You make that sound like it's some kind of deliberate manipulation or something, some of us were just brought up with the idea that doing helpful things for people is expected and not really that big a deal, and it makes us uncomfortable when people make a big deal of it.

In the particular case I am thinking about the guy being complimented (probably unintentionally) hurt the other person’s feelings by basically rejecting the very sincere compliment, even though he could have easily said “I’m always happy to help” or something similarly impersonal and satisfied the complimenter without making anything bigger out of it. Or even used the same words he had but less dismissively. Tone of voice matters a lot in face-to-face communications.

My point was just that I wouldn’t consider even the most insensitive such responses to be “monstrous”, so I was wondering more specifically what Doreen Michele meant.

The single most effective thing I have found for reducing forum drama is to mostly ignore any compliments. Saying "Thank you" is inevitably followed by multiple people feeling compelled to openly and publicly hate on me.

I had an affair in my twenties with a man whose life could have been absolutely ruined because of it. He wasn't especially good looking, but he had beautiful blue eyes and I had a thing for blue eyes and told him how much I liked his blue eyes. We were not sleeping together at the time and it wasn't an unreasonable thing to say, given circumstances. This was a huge turning point in the relationship and he ended up nutcase levels of obsessed with me.

This man is the reason I did not use my first and last name online for many years -- because it is a fairly unique combination and I didn't want to be easily and readily found by him. Five years after I ditched him, he hired a fucking detective to track me down and called my house where I answered the goddamned phone in front of my children, like that isn't awkward as all hell.

No, he hadn't filed for divorce from his alcoholic wife. No, he hadn't left his incredibly conservative career. No, he absolutely was not in any position whatsoever to say "Oops, sorry. You can move in with me." if his phone call outed me to my husband and resulted in a divorce.

I'm not exaggerating when I say psycho asshole monster. It's only not been more of a debacle because avoiding drama is one of my skills, thankfully.

It sounds like he took the compliment as a sign that you were really serious about him and the relationship, whereas you intended it just as a statement about his eyes.

The “nutcase levels of obsessed” part sounds like a pre-existing problem / part of this guy’s temperament, rather than a normal response to receiving compliments. The people I know who attracted stalkers didn’t so far as I know trigger them with any particular action.

Dunno, I’m not a psychologist. I would be interested to hear more about this kind of compliment-as-behavior-switch in other kinds of circumstances.

Short men do this a lot and make it impossible to say "Eh, your height doesn't bother me, but I like X about you."

Men who see themselves as ugly do this.

Men who are heavyset and hung up about it.

Etc ad nauseum.

At some point, my personal policy became "Sorry you have so much baggage. I'm not your goddamned therapist. I wouldn't touch you with a ten foot pole, not because you are short, but because, Oh. My. God. BTDT, got the t-shirt and life is too short for this shit, geez."

People paint themselves into a corner and make it impossible for other people to make X trait into a non issue. And then it becomes this hill to die on and god help you if you stupidly are oblivious and genuinely didn't think they were too short, too ugly or whatever.

I’m truly sorry for what you had to go through. That really sucks.

It's always something genuine like my art I post in social media or a cool shirt I happen to be wearing, or that I'm always genteel.

I think it depends on your culture of course but from my experience it's a weekly occurrence.

> He made it absolutely impossible to tell him I liked him without it going really terrible places.

I feel for him. I do have ADHD as well, and it is very hard for me to accept compliments. I was also bullied in school which I assume also plays into this. Everytime someone compliments me, I feel like I am getting set up for a joke. Raising your hopes, and then slashing them in the most hurtfull way possible. "Oh wait, you actually thought I like your eyes? lmao you're such an idiot"

But I do also agree that you're not his therapist, and that he probably should have talked to his therapist(which I assume he saw for his adhd) about it. I did. Its great.

Go ahead and "take the bait." The assholes who are merely setting you up will out themselves as assholes and you can stop wondering. You can also not take it personally because they are assholes. They are telling you who they are, not who you are.

And then the non assholes will finally have a chance to connect with you in a genuine way without having to try to wrestle you to the ground and cram a compliment down your throat against your will. Because I assure you, healthy people won't do that. If you set your boundaries to "Fuck you and get the hell away from me" healthy people will stay the hell away. The only people who will try to get close will be people with serious issues and it becomes self fulfilling prophecy.

I'm not comfortable with compliments either. Most people are perfectly fine with being told that as an explanation for lack of ability to graciously accept a compliment and then they don't have to wonder if you think they did something wrong.

Anyway, I think I'm done here. Too many people seem to feel I need "advice" or whatever and I don't.

I cant. Malfunction of the executive functions make it pretty hard to relativize it. Initially I am gonna think, wow, thanks, I guess my eyes do suck, and so do I. Usually people would try to think about it again and be able to relativize it "wait, why did he say that? wow, what an asshole thing to say". But I get stuck in that "I guess you're right" feeling.

> Go ahead and "take the bait."

This is very hard to do, but I am working on it. Its not easy to overcome a childhood trauma though, and trust people again. It took me about half a year to finally open up to my therapist. Learning to trust again, and let yourself be vulnerable is terrible hard after learning for 10 years that its the wrong thing to do, you cant "just do it"

I didnt mean to give any unsolicited advice, apologies

I know some things that might help, but I'm leery of posting them because that makes me the one giving unsolicited advice, a thing I'm already guilty of here.

Take care.

You too

Nutritional supplements actually have a better track record than drugs for dealing with things like ADHD. If you can pinpoint the things that you need for your brain, you can see real improvement over time.

B vitamins, high quality salt, the right fats and certain minerals, like magnesium and calcium, are likely candidates. Start a journal. Try one and only one new thing at a time to see what it does. Don't buy multi vitamins. Get individual supplements and make sure they are bioavailable.

Mold problems at home, work or anyplace you spend a lot of time can have significant negative impact in mental function. Try to root out moisture issues and mold problems.

Start a private journal and deconstruct what people say to you, how you feel about it and why you feel that way. Most people aren't terribly nice. The veneer of civilized behavior tends to be pretty thin. It may be more them than you. You may find your reactions aren't as irrational as you think they are.

During my divorce, under circumstances where I didn't really care how things played out and a lot of men were chatting me up, I point blank asked men what they thought was attractive about me. This was incredibly eye opening because every one of them had a different answer. So my ideas about what made me attractive -- that it was X or Y specific thing -- were completely busted and it was a fantastic experience. People are attracted for reasons specific to them. It isn't really a case of "I have X trait and that is my main attraction."

So if you ever have an opportunity to participate in a workshop or similar where you can get feedback from a variety of people, you might be surprised what you learn about how the world sees you. It can be a wonderful antidote to the thoughts about yourself that dominate your self image.

Similarly, I did a series of self portraits in therapy and that was eye opening. Most people don't really have a clear idea of what they look like. Their idea of themselves is often something of a caricature that exaggerates specific traits and underplays others.

Best.

I'll give your recommendations a try. Thank you! :)

> Most people don't really have a clear idea of what they look like

Wow! I had no idea about this, that's super interesting

The best is Celtic Sea Salt. After that is various other brands of sea salt, Himalayan salt, kosher salt, canning and pickling salt.

Sea salt also has additional micronutrients. It isn't just sodium chloride.

Not necessarily a huge issue if you are perfectly healthy, but it makes a surprisingly large difference if there is anything wrong that intersects with these chemicals in some manner.

Men who see themselves as ugly do this."

Wait, you think telling someone, "Don't worry, your ugliness doesn't bother me. After all, you're friendly!" is a reasonable thing to say someone?

That's the exact opposite of making X trait a non-issue.

I had someone say pretty much this to me at work. It startled me but for some reason wasn't a problem. I've since noticed many successful, well-liked (rich, famous) people are quite ugly.

"oh man, why am I so short?" - "hey man, that doesnt bother me at all, you look great none the less"

It becomes a case of "No one loves me because of my big hairy wart. Want to see my big hairy wart? Let me tell you how many hairs it has. I've actually named all the hairs. This grey one is called George. It's vastly uglier than the other hairs because it's grey..." Ad nauseum, making it absolutely impossible to go "My, what lovely hands you have. Gosh, that's a terrific jacket and it really goes well with your eyes. Want to have coffee sometime?"

They basically insist you love their wart upfront in a way that just makes the entire thing a non starter no matter how hard you try to avoid the topic of their wart and focus on other things. No, their wart is their entire dating identity and only someone with a wart fetish could possibly figure out how to work things out with them.

> He wasn't especially good looking, but he had beautiful blue eyes and I had a thing for blue eyes and told him how much I liked his blue eyes.

These statements would set up massive, bar-you-from-the-industry-forever red flags on any man that dared express them.

You might try reading things a little more carefully. I rejected him, then spent years arranging my life to avoid him. I'm absolutely not butthurt that we didn't end up together. More like "Dodged that bullet!!"

A. I've been a member here for over 9 years. My previous handle was Mz. Some of the people asking questions know that I have an established track record here and are familiar with at least some of the following details.

B. I was molested for several years as a child and raped at the age of twelve. I'm quite open about that fact, as well as the therapy and infidelity and divorce that is part of my backstory.

C. I'm not advocating for infidelity. I'm also not going to automatically vilify people for it. I spent years reading all of the research I could find on the topic to sort my crap. It's usually not a black and white case of one spouse as villain and the other as victim. It's typically more complicated than that.

D. The last man I had intercourse with was my ex husband the night before he physically moved out the first week of May 2005, more than 13 years ago. I've been celibate for medical reasons ever since.

That fact has freed me of a lot of baggage from an unfortunate childhood and I no longer live in fear that "I'm really just a whore and was born such, obviously, which must be why grown men did unspeakable things to me as early as age 3 or 4."

At this point, I'm quite clear that I'm socially conservative and "the marrying kind."

My infidelity is not the reason my marriage ended. My ex is a good man who put up with a lot of crap because he loved me. He deserves a purple heart for what I put him through. He's one of the reasons I recovered from my childhood trauma and did not, instead, either commit suicide or end up in jail for some reason.