To despair at how helpless some people are

[ThankYouVeryMuch]

You see it on here all the time, poster says they’re in a difficult situation and lots of people respond with sensible advice and details of organisations they can call for help and there’s always a reason why they can’t ask for help.

I saw a job at a local hair salon advertised on Facebook, 1 person posted “interested” underneath so the salon owner responds with their contact details (that were in the ad) and asks for a cv and the person responds “I don’t have a cv, nevermind” or someone else put on my local Facebook group saying she was new to the area and asking if there were any new mums in the local area, so I responded that there was a lovely, free mum and baby group in her village the next day and I knew the organiser so if she wanted to go along I’d make sure she got a warm welcome, and the response was “I can’t go to a baby group, what if none of the other mums speak to me”

Some people just seem as if the world owes them something and they should get what they want without putting in any effort.

I generally put this kind of thing down to 'attention-seeking'. Some people never learn to interact with other people on an equal level, and only know how to initiate acquaintanceship with strangers by appealing to their pity.

I can't really get my head around it simply being anxiety and lack of confidence; seems to me that it requires a lot of confidence to broadcast to all and sundry that you're, for example, too scared to go to a Mum & Baby group in case no-one speaks to you.

I think you’re onto something there Jamie.

It comes up quite a lot on here, people will attribute some cheeky fuckery to lack of confidence or low self esteem or anxiety when actually it takes a huge amount of confidence and believe in yourself to ask others to put themselves out for you, it shows you think you’re worthy of someone else’s time and attention and effort. Someone with low self esteem and confidence probably wouldn’t even make it known.

There’s a woman on OH’s friends list who is always posting the most ridiculous questions and asking favours to her friends list, you can kinda see the self defeating cycle. She asks favours or questions, probably because it’s the only way she thinks people will interact with her, but people distance themselves as they don’t want to be taken advantage of with a direct ask for help or just think she’s a bit thick to be unable to google the next train departure herself. So she does it even more as she feels lonely and it’s a way of getting a response from at least some people. Then those few people cotton on and so forth.

Jamie yes, this always puzzled me with my MIL. She hints and hints trying to get other people to do things for her because she “can’t” or “doesn’t like to”. It often goes over people’s heads because they don’t understand they are being hinted at (or perhaps they do understand and ignore it).

So, for instance, she won’t ask outright for time off at work, just hints to her boss and colleagues that she’d like to go to her grandchild’s school thing but, oh no, she can’t because she’s working, it’s so sad blah blah blah, expecting them to offer her the time off, offer to swap shifts etc.

But here’s the thing, when they don’t, and they usually don’t, she then gets mean and vindictive and says horrible things about and to them. That’s not the actions of someone who suffers from anxiety or shyness.

My mum is pretty bad for this. I think it’s part anxiety, lacks initiative and partly because she loves people doing stuff for her. She likes to tell people she can’t do C because she’s too unwell

I do think though some people just lack initiative

There was a regular ' needy' person on our local FB selling page. She would ask for specific items and always say that it HAD to be delivered to her!
I asked her, was it because she didn't drive? No, it was because she couldn't be arsed!
Lazy!

As Jamie hinted at. I think it's all down to people not knowing how to interact as an adult.
They revert back to being a 'whinning' child, who can only get attention by looking and sounding weak.
I met someone at a gym when I first started and she went on and on about her 'weaknesses and fears'.
Only just met the woman!
But now that I'm not a newbie, she picks on other newcomers and tells them about her 'bad stuff'.
WHY?!

Frasier I have observed what you describe as a behaviour quite common in older women and I came to the conclusion, very unscientifically that perhaps when they were young it was frowned upon to ask fir what you wanted, perhaps there was an expectation to smile and do as was expected. It is fairly recent that girls and young women have been encouraged to speak up.

My parents tried to do absolutely everything for me up to about 8 years ago (I'm now 31). I hadn't realised all that time that people my age had been far more independent. It was thanks to my then bf, now husband, and an observant aunt who pointed out to me that I should be managing me own bank accounts, driving, arranging my own holidays. My parents didn't like my new found independence, they were both controlling and thought their "children" couldn't be trusted instead of giving us a chance and even letting us fail. It's something I never want to do to my DD because it held me back and even though I'm independent now, it took an intense few years of learning the hard way.

I think I have little tolerance for general helplessness because it simply wasn't accepted when I was younger. You'd hear 'There's a first time for everything', 'Practice makes perfect' or 'Pull yourself together!'.

Whether you liked it or not, you had to tackle things you were scared / nervous to do, unsure how to do etc head on.

For many people it's a psychological game called "why don't you?...yes but..." Any suggestions of how the person can help themselves is countered with "yes but... "and then a host of reasons trotted out. It's a game the helper cannot win and one once in it, is best walked away from.

I'm probably going to regret posting this but I keep wondering if I'm overhelping DS with revision. (This is connected to the thread, honest! I'm trying not to produce a helpless man!)

He's Y10 and has always done poorly in his EOY exams. I was fairly sure that it was his revision technique that was at fault - part laziness, part over-thinking and allowing rabbit-in-headlights to bring him to a halt rather than really trying to push through. So I brought in a tutor 12 hours over 12 weeks, I didn't want to get into a long-term thing, but I thought an outside party might be more less emotionally driven than me to try to get him to think more creatively and in a more organised way about his revision, to encourage him by showing him how to gut notes, all of that type of stuff - not teaching a subject. Also sent him on a Bio/Chem revision course.

He still didn't do brilliantly in the year 10 exams, and I have to decide how to go forward with the gcse year, so my question now is: would you let kids plough their own furrow and potentially not do well enough at GCSE to go through to their own sixth form in the interests of producing kids that learn to overcome helplessness? Or would you do what it took to get them through GCSE, but then tell them they're on their own? This is all a genuine question. I really do worry that I overdo it, but I also don't want to undersupport if I've just got an immature one who will come good further up the scale.

I have experienced on a few occasions the 'mum wanting to sit in on their 21 year old graduate sons interview' thing. It is quite astonishing how these parents honestly think that their presence is helpful. I had one women get quite angry at me when I informed her she had to wait outside yet she still insisted on 'sitting in' on the interview to make sure 'it went okay'. It was a shame as the lad concerned, although clearly a bit nervous at first really opened up during the intervew. I saw that on his CV he played rugby so I spent the first 10 mins just talking about a recent international before we moved onto the role itself. I did say that if he had any other interviews lined up that maybe his mum should wait in the car instead and the poor sod told me that he asked her several times not to accompany him but she was having none of it. Bonkers.

If the tutor helps and you can afford it I would keep up the tutor as public exams are so vital (we didn't use tutors however and they did fine; actually my daughters chose A level Easter revision courses so I suppose I did pay for those and one was residential so in a sense a chance to be independent).One of my student teenagers just left (driving) to collect a bike he is buying. I was thinking about the thread. I did help him put the car seats down in the back (he is driving himself, finding the route to that town, taking the cash etc) although I couldn't see a lever he saw to put down the seats. I was here so reminded him to take the cash but he had it already and his biggest issue is what to do if it won't fit in the car but he will sort that out, not me. Let us see how he gets on and I hope he tests it before parting with his hard earned money and doesn't flash the cash until he's tested it in case someone just pulls the cash from his hand as part of a serial bike selling fraud. All 5 passed their driving test at 17 and drive on motorways.

My mother had to take about 3 goes at her driving test . in fact I found her 1950s notes the other day - she was very excited about it and planning what car to get and just couldn't pass despite lessons so gave up and only then learned in the 60s - probably incentive being she was pushing the toddle rin the pram 1.3 miles whilst I walked whilst she was pregnant and then back home, then back up at lunch time (I came home for lunch until aged 10) and then back and then there and back again 1.3 miles x 6 a day - quite an incentive to take your driving test again which she did and then passed but was never that keen on motorways and didn't drive abroad.

Yep. People with genuine low confidence are scared to ask for help, and they're certainly not so secure in themselves that they don't mind everyone on social media thinking they're too thick to use google.

Any requests they do make for help that are refused will never trigger a MN CF-type tantrum. Instead they'll apologise profusely for having troubled you and they certainly won't ride roughshod over your refusal!

It's all very sad sometimes- I have encountered so many adult women who make bids for sympathy in order to gain new friends. It works really well in the short-term, but in the long-term people always get exasperated. I do wonder if some of them are aiming for good old British self-deprecation (because no-one likes arrogant women), but if so, they overshoot by miles.

I was recruiting recently at work and we had a pretty decent application from a recent graduate. The CV was a bit sparse – but that’s to be expected from someone just leaving uni of course – so the work experience was very detailed and elaborate and covered a wide range of duties. The cover letter was good too, although a bit flowery – like the CV it seemed to be overwritten to make up for the gaps in experience. This was fine, although generally the writing style felt a bit old fashioned for this particular industry.

Wasn’t until I got to the end of the cover letter when the penny dropped. The final sentence, a few paragraphs down from the candidate’s sign off, read:

‘here you go, have written for you. Love mum x’.

Oh yes. Mummy had written his CV/cover letter. Not tweaked and edited – WRITTEN. And her DS had obviously just cut and paste the entire thing without even checking it.

Needless to say we didn’t progress his application!

Young people with overbearing parents may in fact be subject to excessive power and control that is not their fault.

I had an odd path to maturity in that my father was very controlling and saw any signs of independence as usurping his authority. He set very tight boundaries and, at 18, didn't allow me to learn to drive, use the telephone, sit in the front seat of the car, cook, allow my boyfriend in the house, have a house key or go away to university. He was a bully and I was afraid of him.

Less than two years later, after a few very hard-won steps towards independence, he decided that he and my mother were moving 300 miles away. He sold-up and dropped me and all my possessions off at a halls-of-residence, leaving after about 5 minutes with a cursory: 'So, you'll be alright then won't you?".

Yeah, equipped with all those life skills you've given me!

I think these people were raised by parents who mollycoddled them in all honesty. They never had to stand on their own two feet growing up so as adults they just don’t know how to help themselves so make endless excuses hoping someone else will step in and take over. Very, very frustrating.

I think sometimes its warranted / understandable.

I signed up for a toddler group at my local children’s centre. I took my twins for the first session and it was absolutely horrific the first week. One of them is a daredevil and the other has a visual impairment and is being investigated for an underlying genetic issue, is struggling with sensory things and spent the whole time crying, clinging on to me or eating any dirt he could find on the floor. None of the other mums spoke to me but many did look at me like I was a disaster. When the group leader asked how I was doing I burst into tears. If you’d asked me in the days after that if I wanted to go to a baby group ever again I’d have said no.

I did keep going though.

I know people who are very involved in the lives of their adult children. Far more than I am or would want to be. Hence the children don't do diy, car maintenance, decorating, gardening etc. It's all done for them.

You figure it out or you sink

This is so true for me - I always thought I was capable, then when I became a single mum 3 years ago I realised there was still stuff I had always left to ExH. Both my parents have passed away so I just had to work it out for myself, I had no choice!

I think some people are genuinely lazy but also if they've always had someone to do stuff before I think a lot of people just fall into that habit and assume that someone will always be there to do it in the future.

I understand what you're trying to say - but sometimes anxiety is all consuming and makes you almost delusional.

It's easier said than done to behave less helplessly.

But @NotAnotherNoughtiesTune we've established that we're not really talking about the kind of helplessness that comes from anxiety. Many anxious people function relatively well (albeit possibly within certain limits); many non-anxious people don't seem to be able to help themselves at all.

I think it can often come down to the response to a crisis - some people immediately think "Right. What can I do to make this better?", while others think "No, this isn't fair; when will it be fixed?!".

It's easier said than done to behave less helplessly.

This attitude is part of the problem I think, it goes without saying it’s easier said than done: what ISN’T easier to speak about than to do?

But all to often that phrase is used as an excuse to say ‘so I won’t do anything at all’ in conclusion. When actually yes, everything is easier to talk about than to do. And no, that doesn’t mean the answer is not to try and figure out a way forward.

Like PP have said, everyone finds things difficult at times. The difference is that some people say ‘okay this is hard, how can I push myself to conquer this?’ while others say ‘can’t, won’t, shan’t’ and assume others will do it for them.

Ideally recruiters (particularly those targeting young people/graduates) should try to judge young people objectively on their performance in the selection process, not put an immediate black mark against their name because they have a slightly batty or overbearing parent.

Having been on the receiving end of some slightly odd phone calls from my own parents to various organisations/institutions, I do have some sympathy with a young person in this predicament .

I wonder if the introduction of the internet has ruined people's social skills?