When Someone You Love Is Hurting

One of the most challenging aspects of finding happiness is when someone we love is suffering. How can we be happy if our child is suffering from terminal cancer? Is it possible to be joyful when our adult son or daughter is going through an acrimonious divorce? Or what do we do when our parent develops dementia? Life can still be good, even when others we love are hurting.

(Please note, this is talk, not a guided meditation.)

Transcript

Welcome to the Happiness Podcast.

I'm Dr.

Robert Puff.

We talk a lot here about what to do when we're suffering.

But what do we do when someone we love is suffering?

What do we do if our mother gets dementia and seems confused or disoriented?

What do we do if our child is diagnosed with cancer and may have to go through chemotherapy and radiation?

How are we to handle it when our adult child is going through a divorce and it's an ugly divorce and causing him a lot of suffering?

The first thing we want to do is just acknowledge that it's hard.

When we love someone and that person is going through some physical discomfort or some severe psychological disturbance,

It's hard.

It's hard to see that person that we love suffering.

And we need to start with that.

Being truthful is helpful because then we're not going to try to deny our feelings,

Suppress them,

Or turn them off.

We're going to say,

Yes,

This is challenging.

And we start with that.

We look at our feelings.

We look at our thoughts.

We look at everything that's going through us that we're experiencing.

And we say,

I see you.

I feel you.

I'm experiencing you.

There's a retreat center not too far from my home.

It's a beautiful place where a person can go and be still and be present.

But right next to it is a children's hospital.

And they have an open courtyard where parents and children can go outside and meet and spend time with each other.

You can't see them,

But you can hear them.

And sometimes I've heard the children crying out to their parents that they want to go home,

That they don't like it there,

That it's painful the treatment they're going through.

And I can just imagine the terrible suffering that these parents must be going through seeing their children suffer like that.

It's not very often.

I've only heard it a few times,

But I have heard it.

And it is moving.

So if we have other people in our lives that we love,

Perhaps someone we chose to have our lives enter,

Like a spouse,

Perhaps children that we chose to have,

They may go through experiences that are hard for them.

And because we love them,

We may feel their experience,

Feel it in the way they feel it.

And it can be hard on us.

So the question today is,

Is it just that we feel it or can we do more than that?

And we can do more than that.

As we journey through life,

There's going to be times where things don't go the way we planned.

And sometimes things go quite poorly at times,

And it can feel overwhelming.

But it's especially more tricky when it's not just ourselves that are going through difficult times,

But people that we love,

Because with them,

We have even less control.

When it's ourselves,

There's things that we can do.

But when it's someone else,

There's often things that we can't do.

We may give them advice,

We may give them suggestions,

But they're on their journey,

Going through their experiences.

And sometimes their experiences are very hard.

So what do we do?

To love them.

And as I said earlier,

Being honest and truthful with our emotions about what we're feeling about their experience.

But at the same time,

Do well in life,

Because we can always do well in life.

One of the first things and main things we want to look at is our expectations.

Our suffering comes from our expectations.

We expect things to go a certain way.

And when they don't,

We can suffer.

As silly as this may sound,

We may expect that everyone that we love and that we care about never gets sick,

Never has illnesses,

Never goes through tragedy,

And all goes well with them all the time.

Just that belief,

If we hold that,

Of course,

Not to the extreme,

But if we hold that in any regard,

Then we're going to suffer.

Because that belief is a system that is based on untruths.

Being a human being means that life changes,

That there are things that go a certain way sometimes,

But then it radically changes.

Sometimes we're very healthy and then we get a brain tumor.

Sometimes our relationship seems to be going well,

And then our partner asks us for a divorce.

Sometimes we have a great job that we love,

And then we get fired.

Life changes.

Life is impermanent.

It is one of the key components of life.

If we fight that,

If we want things to be coherent and go the same way all the time,

Then we're going to have problems.

Of course,

When life brings us things that we weren't expecting,

We have to go through steps to adjust to those changes.

That's just part of life.

If our mother gets dementia,

Then we have to make choices based on those changes.

How do we help our mother?

What steps do we do to make sure that she gets sufficient care?

Of course,

We may not like it that she has dementia,

But saying that isn't fair,

This isn't right.

Why?

Life changes.

Sometimes we get dementia.

Sometimes we get cancer.

Sometimes we lose our jobs.

Sometimes people that we love leave.

Life is impermanent.

Life changes.

What causes us to suffer so much more is when we fight life and we say,

Life,

This isn't right.

This is wrong.

I hate you.

We can do that,

But then we suffer.

There are two parts to negative experiences.

The one is the actual experience that is happening,

And sometimes these experiences can be daunting.

If our child gets cancer,

We have a long road ahead of us.

It's going to be challenging,

And we're going to be truthful about that,

And we're going to acknowledge that.

We're going to get support,

And we're going to do things in our power to help our child and to help ourselves go through this very challenging experience.

That's part one.

But the part two that makes it so much more worse is when we fight it and we say,

This shouldn't be happening.

This is wrong.

Why?

Life does this to all of us.

Probably at some time we are all going to face some great crisis with someone that we love.

It's going to happen.

It's almost inevitable,

And some of us face it many times in our lives.

Going down the path of thinking that this is wrong,

Thinking that this isn't fair,

Is a path of suffering.

We're making the situation way worse because life is just happening.

There isn't a fairness.

There is just life.

Our role is to perform well under these circumstances.

What do we need to do?

How can we be proactive?

How can we be supportive of the person that is going through the difficult time?

That's our role.

We cannot control what life does.

We can do our best to improve it.

Sometimes cancer treatments can be treated by chemotherapy and radiation,

But the results of that treatment are out of our control.

And when it comes to people that we love,

Our level of control is far less.

For example,

If we discover that we are drinking every night and we feel we have a problem with alcoholism,

We can go to treatment,

Start getting involved with 12-Step,

And improve our lives.

But if someone we love is also struggling with alcoholism or drugs,

We may encourage them.

We may even pay for their treatment.

But that may not mean that they want to go or participate in the help that we are giving.

That's where,

When it's other people,

It's even more important to realize what we are in control of and what we are not in control of.

What we are not in control of is their choices that they make,

For the most part.

What we are in control of is our responses to what is happening.

For example,

Let's say our child or someone that we love is going through a horrific divorce.

We can't control what's happening with their divorce and all the issues that they are having to face.

We can listen to them.

We can be supportive.

But being caught up into the emotions of their pain,

How is that helpful?

How are we helping them by being distressed over their distress?

It is their issue that they need to deal with.

Again,

We can love them.

If they ask us advice,

Of course we can give it.

And we will feel some of the pain that they are going through because we love them.

But wanting it to be different,

Saying that life isn't fair,

Or trying to control it,

Those are things out of our control.

Life happens.

And sometimes the people that we love go through challenges as we go through challenges.

And it is all of our responsibilities to do that well.

When challenges occur,

We look at them and we say,

Okay,

Is there anything I can do right now to alleviate this challenge,

To make it better?

And when there isn't,

Then we do this very important thing.

Then we live.

We let it go and we live.

We live well.

We get outside and enjoy nature.

We go watch the sunsets.

We laugh with our friends.

We experience life to the fullest,

Even with these events going on.

There are people that are going through horrific challenges that are doing well because they are not expecting life to go a certain way.

We all know people who have gotten cancer and will tell us the last six months of their life was the best six months of their life because they learned to live in the moment.

Crises are there.

Our job is to do what we can do at the moment to improve them,

To alleviate the suffering.

And then when we can't,

We just live well and we let go our grappling with the fairness.

But this isn't right.

It's just life.

Life sometimes isn't fair,

But what our response is,

Is to live well no matter what life is throwing at us.

We do that by living in the present moment really well.

Sometimes when it's horrific,

We have to take a deep breath and say,

I'm going to live these next 10 minutes well.

Then we do it again.

I'm going to live these next 10 minutes well.

We can do that.

I'm not saying that it's easy,

But I am saying it's a possibility.

And when we do that,

Our lives get better.

Now,

The hard part about this talk is that we can't control other people's response.

We can get very good at living life well with all the changes,

But we can't control what other people do.

That is their journey.

We can love them.

We can be with them,

But we can't control them.

We can't change their situation,

Which we don't want to do.

We don't want to change our situation unless we have power over it.

And a lot of things,

As I'm talking about,

We don't have power over.

So why would we want to change their situation?

We have even less power over that.

We change what we can.

We watch them change what they can,

But mostly we just live well with the things going on.

And when we're not attached to things having to go a certain way,

Then we're better.

We don't suffer as much when we realize,

Yes,

Sickness is part of life.

Yes,

Loss is just part of life.

Then we say,

Okay,

I get it.

I'm going through this right now.

I'm going to find the beautiful things in life because there's just always something beautiful to be with.

What's harder here is that we just can't help others do that.

That is the solution,

But that is a solution that they have to find for themselves.

And our role is when they fight that solution,

When they struggle far more than they need to.

It's just to love them,

Love them well,

And also model for them living well.

We can do that.

They're going to see us go through hard times,

Hard experiences,

And we watch each other.

We watch the people that we love and we see how they're doing.

And we realize that if they're doing well,

Then we can do well.

So that's one of the most important ways we can help others is one by being there for them in a positive,

Supportive way.

But the second thing is by just living well when we go through difficult times so that when they face difficult times,

They know there's a possibility of hope,

Of joy,

Even in the tragedies of life.

This is actually what I do for a living.

When someone walks in my office to get help,

I will love them.

And my role will be to help them get better.

I can't make them get better.

I can give them suggestions because they're there to get help,

But it's up to them to implement those changes.

But we can help others by making sure we're okay,

That we're living life well.

Because when we live life well,

We can give and love others so much better.

I've been blessed to help people for over 30 years now,

And I hope to do it another 30 years.

When we take care of ourselves,

Then through that self-care,

We are able to love others so much better.

We will be there.

We will love them.

But we won't get caught up into the darkness of pain.

We will do what we can do.

And then we will let go of the suffering.

Knowing that even when people we love are going through difficult times,

There's just always something beautiful to be with.

And we will give our attention to those beautiful things throughout the day.

And that attention,

That energy going towards the beautiful,

Even in the midst of our loved ones suffering,

Will put our hearts in a beautiful place so that we will be able to love them even better.

Thank you for joining me on the happiness podcast.

Until next time,

Accept what is,

Love what is.

Reviews

I found this to be very helpful. It came at the right time for me to learn how to help a dear friend through her grief of losing her father just 6 months after losing her brother. Thank you. 🙏

Thank you

Beautiful, and much needed - thank you! I have decided to separate from my husband of over 20 years, and watching him suffer is the hardest part for me...

Exactly what I needed to hear. Thank you

Thank you 💜🙏

Thank you 🙏

Dr. Puff thank you for this topic 🙏. I am challenged with it hurting so much for me to see. Would you think about doing another talk on the subject. I will focus on loving them well. Lola.