My weight is bearing down on me

Dear globalcounselor,
I’m 15 years old.  My problem is that I feel very bad about the way I look. I feel fat and ugly.  My friends and family reassure me that I am good looking and not overweight but whenever I look in the mirror I see a lot of negative things about myself.  What can I do to change this behaviour. I am tired of feeling so down.

Dear Feeling so Down,
  There are many young girls who feel exactly the way you do. I think the media pressure to be thin has had a bad influence on women and especially young girls like yourself.
   Sometimes the feeling we have about ourselves is a symptom of some other issue we are facing. I suggest you talk to your school counsellor and perhaps you could be referred to an appropriate service. I want you to know that you are not alone. It is a societal problem and if your family and friends tell you that you’re okay perhaps you can pretend they are telling the truth and go with that.  Good luck.

 

Dear globalcounselor,
  I am 16 years old. I had a boyfriend who is three years older than I am.  He is very nice and caring but I don’t feel as if I am ready for a steady boyfriend. I want to take things easy but I don’t want to hurt his feelings.  He is quite serious and very intelligent. I am so confused because I like him but I don’t want to be serious. Confused.

Dear Confused,
I think in this case honest would be the best policy. Talk to your boyfriend and express how you feel. Tell him you are not ready for any big commitment and how would he feel about giving you the time and space you need to grow up.
  At 16 it’s difficult to know what you want.  Let him decide what’s best for him. You have to be prepared that he might want to call it quits.
  I know that once you tell it like it is you will feel much better and there will be greater understanding between the two of you if he is intelligent as you say he is.
  The truth never hurts when told up front but it does hurt if you tell only when caught.

How could a mother kill her own daughter

Dear globalcounselor,

I read in the news recently that a mother in Nova Scotia Canada, killed her own daughter so that she could have a relationship with the man in her life who did not want children. He made her choose between him and her daughter and she chose him. She drove her daughter to an isolated spot and strangled her to death. Globalcounselor please tell me this woman was insane.  I could not sleep, wondering how is it possible for a mother to abandon her child in this way.  What is this world coming to? Jesus keep me near the cross. I am so sick to my stomach.  The woman got life i imprisonment for second degree murder.  This is when I think the death penalty would be appropriate.

Sick

Dear Sick,

I feel your confusion  It is something that should never happen. How could a mother betray her child who expect her to protect her? There is no answer. All I can say is that there is evil in the world and then there is insanity, there is mental illness. I find it very difficult to believe that a mother could do this consciously.  I choose to believe in the goodness of the average, reasonable human being.  Some people could hide their mental illness very well, as this woman obviously did. She fooled everyone but when put under pressure she  acted out of desperation and could not rationally see her way out. She obviously has a very low self-esteem to go to such length for the affection of a man who obviously was not the right person for her. Maybe he was trying to break off the relationship by making her choose thinking she would obviously choose her daughter over him as a mother is expected to.  I think that man is a chicken. Why didn’t he walk away if he did not want children in his life? Why did he  choose a woman with a child then ask her to choose.  One has to ask, is  she protecting him? Was he the one who killed her daughter?  Just thinking out loud.

You have to forget about this and acknowledge that there are some things in this world you will never understand.  We do not have the technology that could accurately read a person’s mind and intentions so we all have to live with this and learn something from it.