Having dead parents is not a personality trait….

Maybe, or more likely, you never recover from losing a child to a sickness you never knew they had, and then finding out they aren't the only one affected. I'm not sure it's reasonable to expect anyone to completely heal from that.

However, through finding ways to manage it, I can honestly say I have added some amazing things to my life that I'm not sure would have happened otherwise.

Resiliency is the ability to recover or exceed functioning after trauma or adversity and covers all the aspects of self (global domains) so if you are 'putting on a good show' but emotionally numb and disconnected then recovery is still ongoing I would say.

Parent loss is complicated. I lost my mum at 22 & have spent my adult life grieving what we never had. My dad died at 43 and I’m grieving what we had. But we will all lose our parents (hopefully- the alternative isn’t better for anyone!)

I think it’s the use of sob stories/trauma rather than dead parents per se.

I think

THANK YOU for not 'bringing your whole self' everywhere all the time, especially your sad and disgusting parts!

I've become increasingly intolerant of this whole bloody 'whole self' concept. We all bring our whole selves always, assuming we're not Lego people. This doesn't mean we're required to showcase our miseries, resentments, unresolved issues, symptoms, fetishes and drug habits like a revolving freak show.

And yes, I have done therapy, including a year of group. I know what raw honesty looks like and it isn't this performance.

Hmmm, well, I have exceeded my baseline in high functioning and keep going every day. However I also can feel emotionally numb and sometimes not talk about what happened. So is resiliency based on how you feel, or how well you can wear a mask? Because what you see on the outside that you judge as resiliency means little in terms of what is really going on. Sometimes, it's not about being resilient but recognising you are having a normal reaction to an abnormal situation.

I never said you weren't resilient, it was addressed to the OP. And I am not saying she isn't resilient either. Resiliency is not emotional numbness and the inability to talk about what has happened. It's about the ability to return to baseline after trauma and tragedy and keep going. I don't think talking about trauma means someone isn't resilient. And I don't think it's trauma farming either. That said, many people have a 'I don't talk about that' position and that is fine too. We don't have to control what other people do. My reflection was simply that when we really feel we do need to control what other people do, sometimes that says more about us than them....

She edited the OP after I made the post. Check her previous comments where she confirms, clever clogs 🙄

Did anyone watch the program 'Blown Away' ? - it was a competitive program about glass blowing (I know...but it was during lockdown) that was on Netflix for a few years.It sounds daft but actually seeing the interpretation, planning and artistry/craftsmanship of the glass blowers was surprisingly interesting. But the whole thing was very American, and classic Netflix, everyone seemed to come equipped with an issue or was representing a particular niche.

In the second series there was a British guy, Elliot Walker, and his pieces were always intriguing and well made & he was always in the front runners for each section of the competition. Until they did one segment where the task was to 'represent the hurdles you have overcome to get here today' or some such idea. And there were heart wrenching stories and people crying and trauma dumping and emoting all over the hot shop. And Elliot Walker made a piece called Spilt Milk which was basically punning on the idea of 'no use crying over it'.
It was so funny, you could see the program was pushing for tragic back stories and emotional sharing, but he just was not playing the game for them, and it really contrasted some USA/UK attitudes. Interestingly his back story was that he had a background in psychology before becoming an artist, and when he had to talk about that work, he spoke about emotional detachment and the ability to let go - it was quite an amusing interpretation but the whole thing felt like a 'fuck you' to the TV attitude of forced oversharing. So he, despite being one of the strongest competitors there ended up being nominated to leave because he 'hadn't followed the brief' (subtext not provided enough human interest) though was not voted out and did go on to eventually and deservedly win the program.

yeah once mfor context was fine, but it felt like they really pushed heavy on the two young lads and their Dads. the siblings, we assumed they'd been in and out of care when they said it had been just them for so long. mom was ill, they never left and now she's better. I'm sure it was incredibly difficult but it was milked so hard. the in-laws felt more relevant. cousins went out before we got too heavy into how they were being expected to be dutiful children and marry soon. which left the Irish father and son and it was pretty clear he was hard work!

Usually on Masterchef the story is about a dead relative who either taught the person to cook, particularly enjoyed eating a specific dish or is a link to a culture with non-UK culinary traditions. So it all seems very relevant indeed to the contestant’s cooking skills.

My father died a few years ago and I don’t care, no trauma, I didn’t mourn and I don’t miss him.

He idolised my evil mother and looked the other way too many times. She’s still alive, and I look forward to the day she dies.

Me and DH fast forward through all the sob stories. It doesn't have an impact on how well they sing or cook or whatever else.
I wouldn't go into a job interview and say 'I was abused as a young child then put into care then adopted and abused again and now am estranged from all sets of parents I have ever had, please feel sorry for me and give me the job' that is all true but has no bearing on my ability to do what earns me a living!

Genuine triumph over adversity is not a "sob story".

I must admit, there does seem to be a tendency to get a bit ridiculous about it all. Like people being utterly devastated by the death of their great grandfather at 102 years old and should they get counselling. I think the longer we all live and the healthier we become, death and old age is becoming even more taboo and beyond our normal scope than it ever has been before.

Why can't people read the bloody OP properly??? 🙄 It wasn't even that long!!

It's a bit annoying because it's so repetitive and predictable at this stage. But at least if it really was something really bad, it's not too bad compared to the ones where the person didn't really have a sob story and has scratched around to create one. I cringe when the sad music starts while someone tearfully explains that their grandma died (peacefully at 95), their aunty passed away (but she lived overseas and they'd never met), or their house burned down (years after they sold it and moved away).

I dont think its scoffing at others trauma, its scoffing at the use of trauma (and thats a word used loosely these days) to provide 'entertainment' and form the backbone of virtually every other programme.

Its like no one has anything interesting to say apart from about their trauma.

And Annie. Her and those kids always banging on about it.

Wow. Often mums are the one person who is completely in their kid's corner and has their back. Hopefully other family members step up to compensate as best they can when children lose their mother, but this doesn't always happen and often the family is under great stress (for example, if the dad is left a single parent coping alone without much support) which limits the support available to the bereaved child.

Can't you see how going through life without that, and becoming increasingly aware as you get older that actually other children have a crucial source of emotional support that is unavailable to you, might make you feel?

It is often only looking back as adults that we can join the dots and comprehend the scale of our loss.

I've applied for a few reality shows and quizzes and stuff back in my early 20s. I never mentioned losing my dad as a child but I did once do a sob story about being domestically abused and having to leave my career, which was true. And I do genuinely think that helped the producers want to pick me. At least for the first episode. So they really try and extract that stuff. But people now are much more switched on so will just volunteer it as they know what makes 'good telly'.

I struggle to feel strongly about it, trying to source and find any kind of emotional hook to lure and audience is the bread and butter of this kind of television so those who seek it out or choose to watch these types of programmes should know what they're getting. There's plenty of other stuff of telly.

I'm approaching 40 and have lost both parents - one when I was very young, one more recently through illness. Coming up 4 years ago my long term partner passed away suddenly so bereavement has played quite a large part in my life and still does whether I like that or not (spoiler: I don't, who would). Is it a personality trait- no of course not, but are those losses defining moments of my life and the absence of those people a continuous and unavoidable part of who I am - yes in so many ways.

Whilst I wouldn't go down the route of airing my own grief on a talent show and to be honest rarely share my bereavement history at all in my real life I can also fully acknowledge that traumatic loss is a very profound event that can change the course and direction of your life. Even if that wasn't an outcome for me, I can understand how people might feel driven to want to make people proud by doing something like this, or do things in their name, or even feel motivated to do something they wouldn't have done before having been appraised of how short life can be.

Also, they will select what they want from many hours of filming.
Yes this is true. The owners of a B&B local to us were on Four in a Bed years ago and came over somewhat as the "bad guys" of the group. They are not like that at all and locals were quite shocked by how they were depicted. They said that whilst everything that was shown was "real" in so far as it did happen and was said, a lot of the situations were manipulated by the production team and the editing changed the context of lots of things considerably.
I don't watch much reality tv but when I do, I view it pretty much as a scripted drama with low cost actors.

They want people to tune in and if talking about XYZ, or manipulating some conflict will do that of course it will be exploited.

Also, they will select what they want from many hours of filming.

I would argue that finding it draining hearing others tell their story if grief IS making it a defining characteristic. Because you wouldn't be drained if you didn't have loss yourself.

Reality shows aren’t reality in that even if not scripted the producers direct the narrative. They want people to tune in and if talking about XYZ, or manipulating some conflict will do that of course it will be exploited.
My children’s father died when they were small. My DD was diagnosed with MS at 17. She rarely tells anyone about her MS as people react oddly sometimes so she keeps it to herself. She never volunteers about her Dad either, now does my son. It’s their private tragedy that they do not need discussing.
And @Velumental that is silly armchair psychology! We talk about their father quite a bit - if one if his favourite song comes on the radio, etc. People handle their histories differently and if it becomes who they are that’s a problem. For example I know a few people with cancer who say ‘I’m a person living with cancer, it is not my defining characteristic’. They don’t want people looking at them and thinking one thing - and I doubt the people on these shows do either, it’s just the way the producers present it.