{"id":688,"date":"2014-04-30T14:22:36","date_gmt":"2014-04-30T19:22:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jenniferfitz\/?p=688"},"modified":"2016-11-11T19:43:35","modified_gmt":"2016-11-12T00:43:35","slug":"just-say-no-to-needy-busybodies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jenniferfitz\/2014\/04\/just-say-no-to-needy-busybodies\/","title":{"rendered":"Just Say No to Needy Busybodies"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\n<\/p>

If you search Google images for the word \u201cNo\u201d, a bazillion variations pop up.\u00a0 If you search Wikimedia, all you get is lovely Nobelium, an element about which I know nothing.\u00a0 It might kill you.\u00a0 Or not.<\/p>\n

I stink at the word No.\u00a0 My kids charm me, everyone charms me, and I cave.\u00a0 When Lisa Hendey mentioned she was writing a book called The Grace of Yes<\/a>, I retorted that my husband would burn the book if he saw it in my hands.\u00a0 In reality, the book isn\u2019t about encouraging overcommitment, not at all \u2014 one of the key skills in saying \u201cYes\u201d to what matters is learning to say \u201cNo\u201d to everything else.<\/p>\n

Last week I turned out in public for a social event for the first time since February.\u00a0 I shouldn\u2019t have gone.\u00a0 Too tired, should have made other plans.\u00a0 I went anyway.\u00a0 All the other moms \u2014 the pregnant ones, the mothers of toddlers, the mothers of older children \u2014 were tired too. You could see it on the faces.\u00a0 In the difficulty making small talk.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know whether it\u2019s a modern thing or just a motherhood thing, but all of us, no matter our condition, have this habit of doing 20% more than we should.<\/p>\n

Nice People Who Love You Will Eat You Alive<\/h3>\n

Chronic illness doesn\u2019t really change life so much as it magnifies it.\u00a0 When you are sick, small things cost big.\u00a0 It\u2019s not that you can\u2019t go to the party, or make egg salad for the picnic, or pick up the phone and return all those calls . . . it\u2019s that each one of those things means you have to decide what you aren\u2019t going to do instead.<\/p>\n

So say you have both a heart condition and a bad back.\u00a0 You want to be lightly active.\u00a0 You can choose between making brownies for the bake sale or doing your back exercises, but you can\u2019t do both.\u00a0 Which one gives?<\/p>\n

Or say you have MS (which makes you tired) and diabetes, which screws up your blood sugar.\u00a0 You can get out for the exercise walk that will most help you keep your diabetes under control, but then you won\u2019t have energy for lunch at Aunt Hilda\u2019s. And if you decline, Aunt Hilda\u2019s going to say, \u201cBut I saw you out walking the neighborhood!\u00a0 What do you mean you\u2019re too tired to come for a little lunch!\u00a0 I see how it is!\u201d<\/p>\n

It is no surprise that the people who get the most grief for not taking care of themselves are the same ones who actually turn out and help others, all the time.<\/p>\n

Social Cannibalism is an Equal Opportunity Destroyer<\/h3>\n

But this isn\u2019t something that only happens to sick people.\u00a0 It happens to everyone:<\/p>\n