...to think ‘Resting Can I Help You? Face’ is a real thing?

[Bebepoor]

And does not receive the attention it deserves.

Honestly. Strangers ask for directions and tell me about their health problems. Acquaintances pour out their hearts to me. Friends tell me things I really wish I didn’t know. People moan about Resting Bitch Face but my affliction is much greater. Any other sufferers?

I have this. People tell me all sorts. No idea shy as I’m not particularly interested or empathetic (my good friend is a psychiatrist and he says this means I’m a good listener!). Vague acquaintances tell me of their fertility issues, marriage problems, sex difficulties ... people on trains tell their life stories.

Comes in useful as a HCP as people seem unable to lie to me though!

Another specky four eyes here and I also appear to have this effect. I quite enjoy it tbh

I have found my people. This week alone on the train I have had a woman tell me about how her first husband ran off with her sister (lucky to say she remarried a lovely man) and then another chap discussing his and his wife’s fertility problems. I am also constantly asked for directions etc. As another poster said, I don’t know my left from my right so I’m sure I send half the people on a wild goose chase.

Finally.
I always thought it was just me who had this - good to know I’m not alone!

I had an older chap ask me which newborn nappies are best as 'she's just had a baby'. I ended up doing pretty much his whole shop. Wondered if he thought I worked at Asda but my full trolley, coat and handbag must have suggested not. Very common for me and I tend not to mind too much.

Granny I had a woman in Asda say “I know you don’t work here but you look like you know what’s what. My mum wants to make a cheesecake, can you show me what cream cheese is?” I understood her point, it’s always marketed as soft cheese!

OYBBK, I've done similar. I was once approached by a young man just down the road from the tube station. He asked me where 'The Anchor' was. My local pub is called The Anchor (not really, I'm just using a pseudonym), which I was walking to anyway, so I suggested he walked with me - it's about a 15 minute walk so he told me all about meeting his friends at The Anchor for brunch, but he was running very late because he'd had a heavy night the previous evening and he had a hangover - plus, IIRC, he chatted about a number of other things during that 15 minutes. When we got there his friends were nowhere to be seen. At that moment I remembered that there's also a cafe called 'The Anchor' about 3 minutes walk from where I first found him, so I had to send him back the way we'd come and give him the easy directions to the cafe from the tube station. Oh the shame . We had a nice chat though

Part of its age - I have fairly deliberate rbf but still get this since turning 40... Females over 40 and dressed in a fairly neutral way (by which I mean clean and tidy but informal) are seen as safe and approachable by most sections of society... People see primary school teacher/ mum / neighbor / capable but non scary grown up no matter what the expression on your face is...

I too have found my people. Any city, any country I'll be the one asked for directions.

Apparently confiding in strangers is a psychological thing, "The strength of weak ties". It's easier to tell a stranger your problems because you probably won't see them again and they're not needed to support you on a regular basis.

Can you imagine a MN meet up of just our type of person? We'd listen to everyone else's problems, mind their kids and give everyone directions!

Pan!

It was Kings College Jenny. Poor sods.

I don't normally have it, but for ages I went through spates of tourists asking me for directions in central London - none at all for ages and then 2/3 in quick succession

Eventually I realised it was linked to carrying a copy of the Evening Standard (if you're reading it you're clearly local and an English speaker) and having my work lanyard around my neck (again, clearly local)

Put my lanyard in my pocket and the paper in my bag and the problem disappeared!

You need to work on your 'resting dopey and clueless' faces. Maybe my affliction is actually not actually so 😂

Overuse of actually...😳

I have severe RBF (best thing I inherited except...) people still think im their girl! I've had people come off the street into my work, bypass 3 other admin girls and ask me all sorts. I'm an absolute mess with directions and sent some poor guy on a 20 minute excursion in the entirely wrong direction by accident. He came back and asked me to try again!🤔 in supermarkets no matter what i do I always get where something is or my favourites - how wouldyou cook

I have this! (Also wear glasses)

It seems to be wearing off now I'm getting older, though. Having said that, I was in a cafe on Saturday (with bouncy DS going a bit nuts), when a complete stranger who'd been sitting with her friends at another table asked if she could come and sit with me. There were loads of empty tables.

I asked how she was, and she started with "it's been a hard day". On this occasion I was able to Top Trumps her, as I'd just been to my MIL's cremation, but I think if I hadn't said that, I was in for a long tale.

My dad also has this face. He gets suckered into all sorts of things, but just goes along with it and has some great stories!

Hit post too soon! How would you cook x ingredient as ive never used it before (wtf) or which recipe would you use and what do i need for it?

Should we all start charging the council a flat rate per enquiry? Clearly we provide public services 😂😂

Me, me, me. Bizarrely it only clicked a few years ago with me as my dad pointed out how often it happens. At the time we were just wandering around an area where DH and I now live after looking at our house and a lady came up to me and in the space of 2 minutes told me:

• where she lived
• that her husband was an amputee
• that her son and his wife didn’t live with them, they were somewhere else, I quote ‘living their life’
• she invited me in there and then for tea
• she told me she makes the best Indian biscuits (I was tempted)
• she didn’t drive and so what journey she would make by bus where from and where to

There was probably more. But yes all the bloody time and I am incredibly anti-social but just spineless.

It’s beginning to sound like cats and non-cat people, i.e. cats will always jump on the laps of the visitor who hates cats.

Just remembered a few more over the years.

At least 15 years ago, the Japanese tourists who asked me to take a photo of them outside the IWM with their digital camera - not only had I never used a digital camera back then, but I clearly looked trustworthy enough to hand over their (at the time) expensive piece of kit!

In the kitchen section of a department store a woman came over to me holding two Yorkshire pudding tins - one quite lightweight, the other a heavier and better quality one - asking me which I thought would be the better one to buy. I had no idea I looked like a Yorkshire pudding expert!

More recently in my supermarket shop I had a packet of Nurofen, the checkout assistant asked me whether I thought it would help for her back pain, which, apparently had been troubling her for a while. Doctor Pan to the rescue!

... and I don't wear glasses.

I get this, and I wear glasses. In my case it’s a reasonably recent development, which I put down to evolution from standard RBF to “sensible middle-aged lady face”.

Oh my god, yes! I have "Resting - Tell me your whole Jerry Springer life story" face. NOT FUN!!!

I thought it was just me! Yes, I get this, too.

Have found that when I'm wearing sunglasses, I get fewer requests for help. DD reckons it's because a) I have kind eyes and b) people like to make eye contact. So taking this away helps reduce random people bugging me.

i am also a glasses wearer and get this! At work I'm the magnet for questions whenever there's a new employee. Lately there's been loads of new people and I've had to try and come up with ways of looking super busy so that I can get any work done at all.

Oh God, I have this BUT I also have Resting Bitch Face. I seem able to alternate between the two

I can join a bus queue and someone who appears to have been standing quietly up until that point will come and tell me their life story.

On one occasion I was walking home from the school run when a woman stopped her car and asked me how old I thought she was. She then proceeded to tell me that she and her husband had argued about her trying to look younger than she actually was, she stormed out and was driving around when she saw me (even though there were people ahead of me who she'd driven past) and decided to get my opinion!