Thoughts for the people who give advice on A New Mode…

When I found this place, I was lost and hurting and terribly confused. Yes, I was already in professional therapy, but I was looking for other people who might understand the pain I was in (which a happily-married well-off therapist wouldn’t necessarily understand).

What I got with my very first question was a combination of bitter rants, cruel jokes at my expense, and not-so-subtle stabs at my lack of self-confidence.

Needless to say, I found it VERY unhelpful and left shortly thereafter.

Over time, I started to wonder if I was really SO bad and SO dumb that even other women couldn’t stand me. I came back to the forum, to see if it was just me or if everyone got treated like garbage. Sure enough, wasn’t just me.

I see a lot of the same people over and over, seeming to take utter delight in other people’s misery. They take jabs at women who are already hurting and down on themselves and take great pleasure in rubbing in JUST HOW DUMB WE ALL ARE AND WE SHOULD KNOW BETTER.

Shame on you.

No one says we must coddle each other and be lovey-dovey, but come on – if you were hurting, wouldn’t you want compassionate constructive advice, not another kick while you’re down?

Next time one of you “seasoned professionals” takes a deep breath and gets ready to lambast yet another silly, confused, heartbroken girl, STOP and remember what YOU felt like when someone broke YOUR heart.

Did you really need someone to tell you how you screwed up and how dumb you were, or did you want someone to say “been there, done that, honey, and yes it hurts but here’s how I made sure it didn’t happen again”?

Not everyone who posts here is hopeless and stupid. Nor are we all doormats.

And not all men are bad, wicked, conniving, deceitful, evil creatures led solely by the penis.

I post here because I still remember what it was like to hurt. I want to help ease someone else through that same hurt, so they can make healthier choices down the road.

… Do you?

I do get tired of the “needy shaming” on here. A lot of people act like women should just be chill about whatever and always bow to the man’s need for space.

I think the DATING advice here is excellent for the early stages of dating- no, you should not spaz out when a guy you have had 2 dates with goes quiet for 2 days. But it’s fully OK to expect a man that you are in a relationship with for a year to give you a heads up when he is going to go silent for 24 hours.

It seems like a lot of women read the advice and are fearful of communicating with men out of fear of being stamped as “needy”.

Guys do complain about needy women but usually the guys complaining are :
legit complaining about a woman who went nuts and flooded their phone with texts after not seeing a reply within an hour

OR

are guys you need to avoid because they withdraw for no reason without warning and are emotionally idiotic. The guy who complained to me most about “needy” women ghosted me 3 times. I remember him telling me about a girl that showed up at his place- now I know why, he probably ghosted her.

It’s not needy to confirm plans or say hello. Or ask what’s up when you haven’t heard from someone in a while. This cool girl “never text unless he texts first” is ridiculous.

Just imagine stopping 10 random strangers on the street to ask them for relationship advice on the same issue. Would you not expect to get many different answers and perspectives? Would you not expect for some of them to be blunt and to the point while others are more compassionate and supportive? Hell I have people in my own family who have no tact and don’t wear kid gloves when giving me their opinion. Why do you expect more from a random group of strangers? It amazes me at the number of people who want to bash this forum and the advice given on it yet they continue to come back here for YEARS to post or give advice. You said yourself you received some really good wake up calls and constructive criticism. Do you not think that someone being upfront and telling you your boyfriend was going to leave if you didn’t stop a certain behavior or acting a certain way was a wake up call that may have helped you to keep the 3 year relationship you currently have? Do you not think those comments may have made you more apt to change your behavior to keep your relationship going? Leaving out the consequences of your actions or the “foreshadowing” as you call it may not have convinced you to become this better person you now say you are today. I’m not trying to argue all advice here is good advice. When I posted about my relationship years ago I received some crazy stuff too. Including that it would never work out, he’s emotionally unavailable, I’m a booty call, he’s a player and won’t change, I need to kick him to the curb, or I’m crazy, too emotional and needy and he’s going to dump me. Think someone may have even thrown out he was a narcissist at some point. None of it was true. And now we’re happily married. Go figure.

But I also got some really good advice and it helped me to see things from his point of view. I would assume that most people give advice based on their own experiences and relationships they have witnessed with their friends and families. I know I do. So if someone says you screwed up and the guy will probably leave you it’s because that’s their experience. For example, when my husband and I were first dating a few months in we had our first big fight. We both said some things we regretted, I acted crazy, got emotional and slammed a door in his face and we broke up and didn’t speak to each other for 7 months. So if someone had posted a question during that time I would have said if you act like an emotional crazy person during a fight a guy is going to leave and not come back. However, a year after that when we got back together and both apologized and worked things out I would have had a different perspective and said that guys will forgive and you can fix things. Therefore I don’t find it surprising that your responses may have been split with half the people saying you can’t work it out and half of them saying you could. I don’t think it’s because these women are hateful or quick to judge or bitter. I think it’s because statistically most dating relationships don’t last. Based on my experience, my friend’s dating experiences, my husband’s dating experiences and reading on this site for several years now, most relationships won’t make it past the 3-4 months mark. And A LOT of the advice on this site relates to women posting about men they’ve been dating for less than or right at that length of time. So it’s quite easy to say that the odds of a huge fight ending a short lived relationship are quite strong.

Every relationship is different as every person is different. What works for some may not work for others. If everyone had the right answers and every thing was black and white with regards to a relationship, then you wouldn’t have forums like this or so many books on relationships. Personally I think there needs to be a thread titled “thoughts for the people who post on A New Mode.” Recently it seems I will comment on a post only to have the OP come back with some vital piece of information they decided not to provide in their original post. Such as, he cheated on me multiple times, he’s talking online to lots of other women, he insults me, says I’m fat, is controlling, etc. Or they’ll post something and get lots of advice, only to post a week later leaving out some of the important bits so they can get a different answer and the one they want. There are a lot of people who don’t want to see the truth even when it’s glaring right there in their face. You have to admit some of these posts don’t even seem like they could be real. You’ll have someone post saying her boyfriend never spends time with her, goes out drinking with his buddies, is texting other women, has cheated on her in the past, does drugs, her family hates him, he doesn’t have a job and she supports him but he never tells her he loves her. And she’s expecting support and us to tell her she’s doing the right thing by staying in this toxic relationship. Well that’s not going to happen and I hope it never does. There’s a difference between giving someone support and watching a train wreck of someone who keeps ruining their life. Sometimes telling someone what they don’t want to hear is the only thing that will help them out of the situation they are in.

Really- I don’t see any “complaining”..I see a lot of thoughtful and insightful feedback about the advice offered on this forum. Based on your comments, it is clear you wouldn’t understand that kind of thing

People are going to say whatever they want on here. I agree some of the advice is nasty, but scolding strangers on the internet isn’t going to change anything. The kind of people who hide behind a computer screen and use it as an excuse to be rude aren’t going to change just because a few people on a random forum complain about their behavior.

The lack of empathy is what makes me the most sad. It’s hearing women call other women “STUPID” or “NEEDY” or lord, even mentally ill for being upset when men do hurtful things. We are OK to call a girl stupid and needy for texting twice after being ghosted by a guy after having sex to soon, and we call her out for being too emotional, stupid, naive, on and on.

Meanwhile, we excuse the man (boy?) in the situation because “that’s what men do”, even though a lot of what men do is treat women in a very poor, unhealthy way. Like how about, “hey, what that guy did was really very wrong and pretty much shows he is emotionally unhealthy”. Vs “Hey stupid girl he ghosted because you texted first which shows you to be a weak needy POS”.

We do need to learn how to work around the “bad men”, but there is a learning curve. Calling women stupid after the fact does nothing.

It was the post from someone with anxiety where some of the posters showed a real lack of empathy towards a woman with anxiety. I’ve also seen people called stupid more than once. And called needy for far less than bombarding a guy with texts. Maybe we read different posts?

It’s often helpful advice, but often framed really harshly.

Oh good lord, PLEASE do not shut this forum down. I think most of us have been around long enough to know that you can’t control what others say. You just have to take each post with a grain of salt. Yes, there should be forum rules, but every forum has those. That said, I’ve received some harsh criticism as well as some very helpful advice. Mostly, I’ve been able to see such a different perspective and learn SO much from these forums. Even some very old threads I’ve found have helped me tremendously. I’m grateful for this site.

Honestly, contact Eric on facebook if you have an issue with a post. He’s really responsive. If you want to maintain your anonymity, just write a post flagging your concerns and I’ll let him know for you

Yup. The forum is clearly not working for all you ladies. More bad than good. Glad you pointed it out so that the owner can evaluate why he is paying his own good money to keep it open for all the mean people who are giving bad advice. I like the forum. I think there is more good than bad, but by reading all the complaints you would think it was a lost cause. If you don’t like it why do you stay and complain. It’s like saying I hate the food at that restaurant but then you go there everyday to eat lunch.

Kk….I don’t see complaining here. People are offering input in order to make the forum better or bring to light some things that could be changed. It’s not the same as complaining.