HealthyGamerGG - Dealing With Guilt - AITA Caller #1 - AITA

Episode Date: February 18, 2023

🎙️ Dr. K shares advice on dealing with guilt and the question, "Am I the A**hole?" 💭 He emphasizes self-forgiveness and taking responsibility for our actions, while also acknowledging others' impact on us. 🌟 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

And then the other thing is that, so I'm going to go ahead, I don't know what chat thinks, but I'm going to go ahead and say, I don't think you really did anything wrong here. Cool. So what do you go by my friend? Sorry, can you repeat that. What do you go by? What do you want me to call you today? Oh, call me James. James. Welcome, James. Yeah, nice to meet you. Hey. So what's your situation? Well, I was seeing a girl and I was kind of, A little bit stressed and annoyed because I didn't know where my boundary was between going to her place and not. At a time, I felt like I wanted her to kind of try to push on our behalf. But we broke up recently. It was pretty rough. Not going to lie. Sorry to hear that, man. Thanks.

Is that it? Oh, I don't know which situation you want me to explain the push for change or how the breakup actually went. Oh, well, so generally speaking, I think that, so what's your understanding of what we're doing today? Am I the asshole? Yes. So what, I mean, so far what I've heard is that you were in a relationship and y'all broke up. So I'm not seeing any asshole behavior there. Is there anything that you're concerned about that you may have done incorrectly?

Yeah. I feel guilty and I feel like the asshole even though she broke up with me. And okay, so why don't you, can you tell me a little bit about what's your understanding of why she broke up with you? So when I went to Sear, I flew from Dublin to Croatia to Sear. I was on pain medication for some sinus issues. Things were clear. I was like, okay, cool. But then suddenly they got very, very bad, very quickly.

I was like going through horrible headaches, stuff like that, stressing her out a lot. How were you stressing her out? Well, I could see that like she almost didn't know what to do. She was a bit overwhelmed. There was a time in a restaurant where she got frustrated because I was about to faint. Yeah. She was getting frustrated because you were about to faint. What made you want?

want to faint or not made you want to but what was causing your near fainting so i later found out that um i was actually taking a bad reaction to the pain medication i was told they didn't have a certain substance they did and that was causing me to feel faint feel dizzy slurred speech terrible terrible stuff i was trying to ask for help and she didn't really take me anywhere and i saw her getting frustrated and I felt guilty. What kind of help were you asking for? To see a doctor. I see. So you were asking her to help you see a doctor?

Yeah. And what did she say? The first time, she called her mom to talk. Her mom was then talking to me, like, do you need to see a doctor? Are you feeling okay? And I was like, no, I don't know how I feel right now. It just feels bad. Yeah.

I think I'll shout it out by her mom. Actually, later that day. You got what by her mom? Her mom then started shouting. I mean, blaming me once my girlfriend went to the bathroom. What was she shouting? What was she blaming you for? What was she saying?

Saying like it was irresponsible of me to come. I shouldn't be playing with my girlfriends or my ex's feelings. like if I was sick I should never have tried to come what are you doing here like you're not strong enough that sort of stuff what do you think about that I want to say it's like not true but I still feel that guilt like it is my fault and what do you think is your life I felt better well like if I didn't get sick if I took care of myself maybe things would have been different I thought it was okay, but I didn't know something like this could have happened. Okay.

And so what do you think is responsible for the way that you were feeling when you were in Croatia? What do you think is responsible for your sickness? Physically or... How do you understand why you were sick in Croatia? I mean, sorry, words are kind of catching me. I have feelings, though. just not the words. They're hard. That's fine. Take your time.

Guilt, shame, and then blaming myself. That's what comes up. Okay. So I can notice that it's like when I ask you a question, what I'm sort of getting from you is that there's almost like this, it almost feels to me like a geyser where there's like this fountain of like guilt and shame that's kind of dominating your mind when I ask you. question. Is that fair to say? Yeah, it's kind of floating the space, to be honest. Right? So I'll ask the question again, because I think it's important to try to, it may not be possible, so no blame, but to try to kind of push past that. So my understanding is that you were ill when you visited your then-girlfriend in Croatia, correct?

Yeah. And prior to going to Croatia, you were ill, and then you had seen a doctor, presumably? Yeah. And the doctor did what? So the doctor said, hey, take these medication, this antibiotic, and this pain clear when you need it. If it clears up between this day, you're good to go. Okay. So did the doctor tell you not to travel to Croatia or anything like that?

One doctor said be cautious about it. The other doctor said if you're feeling good on that day, things have cleared. There should be no reason why you can't. And how did you feel that day? On the day I left, I almost felt fantastic. Okay. My nose was clear. There's no head.

So would you say that you follow the doctor's medical advice? I say so. Yeah. Sounds like it to me, right? So if your doctor didn't say don't travel. and they said, be cautious about it. And if you're feeling good on the day you have to leave, then you're fine to go. Because if you take antibiotics and painkillers, and then when you got there, what stressed your girlfriend out?

So at first, I just kind of had like a pain in the head and I was like, oh, I'll just take a painkiller. Not realizing me taking the pain killer was going to cause the effects later. so I was kind of drowsy not really present trying to be I kind of felt like I was like that kid being driven around in the backseat of your car and you're like okay we have to take care of them now okay so you were ill and what's your understanding of like what was causing what caused you're the way that you were behaving. Well, now I know it was that bad reaction to the pain medication. Okay.

So, and then the mom starts yelling at you, right? Yeah, that was after visiting a restaurant the first time. Now, earlier, when you were first sharing the story, you said something about, you said something about boundaries?

Can you tell me a little bit about that? Yeah, so, like, two weeks probably before. There is a situation where me and my girlfriend or ex needed to talk about something important. But prior to that, her dad had decided I'm not welcome in their shared apartment. I was finding that very difficult

because we didn't have space to talk really about important things unless it was in a public cafe, in a shopping store, yeah. So what, what, I'm confused? What is that? So, but y'all are long distance, right? No, actually, I was going to visit her while she was visiting family, but she does, like, live two hours away from me regularly. I see. So, so, so, and so I'm confused.

So her dad was not okay. How old is she? Uh, 20 something. And she pays for half to rent, half of everything in the apartment. So, so y'all, but y'all don't live together? No. And so I'm confused. So the dad doesn't want you to visit her at her apartment?

Yep. I wasn't even allowed to pee in the house. Travel two and a half hours to get there and was told going to shop and center. And that was upsetting. And so what was the, way, it sounded like you pushed a boundary. Apparently so. And what was the boundary that you pushed?

I don't know. My girlfriend wasn't very communicative. I tried asking what's going on. I was allowed to stay her apartment before that, but something changed and she wouldn't tell me. And I never got to know. And so this was a few weeks before you visited her in Croatia? Yep. And so who invited you to Croatia?

My girlfriend did. Did she invite you? Yeah, she said, hey, just come over. We can chill out, talk things through. So I'm super confused. So you're living in Dublin and she lives two hours away? No, I'm living, well, near Dublin that I can get to easily. She's living into a Dublin area.

I see. And so you're, but does her family live in Dublin too or she's living there on her own? So her father lives in Dublin. Her mother lives in Croatia. I see. Okay. And so you're not welcome. And when did you say she pays half the rent, her dad pays the other half?

Exactly. I see. Okay. So she lives with her dad. So you're not welcome in the roommate's house. But are you being invited by? your girlfriend there? At times I was and then it just all shut off, basically.

But I was invited to hang out adjacent to her apartment because her apartment is right next to the travel line and all that, yeah. Okay, so James, this is where, so what do you think here that, what do you think you did here that could be perceived as being an asshole? In that context, I think how I brought up. I was, my mind went blank there. Sorry for interrupting. I should have let you finish.

I'll ask the question again. So I, like, what do you think you did wrong here? What do you think you're guilty of? How I talked about it maybe or brought up with my girlfriends, how I made her feel. Did I push something? I don't know. I feel like I did something wrong. Okay, you feel like you did something.

That's why we're asking these questions. Okay. So here's what I'm hearing. And you let me know if this makes sense to you or not. So I know this situation seemed a little bit confusing, but it sounds like y'all both live in Ireland. Right? Yep. And there's this, with this first business of you used to be able to visit.

Yep. But now her dad, who is also her roommate, which is weird, like, you know, set some limits or boundaries on you being able to visit? Yeah. Okay, so that's like one issue. And then you were invited by her. And then her dad is like, by the way, you can't use the bathroom. Like, what do you think about that?

Yep. I felt like I was treated like a dog, to be honest, being told, no, go outside. So I'm going to ask the question again. I'm not concerned with how you feel in this moment. I'm going to ask you, what do you think about that? Oh, I think I don't know what right words to use. Okay, it's not about right words or wrong words. So let me, and I know I may be a little bit difficult right now, so I apologize for that.

But I do think it's important. It's okay. Because if we're, so here's the key thing to understand. If we're the asshole or not doesn't depend on our feelings. Does that make sense? it depends on our actions. I can hear you say that, but it's not matching up

of what's inside. Perfect, right? So that's why we're doing this. Because oftentimes we think that we are guilt determines whether we feel guilty or not determines whether, like that's how our mind tells us

we did something wrong or didn't do something wrong. Does that make sense? Same thing. I hear what you're saying. It just doesn't match. Okay, so I'll try to, let me just kind of,

start from the top. So let's forget about the roommate situation for a second. Let's focus on the trip. Yeah. So if one person gets invited to visit someone else and you go and you visit someone else, and that person becomes sick, ill, and has a medication reaction that was unexpected and is due to a doctor prescribing a medicine, which we didn't know how you would react. So like the person followed the medical advice that were told by the doctors, be cautious, take this medication and if you feel well, you can go. And they do what the doctor says. And then they show up and they have a bad medication reaction.

Yeah. I don't think that's their fault. Does that make sense? I see where you're coming from. So I'm going to say this as a doctor, not your doctor. But generally speaking, if I prescribe a medication to a patient of mine and they, have a bad reaction, I don't blame them for it. Does that make sense? Yeah. Right? So like some, there's one reaction called anaphylaxis, which is like when people can't

breathe, okay? It can be potentially fatal. I don't know if you've ever heard of like an epinephrine pen or an epipen, but it's a really scary. Yeah, my family have to carry them. Huh? My family have to carry them sometimes. Yeah, so you're familiar with this. So someone needs an epipen. Is a doctor, Like, screw you, asshole. It's not the patient's fault if they have a medication reaction, right? Yeah. I don't blame someone for needing an Epipan. It's actually quite absurd.

And then the other thing is that, so I'm going to go ahead. I don't know what chat thinks, but I'm going to go ahead and say, I don't think you really did anything wrong here. Like, because what I'm hearing is that you had a medical reaction that was unforeseen and more importantly, unanticipatable. because we're not, we didn't hear anything about like anyone expecting you to have this reaction. And that you traveled somewhere else. You were invited by someone and you were a guest of someone's. And you got sick. And then when you got sick, yeah.

Her mom was like, you're weak. I don't know why you're here. Pretty much. Yeah. Yeah. And I don't think getting sick is a sign of weakness, especially if it's a medication reaction. there are some sicknesses that you could conceivably blame people for. Like if you've been smoking for 40 years and you get lung cancer, like arguably you can blame someone for that.

But I don't think a medication reaction is something that you can blame someone for. And so I'm not really hearing that you did anything out of line. In fact, what I would say is that it sounds like people invited you to be their guest. And then generally speaking, like, if I invite someone into my house and they get ill, I think it's reasonable for me to try to. take care of them, right? Because that's what you do for guests in your home. You don't, does that make sense? Yeah. Like, if you have like a friend visiting you for Christmas and then they get the flu or something and they're like, hey, can you take me to go see a doctor? What do you

think the right move is? Oh, doctor. Let me do it. But hold on, James. What if you don't like them? What do you think the right move is there? Doctor. But you don't like him. Is it still important to take him to the doctor? Yeah. Absolutely, man. So where does the mismatch come from? I think the mismatch comes from somewhere along the way.

I'm not quite sure why, but somewhere along the way, like people are blaming you for this and you're happy to take it. So what I'm noticing is that they're blaming you and you're feeling guilty, which is not a mismatch. Does that make sense? The problem here is that there should be a mismatch. Does that make sense? Okay. Because her parents are blaming you and you're feeling guilty. Yeah.

That's not a mismatch. Do you understand that? Actually, I don't. Sorry. So, like, if I blame someone, even if I'm wrong, forget about right or wrong for a second. If I blame someone, and even if they're not wrong, if they feel guilty and they apologize, you get how there's like harmony in this situation. It may be incorrect, but I'm blaming someone and someone is happy to take the blame.

That's what guilt is. Okay. You see what I'm saying? Like, you're feeling guilty and they're thinking you're an asshole. So like, y'all are kind of okay with that. It's wrong, but there's agreement. Okay. I see what I'm saying?

Like, just because everyone agrees doesn't mean that anyone is right. But what I'm kind of noticing here is that like you're feeling. and guilty and they're blaming you and people who feel guilty can't push back against people who blame them. Does that make sense? I get you. What are you hearing, James? What are you understanding? So someone feels guilty. That matches with someone blaming them. So they don't push. Absolutely. There's the match. Absolutely. It's fit into play. And if one person blames another person and the other person feels guilty, does that mean that a guilty person made a mistake?

Could it, though? It could. You're correct. It could. But it's not a definite yes. You get that? That I do, yeah. So I think the problem here is that, so first of all, I don't think you're the asshole,

unless we're like missing something. Like, unless you're showing. up, like, pressuring your girlfriend into going or things like that, then I think it's a whole different ballgame. So if we hear... No, it was just... Yeah. Sorry, you were saying?

No, go ahead. Oh, no, it was just me turning up. I felt good on the first day. The second day I was starting to feel bad. I was just getting worried and stuff I thought. The episode happened. I asked, hey, I needed to see a doctor. Didn't get to see one.

then the mom was very, very harsh. I was overly stressed out. I didn't know what to do or think. Yeah. So, I mean, I don't think you did anything wrong here. It sounds to me like, honestly, like you had a bad reaction to a medication. And then if anything, the one thing that sort of maybe makes sense to me is that maybe the reason you feel guilty is because your girlfriend is stuck between you and her parents. What do you think about that?

That is not something I thought about. Right? So her parents clearly don't like you, but she does. Yeah. So I think what we're sort of seeing here, huh? Well, no, we're broken up now. Yeah, ex-girlfriend. But I think what we're kind of like what I'm seeing, and sometimes this happens where essentially like she's not able to set appropriate boundaries with her parents.

So she wants you to come over, but she's not like, she can't go all in on that. and then so you get pulled in and then they push you out. It's like, this is absurd, dude. I, if my roommate or my kids, if my kids invited someone over that I didn't like, I would still let them use the bathroom in my house. Yeah. Like that doesn't, I don't think, you know, I mean,

I think if someone was invited to my house by someone, else in my house, I would let them use the bathroom. Unless I was concerned about theft or some, you know, maybe some situations. But I want to say, like, even if there was a convicted felon who was invited to my house, I would let them use the toilet. Like, I wouldn't have them go down the, like, unless I had a plausible threat of them being behind closed doors and, you know, if they were going to, I don't know, like flood the toilet. I can't think of a scenario, a reasonable scenario in which I would not let someone use the bathroom. And like you said, you felt like you were treated like a dog, which is what you were treated like.

I mean, I think the assholes here seem to be her parents. What do you think about that? One parent, yeah, I can see. Which one? The dad, for sure. The mom, I don't know if she said those things out of a place of anger or worry or something else. I mean, I don't, I mean, whether it was anger or worried, this is where like, so this is the other thing, James, like, it's possible that we're getting such a biased story from you that we're missing something here, but I mean, I don't think that there's, this is where like, it doesn't matter where she was coming from. You were ill, you had a medication reaction. They wouldn't take you to see a doctor. Like, what the fuck, man? Yeah. I was just told to get on the plane and brought back to her aunt. How to go to the doctor, Ligier, an hour after.

my flight ambulance brain scans all that stuff it was horrifying okay so like that even reinforces the story so if you're telling me you got urgent medical attention and someone a medical professional was so concerned that they scanned your brain like yeah basically right because like this is where the medical professional decides it's not you know we just don't go around scanning people's brains chances are you got a cat scan which exposes you to some radiation so we don't just order them willy-nilly. Right? We only really order them like when we need to because they're expensive and they irradiate you. So we don't want to just do it. So I mean, it's a good test to run if people are concerned, but we just don't go around cat scanning people. And so I think the biggest issue

that I'm hearing here, James, is that somewhere along the way, like, I don't know if you've been in abusive dynamics before, but this sounds to me like sort of an abusive dynamic where people are blaming you and something about the way that your mind thinks, like you accept that blame. But I'm not hearing that you did anything wrong here. I just feel like it's, again, me kind of having a moment of weakness, I guess. Like, yeah, like, I feel bad when I have those moments. Sure. I guess.

And I mean, I think that that kind of makes sense in the sense that you're concerned about you don't like feeling weak. Like I can empathize with that. But I think this is where... No, it's more so showing it. Huh? Oh, no, it's more so showing it or having to, like, let it out, I guess. Yeah.

Yeah, so that, I mean, that's where, like, I can empathize with the feeling. But I think this is where... I also don't think that... I don't think... I don't think that being ill is a sign of weakness. It can feel that way. But, you know? I mean, you got sick, dude.

Yeah, I got sick. I don't think that makes you weak. You're welcome to disagree. Sorry, I'm just reflecting. Good. It's not something you should apologize for. Anything you want to add or any questions? I mean, so I think Twitch chat is...

pretty confident. 80% of people. Oh, I haven't been checking Twitch. Yeah, you shouldn't. You shouldn't. You shouldn't check Twitch. But 82% of people don't think you're the asshole here. And my guess is that the rest of the people just think you're trolling.

Or I think some of the people were, one person said yes, and I'm pretty sure they're trolling. No, I wish, like, afterwards, I still can't retype correctly because I keep making typos, of stuff like that. It's, ugh, it's a whole thing. Yeah, so I don't think you're the asshole here, man.

Brain stuff. It sounds to me like you got sick, and it sounds like, you know, your girlfriend was caught in a situation where she couldn't set appropriate boundaries and, like, advocate for getting you medical attention,

which is bizarre. And... Yeah, I feel like, kind of like, I was there for her a little bit. When she had stuff that, you know, needed attention. But now I had that same or similar issues. And it was like, oh, can't touch this.

Okay, throw it away. Oh, break up with them. Okay. Just get rid of them. Can't deal with it. Yeah. So that sounds brutal, dude. It has been.

And it, I mean, I don't, I'm not really hearing much that I think is your fault. And this is where, you know, it can, it can hurt to break up with someone. But I think that, like, being in a relationship with someone, who can't set boundaries to protect you from people in their lives, right? This isn't just parents. This is like things like exes and stuff like that. I don't think those relationships end up being very healthy. So if you like someone and you want someone in,

if you want to be in a relationship, someone and you want that person to be in your life, you've got to be able to advocate for them and have them be in your life. Hold on one second. Yeah, okay. Concerned, mother, all that sort of stuff. Well, we're concerned for you too, dude. But I don't think you're the asshole.

No, really. This whole community has just been like reaching out. I don't know where to put the feeling. Like, yeah, strangers coming out, helping, asking if I'm okay. It's, yeah, it's wild. Yeah, the community is great. Maybe they can help you. Yeah, it really, really is.

Maybe they can help you learn what you're worth. I don't think I know that, actually. Yeah, I can tell. And that's okay. Hmm. And so hang around for a while and we'll see if we can figure it out together. How does that sound? I like that, yeah.

Cool, man. Good luck to you. Thank you.