I find myself bursting forth uncontrollably with snickers, chortles, and ultimately tears, like that classic scene from The Mary Tyler Moore Show when Mary laughed through Chuckles the Clown’s funeral (okay, I’m dating myself, but check it out on YouTube for another guaranteed laugh). Clearly it’s a release of months of emotion and tension that have been held in check, and I love when it happens, no matter how embarrassing, because it’s a piece of myself that I recognize from my youth.

Our lives are stressful, and tedious, and sometimes irritating, and it’s often hard to find the humor in the moment. If we can step back and laugh at least a little about some of the frustrations tackled on an average day, it will benefit ourselves and our families. So if you see me chuckling randomly to myself around town, don’t be concerned. Please join in!