Swearing

THERAPY DOC ASKS: IS BLOGGING THERAPEUTIC?

I'm old. Discovered a little late that thousands of people write blogs, post diaries, essays, photos for everyone to see ranging from the perverse to the hysterical.

Some are so good, so well-written, it's amazing that anyone bothers with paper things at all anymore.

Radiation from the computer be damned, you got the result.

Has it been therapeutic? Well, yeah.

For a lot of reasons: You get stuff out of your system, talk tx, AND you get feedback from people, generally positive.

For me it was like being on the flip side of an office visit. Instead of me reading you, however, you're reading me.

You should know that bloggers check statistics obsessively to see how many people are reading their blog. I'm not going there, peeps, but it's true. (If the shoe fits, uh)

Anyway, some of you know that I started blogging to get the Grandparents Who Missed Their Grandchildren thing out of my system. Those of us who raised our kids to be independent only to regret it later when they flew the coop (taking OUR grandchildren with them, such a chutzpah) would theoretically unite and commiserate on this blog.

Turned out, of course, other grandparents didn't want to have anything to do with me. My luck.

One guy from Evanston, bless him, wrote a comment that included the entire Harry Chapin song, Cat's in the Cradle and a very long letter about his experience being sandwiched between the East and West coasts, missing family, missing the opportunity to be with everyone, parents, sibs, nieces, nephews. He missed them all of the time.

I felt really bad, like I had stirred up something.

But I got into reading blogs, and my d. told me to write one and she was right. So therapeutic.

But why, really?

I'm thinking because BLOGGERS GET TO SWEAR a lot in public. And this is a good thing.

I'm in good company, too. Check out MIR on BlogHer.Org who totally gets it http://blogher.org/node/9727.

Fish and Family's good one. I jolt it all the time. So is Poop and Boogies (not what it sounds like, exactly) . Poop rallied behind his mom who swore appropriately.

Maybe it's unconscious, or a guilty pleasure, or people are embarrassed to talk about it, but we certainly do love to swear.

True confessions, here. Therapy Doc almost became a “hell and damn guy," despite her female genderness.

I learned about "hell and damn guy" when a patient lovingly, affectionately, reverently, referred to her father, a military officer, as a “hell and damn guy,” meaning he refrained from the bigger stuff, the "s" word, the "f" word, the "b" word.

But it's not me to be a "hell and damn guy". It's not fitting for a professional, seriously, to swear. Period. It's just not right.

So at the office I'm always apologizing when it happens. But you should know, d-it, I try, seriously, I try.

Copyright 2006, Therapy Doc