Gossip, Snark and other Relationship Poisons

In my family, we talked about other people all the time. My mom complained about my dad to each of us kids. My dad did the same about my mom. We kids complained to our parents about the other parent or a sibling. We complained to our siblings about our parents. An unspoken but deeply held family rule: don’t be direct.

When one or more people in a family are insecure, avoidance (especially conflict avoidance) is bound to show up. I brought this behavior pattern into my professional, social, and romantic relationships because, for me, it was normal. I complained to my friends about my love interests. I complained about one friend to another.

I didn’t think of my behavior as gossip. I didn't think about how I was “poisoning the well,” manipulating other people's opinions, and contaminating feelings between other people. Like a fish who doesn't know she is wet, I didn’t know my family pattern was contaminated. It seemed normal that one ever really trusted each other, and each of us knew that we were being judged when we weren’t there.

I also never learned to be direct, to express my true feelings, or to set effective boundaries. The really big loss, though, is that I never learned how to reestablish love and trust when I hurt someone’s feelings. I didn’t learn that relationships become stronger, intimacy deepens and trust grows when people can openly talk about hurt feelings, jealousy, bad moods and all the other normal reactions we have as humans.

I had no idea how healing and connecting a heartfelt apology could be when given sincerely and accepted with love. In psychobabble, we call this "repair," and when done well, it is the superglue of relationships.

It took a lot of therapy, some great friends, and a very patient husband to teach me how to be direct and kind, to say, “this isn’t working for me,” without shaming or blaming others. It took the blessing of a dear friend letting me know I had hurt her feelings and giving me the chance to tell her how much sorrow (the root of the words, “I’m sorry”) I felt, learning I had hurt her, to experience the sweetness and relief of her forgiveness. To this day, she is one of my most cherished friends.

There is another gift in being direct. It’s more subtle, but equally powerful. It’s the gift of realizing that when we talk about others, labeling, criticizing, or analyzing, we are really projecting (talking about ourselves without realizing it). When my mother complained that my father never helped, she was implying he was a jerk. But what she never said was that she had always felt alone and unappreciated, not just by him, but in every relationship she ever had.

I know this feeling because I learned to behave like my mom in my own relationships. I did everything around the house, hoping my husband would notice and understand the secret code: do for me as I am doing for you. He wasn’t raised with the code and didn’t know it. With the help of my therapist, I learned to ask for help directly, without any of the irritation or frustration that was my own projection:

If I have to ask, it means you don’t really care. This confirms my belief that I am not lovable. Now I feel shame, and I am mad at you for "making" me feel shitty.

Of course, the craziest thing happened. When I asked, “Can you vacuum today or tomorrow?” he cheerfully said, “Sure.” That was it. There was no drama. It was my fuming, my irritation, my assumption he was a jerk, and my unconscious belief that I was unlovable that led to our previous fights about chores.

He didn’t mind helping. He minded being treated like he was a jerk.

The deeper lesson for me was that my being lovable was separate from him being helpful. This is key for those of us who were loved conditionally. Growing up, I was loved when I pleased my parents. Anticipating their wishes and fulfilling them without them having to ask was a survival tool. If I hadn’t mastered that, I would have been shamed and blamed.

If you were raised in a family with insecure attachment patterns, it might be difficult to be direct. You may find yourself shaming and blaming others when they disappoint you (maybe just in your head). This is a rich opportunity to look for the underlying belief you might be holding about yourself. It might be a chance to practice being honest and kind, asking for what you need or want without snark. It might be an opportunity to express hurt or disappointment and see if the other person can offer you a genuine apology.

Of course, this is difficult, even scary when being direct was against an unspoken family rule. It may be easier to take this risk with support, or to try in smaller, easier ways with people you suspect are more secure and more able to manage direct communication. Maybe it’s not so much what you do differently, but just a shift in awareness. If you are talking (or thinking) negatively about someone else, what’s really happening inside of you?