"Get a life"

Pulling yourself up by your bootstraps is very difficult when you have no strength and nothing to lean on. Those standing confident and upright on solid ground may see it as lack of effort, but they are not in the quicksand.

Though the phrase "get a life" is in common usage and may not be intended to be offensive, it is in effect a rather dismissive and sarcastic criticism of another person. Confident people might be able to shrug off the remark but those who are less self-assured or emotionally vulnerable may be very hurt by these words.

It's difficult to know another person's state of mind and, since it might hurt someone's feelings, why use this phrase?

'get a life' usually means stop moaning and do something about your unhappiness so I guess it matters how you are being told to do so and by whom. Said in and irritated or aggressive way it is just plain rude!

Yes. I'll stop digging.

Why would I need help of that sort? When in a hole, jingle..........

It is surprising how helpful it can be.

That is all.

I don't understand that post, jingle. Were you suggesting it for me?

Shall I report that myself?

Maybe just a little bit of fluoxetine....................

#canworkwonders

Who has suggested that people should not take medication for long term depression? Certainly not me. I merely said that I am not suffering from depression and therefore do not need to take medication. Surely I am allowed to describe my own situation?

It is a phrase usually used to dismiss the complaints of an individual when some aspect of their life is being trampled on unnecessarily by another person. Complain about noise late at night from a neighbour and be dismissed by your neighbour with the phrase 'Get a life' because they cannot see why they should even consider other people when doing what they want to do when they want to do it.

Being independent and having one's own life that is not entirely dependent on someone else is utterly different. DH's work took him away from home and usually abroad, frequently at short notice, and usually for an indeterminate period.

Fortunately I am a self contained person and was quite happy on my own or with the children, except when we moved house and DH went abroad the next day and the wind blew the garage doors open and I couldn't close them. The difficulty now he is home all the time. He is gregarious and whatever he is doing he likes to have other people around him. And I do whatever I am doing best when I have no distractions......

that should be His, Hers and Ours!

Only just got back to this thread and have enjoyed reading all the contributions. I didn't mean to do anything wrong, or get at anyone (that truly isn't my style!) just thought it was worthy of a discussion in it's own right, because of my experience.

So ... in my case, it had the following effect - because I 'got a life' and became an independent woman all those years ago it somehow made me more attractive to the husband and he made an effort to be involved in some of my interests. So now we have His, Hand ours! Works perfectly.

I read somewhere that relationships are best understood like physics - where there is push, there is pull, and vice versa - the ideal is to achieve equilibrium

I don't think all depression is temporary, for some it is much longer and therefore I feel this needs to be said. It is not something people have a choice about and only those who have no experience of clinical depression think that it is something that can be coped with without medical attention. I don't agree with handing out pils willy-nilly but I do think that those with clinical depression need lots of specialist help and do not need anyone to imply that it is something they should be able to deal with on their own.

There is cure for sadness except time, and that only provides other things to think about. Pills help if it becomes an obsession which threatens to take over a life, or if it is general depression without a reason for sadness.

Elegran - I am reluctant to take so much as a paracetamol for a migraine
seeing that addiction to prescription plus over the counter drugs has ruined my daughter's life. I don't suffer from depression, just sadness, and there is no pill to take that away.
I do, of course, realise that for many people medication can be very helpful to get them through a temporary bout of depression.

jingle Just remember to pronounce it as if it has a K at the start not a CH.

i used to hate it when my husband played cricket,,,,but now i cant wait for him to get out of the house,,,,i love time on my own,,,,,,,,also when we got married he worked abroad and only came home everyso often,,,,,this went on for years,,,,i left him to his career,,,,but it was driving me to disspair. i cried all the time,,,i just wanted him to come home, i was just so dull and boring,,,,,,,,,,now he has retired home all the time,,,drives me mad,,,,,,,,should have been a high flyer while he was away,,,had holidays abroad with freinds and had a good time untill he came home,,,,,,,,,,,,,now i wish i had,,,,,,,oh well......so all you women out there enjoy your freedom when you can,,,,its great,....

Yes,you can't dwell on it all the time - that stops you thinking about or doing other things, so that the hurt becomes the only feature of your life.

If you find yourself unable to move your attention from it at all, even for a short time, then you need medical help to break the circle and get other thoughts into your life. When the other things become established, the medication can be tapered off.

You are right, Elegran - I think I have come to terms with the 'loss' of half my family because of my daughter's mental health and addiction problems, and I hope it has made me sympathetic towards everybody who has lost someone. I don't have a sad life because I won't allow myself to dwell on it all the time, and I certainly don't have a 'little' life, whatever that means.

I'll never remember that one!

Jingl, see how joining Gransnet has improved your vocabulary?

Nonsense, jingle, you loved Googling it. Now you can try to slip it into a conversation and bamboozle someone else.

Oh. It's a painting thing.

I hate having to google words!