My daughters are the ones who requested family counseling. We need to go over past hurts and set guidelines for future interaction.

Thank you to everyone who took the time to respond. I always find advice that helps or clarifies. I guess my frustration comes from the pushback they do give. I tried to talk with them via Skype on Sunday but they were so angry it did not go well. They can be cruel, but I know that is from hurt. I am trying to set up family counseling to help us learn how to communicate better.

Sneezyone - thank you for your kind words.

My two daughters are driving me crazy .... but more seriously they are breaking my heart. They are 24 and 27. They live together with two other girls in the city about an hour away. I've posted before about how they are "woke" and for some reason that is making everything a mine field! Below is just an example of how things get so derailed lately. My oldest daughter took a two week trip to California. Partly to visit friends and partly to go off on her own and explore. The pictures looked amazing and I could not wait to hear all about it. I texted them I would love to call and chat to catch up and hear about the trip. We were supposed to talk at 4:30. I call at 4:30. No answer. I text to say "answer your phone". I get a text back that says "Hold on a sec. Something came up." So I wait. 30 minutes goes by. Now they text and say "Sorry, something came up with DD2 -- everyone is ok" Of course now I start worrying. I text again "just tell me what is going on" -- this goes back and forth for a while. All the time they took to text things like "hold on" or "something came up" could be used to text the actual reason. Drama on top of drama. I finally find out that someone has been texting my DD2 pretending to be a someone else, a friend she had in college. They texted back and forth about a lot of things, and I guess some of the stuff was personal. I think they were talking about a guy DD2 likes and there was some sexual details that went back and forth. Of course this pretend person then spread the texts around. My DD2 was freaking out so bad she was throwing up. Everybody in the apartment was up in arms. I could sense the 4 of them just ramping this whole thing up. Don't get me wrong .... it's a lousy thing to have happen. But you know what? The same thing happened to her in 8th grade when someone stole her phone, pretended to be her and texted a bunch of guys with sexual advances. 8th grade and new to the school!!! She did NOT freak out anywhere near what she was doing now because I sat her down, told her that this person made a victim out of her but once she knew what was happening she no longer had to be a victim. When we found out the two girls who did it the only resolution I asked for was that DD2 could sit with the two girls and look them in the eye. She said to them "What you did to me was mean. It embarrassed me and it embarrassed you. I have never done anything disrespectful to you and I do not appreciate you seeking me out to disrespect me." I wanted my daughter to learn that you cannot control what mean people do, but you have a VOICE and a PATH to control the situation, confront it and then walk away. But none of this was getting through on text and they would not answer the phone. Then I get a call about 9:00 pm. They want the contact information for my nephew, their cousin, who is a police officer. He is not a police officer in their town. They wanted to get him involved. They contacted my other nephew for the information. It was like there was someone outside their window with a knife and they needed police intervention NOW. I tried to tell them to put out a message on social media saying "if you receive any weird texts it's not from me so ignore it", then to step away from social media for about 48 hours. Cut off the oxygen to the whole thing. It's literally a 2021 version of a prank phone call (I get it's a little more than that but the motivation from the bully is the same. Basically, don't give the pr*ck the satisfaction.) It is not my job as their mother to match their level of hysteria - that does not help anyone. Well, that was it. I was "denying them access to the one person that could help them." I am "minimizing her pain". Everything these days is about being a victim. I always say "you adjust your norm to who you hang around with" .... I think they people they are hanging around with coddle this concept of "I have been victimized! Justice must be done!" Everything is insulting, Every joke is prejudice, every slight is born from someone profiling you or discounting you because you are female, every male has "toxic masculinity". Where are the days when you would just say "Boy, that person is a real JERK so I am going to either tell him to go to hell or just walk away." Everything has to have some deep-seeded motivation that they then wear as a badge. "I have been minimized!!" So I have still not heard about the California trip, or how their jobs are going, or just a simple chat. Now it will be days and days of hurt feelings, demands to be acknowledged, crying about a safe space........ UGH!! Right now the plan is to talk (not text!) on Saturday. I am going to keep my original advice, try to stay cool, and stay my path. It will go badly though. I just want my normal, calm, stable relationship with my daughters back!

And I have already wasted an hour at work on it! 😀 I know I am probably behind the curve, but someone finally explained TikToc to me! I go to their website and ...... BAM! I can watch quick videos of cats and dogs doing funny things (always a lure for me), I can stalk celebrities I love like Henry Cavil and Gordon Ramsay .... the options are endless! Be warned. It is a time sucker! Unless you work all day in front of a computer like me .... then it is a great way to pass the day haha

Cats toy with us. We are at their mercy. I bought a new, bigger bed for my two cats because they were outgrowing their original bed. They go to great lengths to avoid the new bed at all costs. It's like that game "the floor is lava" only the bed is lava. They will jump over it ... push it aside ..... anything not to use it.

Someone once asked which show I would live in if I could, and my immediate answer was The Waltons!!!! I want to be part of their family

Like I have said to the caller, no one has any idea what is happening in other people's houses. Perhaps they tested positive but have informed the people coming in and out. Perhaps the neighbor is wrong and no one in the next door house has COVID. Perhaps they are all family members and they are willing to mingle. I do NOT want to live in a world where someone calls about something I am doing in my house and all of a sudden someone is knocking on my door and questioning me. Can you imagine? "Ma'am, who have you had to your house today? Why were they here? We will need all their names for questioning...." And who does all the checking? The police? The police with a nurse? It quickly would get out of control.

If it is an establishment that is flouting the protocols we can go in and work with them through education, etc. In the case of the law firm their website listed out a whole procedure for doing business (they handle real estate) .. you text when you get to the parking lot, they come out with a clipboard and clean pen, with masks, and handle paperwork that way. After speaking with them and hearing and reading their protocols we were satisfied. I don't think people would be able to make all that stuff up about fogging their offices and cleaning protocols without actually doing all of it. I received two phone calls today from people telling on their neighbors. They state that they know someone in the next door house is COVID positive but they have workers and delivery people going in and out .... that we cannot do anything about. We do not go into private houses for that. And frankly I am shocked at how much neighbor turns on neighbor in this situation. Some people would love nothing more than to be the COVID police and turn people in. They literally want us to PUNISH them. UUgh

I saw a commercial the other day for a local shop that will take your old videos and pictures and put them on a disk or flash drive for you. Only the commercial opens like this: "Do you have old pictures and videos of you at home that are degrading?" Ummmm just pictures from college .... I cleaned up my act after that I swear! Please don't let my Mom see those pictures! 🙂

I work at a local health department. Since COVID everyone in the office has been working like crazy .... 80 hour weeks for some, no weekends off, that type of stuff. With most of the calls we get people are nice or at least understanding. Others .... not so much. One woman called today. She is 85 years old and wanted to know when she could get the vaccine shot. I told her the state regulations are for First Responders, Long Term Care Facilities and Healthcare Workers. She would fall into the next round of vaccines, which is from February to April. Her response? "Wow, you guys are slow!" It really irks me when people say stuff like that, especially given how hard we are all working. When I said to her "Well, you may think we are being slow but I can assure you we have been working 80 hour weeks since this all started in March." Her response was "Let me break out the violin for you." Another woman called and reported a law firm that had COVID. According to her they are doing nothing about it and exposing everyone. We called, went over their protocol and it turns out they are just fine with what they are doing. The woman was so upset that we didn't PHYSICALLY go to the law office that she called 7 times in one day to keep complaining. I kept telling her that we do not need to go into an establishment, that COVID does not glow, we wouldn't see it all over the walls, and going into establishments does not gain us anything. She then said we were not doing our job. Sigh.

I'll add my vent: I work for a local board of health department in town. COVID has obviously impacted our work schedule as we are front and center for everything. Mostly what we do is helping the community. But there are a few (lots) of people that call and make me crazy! Some examples: "My neighbor is using a leaf blower and sneezing. I think he is spreading COVID. Can you stop him?" No, that would be weird "I think the flight patterns of planes over my house has increased since COVID. Can you stop this?" No, we don't control air space over the town. "I have a dead bird in my back yard. I think he died from COVID. If you want to test him I can show you where he is buried" No thank you "I drove past road work and noticed none of the people working were wearing masks. I pulled over and told the State Trooper he should be wearing a mask - he told me to f**ck off. Can you yell at him?" Nope, not yelling at State Troopers I am very concerned about COVID and how your office is handling it. Do you have proper training ... did you go to Harvard and study blood pathology and medicine?" If I went to Harvard University I wouldn't have a job answering this phone! "I went to the movies but was not able to get popcorn. When will I be able to have popcorn at the movies?" Hold on, let me look into this for you..... "Ok, but ... why don't you know this information off the top of your head? Because it's popcorn! We are working on spreadsheets showing daily infection and deaths ... I'm sorry you couldn't have popcorn while watching Star Wars! And on and on it goes!

Exactly

She is pretty open with me so I am assuming that the waist touching was all it was. It was in a hallway when no one was around -- I am sure it was very intimidating and upsetting. He also spent the rest of the night saying things to all the men on their team "well, we know women take forever to do anything so that is why our projects are late" or something to that nature. He was obviously just a drunk ass. She wants to go to therapy for a variety of reasons, not just because of what happened above. She is having a terrible time finding someone that takes her insurance and is available with all the COVID stuff. So the fact that she has limited herself to women only is affecting her ability to go to therapy. But she is adamant it has to be a women.

We were discussing the two candidates for presidency. When she could not get me to vote her way, or to not vote at all, that is when she said she does not feel safe. So we were discussing things. It was because I would not agree with her. It was not a case of just telling her to shut up.

Someone posted this on facebook and it just made me chuckle: "The Chick-fil-a drive through would have had the votes counted by now" For anyone who has sat in a Chick-fil-a drive through knows how efficiently they run things!

Believe me, I immediately said to her "If you don't feel safe in my home then please, pack up and leave!" She stopped saying she didn't feel safe after that.

This is where I think their generation is being led astray. When their is bad behavior by others they are not told how to deal with it or how to move on from it .... it is all about declaring that you don't feel safe and expecting everyone to stop and move the earth so that you feel better. When do they learn inner strenght?

This makes me feel so much better because that is EXACTLY what I am thinking!

I agree with this. Words have power. I remember watching Dr. Phil once and there was a divorced woman who was spending the first Christmas without her children. She said she was devastated. Dr. Phil helped her put words to it that didn't imply life-ending. I always try to remember that . Yes, when I went to college it was much cheaper. But, the cafeteria was gross and only open for very limited hours, the library closed at 10;00 pm so good luck finding somewhere to study and when finals came the only accommodation made was quiet hours in the dorms. When my daughters went to college their cafeteria had won national awards for the food, it is open from 5:00 am to 10pm and then again for "late night snacks" at 11:00 pm, the library is open 24 hours and has it's own 24 hour cafe, they had food trucks and delivery from the cafeteria, bouncy houses and puppies were brought in during finals for stress relief. They did not have the stripped down education I had.

We are and I am sure he is contributing to it. He has NO tolerance for women as bosses, gays, alternate lifestyles, etc. When he used to start raving about stuff I would say "Oh, let's hear from the white, middle class, college educated Catholic man's view on how people are not oppressed and sexual harassment does not exist in the workplace anymore or that women cannot handle positions of power!"

BINGO!

Sorry -- I keep editing this! Maybe I am just too old but I don't have a lot of patience for this new trend (not sure that is the right thing to call it). My daughters are 23 and 25 and they are "woke". That basically means everything I say is wrong haha. Seriously, though, I feel like it is such a radical movement. All white men are "canceled". Masculine toxicity is a common topic. You can't just be non-racist, you have to be anti-racist. Some man that my daughter worked with was inappropriate at a company party. He touched her waist a few times - which is completely inappropriate - but now she refers to herself as being "sexually assaulted" which gives it a whole different vibe. She wants to go to a therapist but it has to be a woman. Last weekend my youngest daughter came to visit me. We started discussing politics - always a bad move- and because I did not agree with her on certain topics she stated "I don't feel safe here." I was really really angry with that one. When they come to visit me I always make sure I offer a place for them to decompress and be pampered a bit -- I make their favorite meals and watch movies they want, things like that. But now I have to watch what I say so you will feel "safe"? It's not just my two daughters. The concept of "I don't feel safe" is a common one that I hear. Anything that doesn't jive with their mindset makes them feel "not safe". My family has always been into discussing politics and we have people that are both extremely liberal and extremely conservative. We used to be able to have normal debates. Now, any political discussion turns into tears, accusations of inflicting emotional pain on people and extremely aggressive retorts. I always think about my grandmother who was born in 1900. She live through the 1918 influenza epidemic, WWI, the Depression, WWII, the 60's and 70's, JFK, RFK and Martin Luther King being assassinated - the Kent State shooting, Nixon's impeachment for crimes, the Vietnam War, the Korean War, the war on terrorism, and 9/11. She lived through all the new hair and clothing trends (imaging the difference between 1900 and 1970!) She passed away 2 days after 9/11 at 101 years old. I am sure she thought the world was going to hell in a handbasket many times. But it didn't. I think my daughters (and their generation) think that the world is on fire for the first time and that this is the worst thing we have gone through. I am tired of 20 somethings telling me what to do to save the world as if they are the first ones called upon to make changes. I remember her telling me a story when, during the Depression, my grandfather, after looking for so long for a job because he HATED the idea of taking a handout, finally went to where they were giving out relief money. When he got up to the counter the clerk, obviously giving him a hard time because my grandfather was an Italian immigrant, told him to remove his hat. My grandfather said to him "I don't see a lady in the room and I don't see the American Flag so I am not taking off my hat." The man refused to give him any money. When my grandfather went home and told my grandmother, she said to him "That's wonderful, Andrew, but we cannot eat your hat." So my grandfather had to go back the next day and grovel to get the money so they could eat. I have never had to experience something like that and I am very grateful for that. So when this generation gets themselves into an uproar over things I just think of this. I'm tired of hearing how much debt their generation is in, how for the first time their generation is on the path to do worse than their parents, etc. ..... are you kidding me? I have found that, with age, I have achieved a level of moderation. I now know that the saying "this too shall pass" does apply to a lot of situations that I used to get wound up about. I also have learned that all the chicken littles in the world are usually way off the mark. Things I used to worry about I now realize either never materialized or, if they did, were not as bad as people would lead you to believe. I am waiting for my daughters to get a little bit older and hopefully gain a little bit of a wider perspective. I am NOT saying that they cannot disagree with me, or that they cannot take a different political view than mine, but they have not learned that being swept up in a movement that is so extreme does not allow for any other opinions. Sigh. Sometimes I just want to go live off the grid and be a hermit!

I work for a local Board of Health and I my town has been reluctant to open the schools for a few reasons: In the last two weeks the # of cases has increased. This is due to an increase in the number of people being tested (i.e.- college kids going back to school, people wanting to travel out of the state, etc.) Our data is showing that the most vulnerable population, the nursing homes and schools, are NOT where the spikes are coming from. It's from people quarantining with their family and then other family members getting sick. But people see numbers rising, see our town change threat levels, and just freak. We have been in constant ZOOM calls with the schools. The biggest hurdle is getting the teachers and school nurses to be available after school hours. There is a big possibility that little Johnnie will develop symptoms over the weekend and will not remember who he sat next to, or who had the swing after him. We need the help of the school personnel but they absolutely balk at the idea of having their cellphone go off on a weekend and being called in to help. Meanwhile our office staff has been working 50-70 hrs per week, 7 days a week, to address each case as it comes up. Even with all the procedures in place for social distancing, etc., a parent in town hosted a high school party with 50 kids two weeks ago. The people involved are giving us pushback about giving names, etc., so we can track people. Without knowing who is sick, who was exposed and all the rest, we cannot make a educated guess about whether that party will cause a problem with the school. This is just one example of people blatantly flouting the recommendations set forth. This literally is a case of damned if you do and damned if you don't. 50% of the calls we get are from people yelling about things being closed and 50% of the calls we get are from people being horrified (actual wording) that we even allow people to walk on sidewalks without masks. So when we open the schools we will get A LOT of pushback from the community. That makes elected officials in the town nervous. No one wants to be a scapegoat if something goes bad.

Just my two cents but I think some of the unrest we are seeing is being stirred up (created?) by the media. It used to be that you could catch the news in the morning or in the evening. And they just reported the news. Just the facts ma'am. Now they have multiple stations running 24 hours. It's almost like watching a home shopping show. By the time they have spent 30 minutes explaining why some new useless gadget is the best thing you are on the phone buying it. It gets your riled up and bought in. The news knows the best way to get people to tune in is to have something bad or controversial. Or just plain stupid, but repeated over and over again. I saw a clip of Trevor Noah reporting on President Trump. The President was quoting figures but screwed it up by saying something like "One trillion million thousand" or something like that. Well, that was at least 15 minutes of the show! With all that is going on they focus on flubs. Really? Someone misspoke and the news makes it like that is an indication of incompetence by playing it over and over and reveling in it. That's not just for the President either, they will do that with any candidate. But they have air time to fill. Lots and lots of it. Remember when Howard Dean was running for President and at one political stop he tried to rile up the crowd by yelling "Yeeeeaaah" but it came out screechy? The news played it over, and over, and over, and eventually his Presidential bid was over. Not because of ineptitude but because the media made fun and the sheep all listened. I remember early on in homeschooling watching the news with my children when they were reporting on a snowstorm. They were interviewing a commuter who was stuck on the highway due to the snow and the commuter said "This is the worst storm I have seen in 25 years!" - I remember pointing out to my girls that what that man said was his opinion, but because it is on the news it sounds like fact. Someone watching it will then call their neighbor and say "They said on the news it is the worst storm in 25 years!" and on and on.