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Cheryl Strayed on pain, letting go, and self-help for Donald Trump.

Cheryl Strayed didn’t start out to be a self-help writer.

In 2012, she was poised to be best known as the author of the forthcoming memoir "Wild", a book that sparked the return of Oprah's famed Book Club and would ultimately be turned into an Academy Award nominated film starring Reese Witherspoon.


Cheryl and Reese at the 2014 Golden Globes. Photo by Steve Granitz/Getty Images.

But one month before the book's release, the writer revealed herself to not just be a woman who had traveled the Pacific Crest Trail and written about it but also the anonymous columnist behind the wildly popular online advice column Dear Sugar. She would now forever be known as more than just a talented author. She was the woman who had helped thousands of strangers deal with some of the most intimate problems in their lives with unflinching honesty, humor, and compassion.

“Most things will be okay eventually, but not everything will be. Sometimes you’ll put up a good fight and lose. Sometimes you’ll hold on really hard and realize there is no choice but to let go. Acceptance is a small, quiet room.”

Shortly thereafter, a selection of those columns — her responses to letters about everything from grief, marriage, and incest to addiction, money, and sex — were compiled in the the New York Times best-selling "Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar," a book I've read so much the cover is hanging on by a thread. New York magazine called "Tiny Beautiful Things," "the self-help book women can't stop giving to each other" and it's now the basis for an upcoming HBO series of the same name.

Whether she planned to be or not, Cheryl Strayed has become an incisive, literary life advice guru with a cult-like following. And I am a proud member.

When she agreed to an interview, I was eager to talk to her about her new book "Brave Enough," a collection of her most beloved quotes. I had no idea we would somehow end up talking about everything from her relationship with her father and forgiveness, to finding an authentic voice, and even (brace yourself) thinking differently about Donald Trump.

But that's what happens when you talk to a woman whose main job is to study life, think about its lessons, and then share them. And so she did.

"OK, Erica. Do not act like a fan."

This is what I told myself as I prepared to call Cheryl for our interview.

"Don't babble on and on about how much her books have inspired you, and don't tell her how many of her quotes you've memorized."

Once I had sufficiently ticked through the list of don'ts in my head, I cleared my throat, got into professional interviewer mode, and dialed her number.

"Hi, this is Cheryl."

"Hi-Cheryl-it's-Erica-from-Upworthy-thanks-for-talking-to-me-today-I'm-such-a-fangirl."

Welp. So much for keeping it cool.

Thankfully, Strayed was incredibly warm and approachable, radiating humility. I wanted to know how someone so humble felt confident giving life advice to thousands of people.

On what it means to be human:

I asked whether she ever suffered from self-doubt and how she, someone not trained as a therapist or a counselor or a life coach, came to feel "qualified" to teach people important life lessons based on her own experiences.

"We get great and terrible advice from all sources all the time," she answered. "From your best friend who said something really important to you one time that really altered your way of thinking and the next conversation can say something that is idiotic and doesn’t make sense. We get advice from strangers, books, our parents, friends … all sources. I'm simply one source.

I never said that people need to do what I think they should do. I very seldom focus on instruction. I don’t feel that my main role is to say do this or do that. My main role is to help illuminate the question that they’re asking by exploring various avenues of seeking the answer.

It's about asking 'What does it mean to be human?' And in particular “What does it mean to be human in this situation? In this struggle?'"

I almost missed what she said next because I was so stuck on the phrase "What does it mean to be human?" It seemed to encapsulate all of the questions that we humans ask ourselves every day (How should we behave? How should we respond? What should we think? What should we feel?) in seven words.

I feel like she could make anything sound good, meaningful. But it also made me wonder how she, or anyone for that matter, knows what the right takeaway or lesson is. What is the best decision to make at any given moment in a complex situation or in a complex life if anything can be made to sound inspirational or "right"?

She paused and thought on that for awhile.

"Right before you called me, I was on a walk with my husband. I was grappling with a negative interaction I had with an acquaintance and feeling really annoyed and angry. But then there was also this other feeling of compassion for this person because I know [what she did] totally isn’t about me. That what she said is completely about her own sense of need and sorrow and fear. And so I have two experiences of the same interaction.

One of the great struggles of my life is which one do I land on? Do I land on the one that’s like 'F--k you bitch'? Or should I land on the one that’s like 'I understand that you’re suffering so I will let it go.'

Now that seems like a small thing but apply it to a big thing — my father being a terrible father, for example. Do I stay with rage, sorrow, and absence and suffering, or do I land on forgiveness, compassion, acceptance, and moving forward? We always have that choice."

I agreed. But I also believe that we teach people how to treat us. I worry that if we offer nothing but "niceness"in response to mistreatment or cruelty, we're in some ways letting them off the hook. And if we do that, will they ever learn the lesson? Without me even asking, she had an answer for that.

"What other people go through is not up to us. What we're going through is up to us. I'm not talking about denial," she assured me. "You still have to carry the story with you when you choose forgiveness, but the decision you’re making is to carry it with you forward into whatever beauty awaits. The deal of life is that life is always going to be full of suffering and joy. And I think when you focus on the suffering, you forget how much joy there really is. Always. There’s always joy. It’s always available to us, even in the darkest days."

Even in the darkest days.

The darkest days. That phrase stuck out to me because it drew my mind not only to personal life struggles but to all the hatred and violence and oppression and fear that permeates our current social and political landscape. Mass shootings, Islamophobia, police brutality... And really. Is there any other way to describe Donald Trump's candidacy other than the phrase "dark days"?

I asked her if the themes her quotes touch on, which are so often focused on people's personal lives, could apply to those big societal issues too.

"Yes," she said. And she picked our favorite cartoon villain political candidate to illustrate how.

Him. Photo by Ralph Freso/Getty Images.

On Donald Trump and the big things:

"We forget that Donald Trump — the guy saying all that awful stuff — that’s one human and that awful stuff rises from his heart. And the only way to change the world in the grand scale is to change the hearts and minds of individuals.

So what if this guy really took a deep look at his own wounds? He’s an example of someone who has decided to stay in rage, just like I was talking about earlier. So for him, a couple of people of the Muslim faith shoot up a center and [that behavior] now applies to people of that faith. He’s decided to tell a story that is about hate and ugliness and rage.

What if he were the kind of person who could make that tiny switch I was just talking about in my life, where you say 'am I going to stay in rage or am I going to go to that other place?' I don’t think Trump has ever made that leap probably in anything in his life. So it begins as a tiny thing. I don’t know him. I don’t know what happened to him in his life. But I know that probably all along the way he chose to tell an ugly, small, rage-filled story about himself and the people around him. And then it’s like a stone you throw in the water that resonates outward and beyond. And now it's on a massive scale. That’s why it’s so dangerous to give people power, to elect someone who doesn’t have a consciousness that is steeped in compassion and love and light."

I sighed. She was right. I'm not evolved enough yet to think about Donald Trump's wounds, but I made a mental note to revisit the idea post-election.

I was about to move the conversation forward, but something in my question about what some would call the "bigger" social issues had triggered her. She jumped back in.

"Also, I hate this idea that the culturally significant stories are about 'the big things.' Women are always up against that idea — that our stories are small or unimportant.

I think writing the truth about one life is a big thing. For four years there hasn’t been one day that a whole bunch of people haven’t told me 'your book changed my life.' And when you change someone’s life, you change the world. To believe in that change that we can make in our own lives is what leads to the cultural change in our world."

That sentiment echoes the late Detroit activist Grace Lee Boggs who famously said, "To make a revolution, people must not only struggle against existing institutions. They must make a philosophical/spiritual leap and become more 'human' human beings. In order to change/transform the world, they must change/transform themselves." I shared this with Cheryl.

"Yes! Yes!" she said.

Then she thought about it for a second and said that there was a myth she wanted to dispel.

"Transforming the self can easily be construed as this incredibly narcissistic activity."

I knew exactly what she meant. The me, me, me, navel-gazing, optimize-your-life culture around being your "best self" is everywhere. And it can be pretty insufferable.

"This idea that the most important thing is whatever it is YOU need, what YOU want, because you are developing your mind and your body and whatever. That’s bullshit. That’s not what transforming yourself is.

It isn’t about having the perfect ass and a world that never blows your head open and challenges you and transforms you. It's about engagement, questioning your motivations and beliefs, your biases, and it’s about struggle. And this is the kind of self-help that I’m signing up for and that I hope to contribute to.

It’s a grittier, messier way of looking at transformation. Not just sitting in a bathtub with candles burning, but that’s where you end. It’s not the journey. The journey is a lot rougher than that. It’s about being disrupted from your complacency."

On real self-help:

But that grittiness and messiness isn't what most of us think about when we hear the term "self-help." We often think of positive affirmations and "five steps to a better life," quick fixes. As writer who's a bit insecure about the fact that my own first book will likely land on the self-help shelf also, I desperately wanted to know: Is she comfortable being lumped into that category? How does someone who grew up obsessing over "the great writers" and began her career in fiction and literary nonfiction feel about her work being stuck with the label of a genre that is so often mocked?

"Not only did I never intend to be a self-help writer," she said, "I still don’t really think of myself in that way — probably because I have the same recoil that so many people do when we hear 'self-help.'

"I think when we think of self-help negatively we’re thinking of a book that simplifies and glosses over the complexity of the real, gritty problems of life that we all have. And instead of saying 'OK let’s get down in the muck and face these things,' it sort of makes silly metaphors out of things that are deep and important and big."

I nodded in agreement. She hit the nail on the head.

"Have you ever seen that famous SNL skit with the guy who goes 'I’m OK, and you’re OK?'" she asked.

I chuckled and told her that I had but didn't admit that, at my age, I'd only ever seen a 20-second clip of it on YouTube. But I knew what she was getting at.

“That’s what we think self-help is,” she continued. "A kind of anti-intellectualism."

"And I think that’s really unfair to the genre. Because so many books, my own included, that are lumped into that genre are aspiring to do the exact opposite of that glossing over: embrace our intellects and our rational thinking when it comes to figuring out our challenges and struggles, the relationships we have with others, and the complexity of the relationship that we have with our own past, our own selves, our own lives.

So I think that what people see when they are reading my words is somebody who is willing to not turn away from that complexity.”

Ultimately, she believes that [her] readers experience work in the same way, no matter what the publisher-assigned genre: viscerally and emotionally. And they judge it simply on whether it changes their lives.

Photo by Amy Graves/Getty Images.

On authenticity:

She's a writer who isn't afraid to talk about life's complexity. That's important. But the truth is that her popularity and resonance isn't just because of what she says. It's also about how she says it.

With quotes like this...

“But the reality is we often become our kindest, most ethical selves only by seeing what it feels like to be a selfish jackass first.”

...and this...

"You don’t have to get a job that makes others feel comfortable about what they perceive as your success. You don’t have to explain what you plan to do with your life. You don’t have to justify your education by demonstrating its financial rewards. You don’t have to maintain an impeccable credit score. Anyone who expects you to do any of those things has no sense of history or economics or science or the arts. You have to pay your own electric bill. You have to be kind. You have to give it all you got. You have to find people who love you truly and love them back with the same truth. But that’s all."

...and one of her most famous...

"So write. Not like a girl. Not like a boy. Write like a motherfucker."

it's easy to see why Cheryl is known for communicating ideas in a way that is somehow equally compassionate and unmerciful, gentle and brash. And her words are both literary in their beauty but incredibly simple at the same time. It's hard to tell what has mattered matter more in her ability to connect with readers: her writing style or her big personality. So I ask her.

“It’s both,” she replied confidently. "My voice, writing style, and personality are all one and the same."

She explained: "When you’re a young writer you’re always in search of your voice, and for a long time I thought that meant conforming my voice to the great writers I love. 'I’m going to try to sound like Faulkner or Alice Munro or Toni Morrison.' But what I loved in the work of the writers that I love most is that they’re relaxing and actually speaking with their own voice on the page. And the closer I could get to doing that, the better writer I become.

Voice and authority: It’s all about speaking out of your authentic knowledge."

And she wants to make sure that her authentic knowledge is accessible to everyone.

"I’ve always hoped that what complicates my work is the thinking behind it, not the language that I use to convey ideas. I’ve always wanted my work to be accessible to people of all backgrounds, regardless of their education. I love that you don’t have to be hyper-literate to read my books. You can be, but you don't have to be."

As an example of what she called her "approachability in public persona, on the page, and in actual life," she shared a moving memory:

"At one of my readings in Santa Cruz, this woman came up to me. She was a Mexican immigrant; she was a maid at a hotel. She told me that she had been cleaning a room and someone had left a copy behind of 'Wild.' Instead of just turning it in like they usually do, she started reading it and ended up reading the whole book. At my reading, she wept and said that she’d never read a book before.

And I've heard that many times. So I’m not interested in this idea of the writer as the exalted figure who's above any other person in the world."

Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images.

On her favorite quote:

Later on in our conversation, as we discussed "Brave Enough," I realized she probably wouldn't have judged me for knowing so many of them by heart. The attachment that readers have had to her words is exactly what inspired the book in the first place.

"My publisher said 'all the people on the Internet keep posting your quotes everywhere — we should collect them.' The premise wasn’t 'I’m so wise.' It was crowdsourced! I believe that the power of art is connection. It’s people taking a writer's work and making it theirs. And that’s what people have done with these quotes, and so I looked to them for what should be in the book. I love the idea that a sentence I wrote told them something that they needed to know or hold in their heart.”

I wanted to end my discussion with Cheryl by finding out which pithy line from the collection was her personal favorite, the one that she holds closest in her heart.

As it turns out, it's the one that isn't technically hers. It is her late mother's quote. Her mother is a central figure in her work, and her too-sudden, too-soon death at age 45 not only shattered Cheryl's world but also sparked the life-changing journey of "Wild." When she mentioned her now, her words practically beamed, dripping with audibly noticeable adoration.

"Put yourself in the way of beauty."

"That is something that my mother told me to do. It took me years to really understand what that meant and to learn how to do it. My mom would say, 'It doesn’t matter how miserable you are, how hard any particular day is, you can always choose to put yourself in the way of beauty. There’s always a sunrise and there’s always a sunset. And it's up to you whether you want to be there for it or not. When it’s hardest is when you need to do it the most.'

And so I trust that. It's been a guiding light."

Movies

Julie Andrews said she literally could "feel the evil" when visiting the Von Trapp house

The story behind the movie might be more interesting than the movie itself.

Image via Wikicommons

Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music

Sometimes the story behind the movie is more interesting than the story in the movie.

In her autobiography, Home Work, Julie Andrews shared some of her experiences filming The Sound of Music. Andrews spoke with BuzzFeed News about her book, revealing her thoughts on the actual von Trapp family house. The movie musical, which is based on a section of the real-life Maria von Trapp's book, The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, was shot in a Hollywood studio.

The classic scene of Julie Andrews spinning in a meadow was shot in Bavaria, and the exteriors of the von Trapp house were filmed at a different house entirely.


- YouTubewww.youtube.com


Andrews did visit the von Trapp house in Salzburg, Austria later on in her life.

"It wasn't until much later that I happened to visit the real villa where they actually lived," she told BuzzFeed News. During her visit, Andrews said she could "feel the evil that once permeated those walls." The evil Andrews refers to is, of course, the Nazis. "Because after they fled the country, which they had to do, as in the film, [Heinrich] Himmler took over that villa, and the atrocities there were just terrible," she continued.

The story behind the von Trapp house is much darker than what's touched on in the splashy Hollywood musical. The actual von Trapp family lived in the house from 1923 until they fled Austria in 1938. In 1938, the Nazis annexed Austria, making life hard for the singing family. Georg von Trapp refused to fly the Nazi flag on his house, and declined a request to sing at Hilter's birthday party. There was fear their neighbors would spy on them and their children would become brainwashed by Nazi politics. Even though the family was offered fame, they decided to stay true to their principals and leave Austria.

Julie Andrews, The Sound of Music, musicals, Germany, World War 2, Nazi Germany, Von TrappChristopher Plummer and Julie Andrews on location in Salzburg, 1964upload.wikimedia.org

Not one year later, the house was occupied by Nazis. Heinrich Himmler used the house as his summer residence until 1945.

Himmler was the second most powerful man of the Third Reich. Himmler set up and ran the Nazi concentration camps. The house was surrounded by armed guards and barbed wires. A barracks for the SS was built in the garden. Himmler also built the white wall around the house using slave labor. After the wall was completed, he had those who constructed the wall shot. Very monstrous.

Now, the von Trapp house is a more peaceful place. In 1947, the property was purchased from the von Trapp family by the Missionaries of the Precious Blood. In 2008, it opened to the public as a hotel.


- YouTubewww.youtube.com

While the house has a heavy history, the previous residents of the property took satisfaction in knowing the von Trapps resisted the Nazi party. "What Himmler did here is a heavy weight on the house," Precious Blood Fr. Andreas Hasenburger, the rector of the Kolleg St. Josef, told the National Catholic Reporter. "But we are also proud to live in the von Trapp house, the house of the man who said no to the Führer."

It takes a lot of guts to stand up for what you believe in, especially when you're pressured to forfeit your integrity. Knowing that the family gave up their life to stay true to their principals makes The Sound of Music so much better.

This article originally appeared five years ago.

Pop Culture

Brit living in the US shares the 8 American sayings she loves to hear folks say

It started a wholesome chain reaction of cultural appreciation.

Two women having a conversation at a coffee shop.

One of the coolest things about living in a world with a variety of cultures is that it can help you have newfound appreciation for things in your everyday life that might otherwise be taken for granted. Your daily breakfast, for example, can transform into the most novel of cuisines when you see it through the eyes of someone who’s never even heard of it.

Similarly, certain everyday American sayings and idioms will seem like fun, exotic phrases to fresh ears. Recently, a British woman (@whisked.away.usa) who recently began living in Michigan shared a few of her personal favorites, and odds are many of these would have never been on your radar.

For starters, her "absolute favorite" is “good job.” Honestly, who among you would have ever thought that was anything USA-centric? Although when you take our hustle culture into consideration, perhaps it is pretty fitting.

Also included in her list: “you’re all set” (again, Americans are big on work lingo), “y’all” (of course), “I’ve got to get a hold of them,” (versus “I’ve gotta get in touch”), “liquor” (because of its “old worldliness”), “stove” (she says “cooker”), “huh” (when we find something interesting), and “have a good one” (cause "it's kinda nice”).


Honestly, how cute are these? And perhaps even better, @whisked.away.usa’s viral video inspired a whole slew of equally lovely appreciation for brit slang.

“I like when Brits say: gutted. I’ve started saying it.”

“I love when you all say ‘brilliant’ like when something’s really good. That’s brilliant!”

“I love when Brits says ‘I’m going on holiday’ instead of ‘I’m going on vacation,’”

“I like the Brit…’Hoover the floor.’”

“I love hearing Brits say ‘em’ instead of ‘um.’ I’m trying to start saying ‘em.’”

This top comment really seems to sum up what was so great about this exchange: “cross appreciation expands our world.”

There was also a fair amount of shared love for “huh,” and all it’s many various uses.

“I love ‘huh’ because it can also be the Midwest polite [version] of ‘that sounds super weird, but I won’t say it out loud.'"

“So many different ways to say ‘huh.’”

Since moving to the US, @whisked.away.usa has shared all kinds of fun cultural differences she’s noticed. For instance, did you know that British pancakes are made quite thin (think: crepes) and have a “squirt of lemon”?

In the following video, @whisked.away.usa shares her amazement at the gaps in American public toilets, “drive-thru everything,” air conditioning in houses, certain OTC medications, and the abundance of American flags in certain places.

No matter where you're from, it seems we can all agree that this type of content is the Internet at its best.

Mark Rober subjected himself to bed bug bites in the name of science.

"Good night! Sleep tight! Don't let the bed bugs bite!" This sing-songy rhyme that has been around for centuries alludes to the fact that bed bugs were prevalent in the past. After a significant decrease post-WWII, however, the sneaky pests have been making a comeback. Since the 1990s, bed bug infestations have risen dramatically, leading people to look for ways to avoid and get rid of the blood-sucking little buggers.

Unfortunately, a lot of the information about how to do that is flat-out wrong. Popular YouTube science communicator Mark Rober invites viewers to forget what we think we know and go on an educational journey with the leading bed bug researchers at Rutgers University's urban entomology lab. Not only did Rober subject himself to bed bug bites on purpose to see what happens when they feed, but he also conducted a series of experiments in the lab to find out what is actually effective at killing them and what is not.

Bed Bugs Belarus GIFGiphy

Bed bugs have a reputation for being nearly impossible to get rid of, which isn't really the case, according to Rober. When you know what works, it's actually a fairly simple process to kill an infestation. And the good news is that it doesn't entail any toxic chemicals—in fact the pest control chemicals sold for bed bugs don't work at all, according to Rober's tests.

In the process of learning about bed bugs, Rober shared a few "super wild" facts about the infamous creatures.

Fact #1: Bed bugs can live 3 to 10 months without feeding.

Eek. No wonder it seems like it's impossible to get rid of them. Starving them doesn't work. They can live in the resting stage for 3 to 6 months, and if the environment is cold enough, they can survive around 300 days, or 10 months, without eating.

- YouTubewww.youtube.com

Fact #2: Bed bugs don't transmit disease

Some good news here: Unlike blood-sucking mosquitoes, bed bugs don't carry or transmit disease. The bad news on the front is that because they don't pose a disease threat, only an annoyance, there's not a big incentive to fund research to eradicate them.

Fact #3: Bed bugs are attracted to vertical objects

In one of Rober's experiments, he placed a dish with a cylindrical vertical post inside it an a dish without a column, and nearly all of the bed bugs in the enclosure ended up in the dish with the column. "If you think about it, humans sleep at the highest elevation any given room. So their logic is just crawl up any vertical surface you see until you eventually find a warm-blooded meal at the top."

Part of how they find humans is by smell, which is why certain strong-smelling items can act as a deterrent for bed bugs. In Rober's experiment, Bounce dryer sheets, moth balls, baking soda, and essential oils all seemed to repel bed bugs (as opposed to ultrasonic pest repellers, which appeared to have no effect). However, none of those things did anything to kill them.

bed bugs, bed bug infestation, how to spot bed bugsBed bugs are about the size of an apple seed.Photo credit: Canva

Fact #4: Before 1950, one in three homes had bed bugs

Yikes. Even with the resurgence, we're still nowhere near those numbers, thank goodness.

Fact #5: The way bed bugs mate is weird

The term used to describe it is called "traumatic insemination," and really, you should just let Mark Rober explain it with his visual metaphor. Start at minute 11:30.

bug GIFGiphy

Two things work well to kill bed bugs—diatomaceous earth and heat

In testing chemical sprays, foggers, and other items marketed for killing bed bugs, Rober found a "superstar" in a natural, non-toxic substance. Diatomaceous earth—pulverized fossilized remains of tiny aquatic organisms called diatoms—was the most effective at killing the buggers with a 90% mortality rate after 10 days as opposed to 12% with the Hot Shot bed bug spray. Diatomaceous earth is mostly silica, which absorbs moisture, and when the silica dust sticks to the bed bugs as the walk through it, it dehydrates them. A light dusting of diatomaceous earth around all the cracks and crevices of a room is one way to kill off an infestation, though that process can take days.

The other way to kill bed bugs is heat. Steam kills bed bugs, as does heating up a room to over 122 degrees Fahrenheit does the trick. Temps over 122 degrees kills bed bugs instantly, and as Rober points out, there's no way for them to build immunity to this kind of treatment. So steamers and clothes dryers set to high are the average person's best bet for killing off bed bugs if they have them. The "nuclear option" is to have a pro come in with big heaters and cook your home for a day.

checking for bed bugs, bed bug poop, bed bugs in mattressChecking mattresses for signs of bed bugs at a hotel can help you avoid bringing them home.Photo credit: Canva

How do you avoid getting bed bugs in the first place?

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and that's true for bed bugs especially. Avoiding an infestation if there's already one in your apartment building is trickier, but a lot of people inadvertently bring bed bugs home from hotel stays. Checking the underside of a hotel mattress as soon as you come in the room is a good habit to be in. Bed bugs poop a lot, and there will be spots along the edges of the mattress if bed bugs are present.

The other tip is to use the luggage rack to store your suitcase instead of leaving it on the floor or furniture and to hang clothes on the closet hangers instead of putting them into the hotel room's dresser drawers. Some people may even put their suitcase in the bathtub, at least until they've checked the bed for signs of poop.

Nobody wants to deal with bed bugs, but at least now we have clear evidence of what actually works to get rid of them and what doesn't. Cook them with heat/steam and dehydrate them with diatomaceous earth, and take some simple steps when traveling to lessen your chances of getting them in the first place.

Sleep tight, everyone!

Two men chatting over a beer.

Men sometimes get labeled as more likely to keep secrets for selfish, manipulative purposes. But on the other end of the spectrum, men might keep certain things to themselves due to the pressure of gender norms: wanting to hide insecurities to appear strong for their families, hoping to shield their partners from hurt, not feeling safe to show emotion, and so on.

A Reddit user recently asked: “What, if anything, are you unable or unwilling to share fully openly and honestly about yourself with your spouse?” and the answers are a prime example of this.

These long kept secrets—some hilarious, others heartbreaking—are a rare, candid glimpse into exactly what many men feel compelled to keep bottled up inside.

Check them out:

“I keep the ceiling fan on at night because she farts in her sleep and it's so bad it wakes me up.” —JackassWhisperer

"When I go grocery shopping, i often buy a fresh rotisserie chicken thigh for myself, and wolf it down on a parkbench on my way home like a homeless caveman. I have no idea why, but it's my little me-time ritual." —Sternsson

"My self-doubt is something I conceal. I strive to be her rock and revealing my vulnerabilities seems counterproductive." -AdhesivenessGlass978

"When she asks to go out with her girlfriends or away on an overnight with some friends, she thinks I’m upset I’m not included. In reality, I’m praising the lord for a day or two alone." —Bobo_Baggins03x

man, relaxing, spouse, alone, alone timeAlone time.Giphy

"While I love my spouse deeply, I struggle to fully share my childhood traumas. The memories are painful and sometimes I feel like shielding her from that darkness." —Slight_Policy3133

"My child (18 months) is legitimately well behaved, compliant, and enjoyable to be around when she’s not in the home and it’s just he and I. When she’s around he’s combative, whiney, rude, and a little terror." —D00deitstyler

"Deep down, I really just want to be lazy. I don’t want to go to work, or cook that much, or change the bedding every week, or find part time income streams… Like, in my heart, I just want to lounge about, get a bit drunk and read books or watch youtube videos. I do as much as possible so that she’s comfortable and happy but don’t want to admit that I don’t really WANT to do anything useful." —LeutzschAKS

"The sheer amount of stress I'm under. I do share, but I can't articulate how bad it is." —Herald_of_dooom

“Sometimes the things she says to me in arguments break my heart.” —justVinnyZee

argument, couple fighting, spouse, heartbreak, secretHarsh words create distance. Image via Canva

"I served in Iraq and lost my leg. As a result I have severe PTSD…A couple of years after I got out I met my wife. She is an Iraqi Lady and has helped me through the best and worst times. She's given me beautiful children and a reason to carry on. However…her parents moved from Iraq before she was born. Every time I go to her parents house or there is a wedding on her side of the family I attend whilst suffering in silence. Sweaty palms, heart palpitations, shredding feeling where my leg was etc. It drove me to be extremely disrespectful by secretly carrying a hip flask with spirits and cocaine in as it just took the edge off and made it all manageable. Her parents are extremely religious and alcohol and drugs of any kind are heavily frowned upon and banned from the house. The worst is going to her parents house as so much of the decorations reminds me of the house I got dragged into after stepping on an IED. I keep this hidden because what can I do? Make her choose between family and me? Absolutely not. Prevent my kids from having grandparents and extended family? Absolutely not. My mental health and my foolish decisions at 16 are not going to be any form of potential wedge." —Greenlid_42

"That I sometimes buy $20 scratchers when I do the shopping and occasionally throw $60 at large Powerball/MegaMillions jackpots even tho I publicly say 'lotteries are a tax on people who are bad at math.' I do this because I like to dream of a day we don’t have to work and we can follow our passions." —wembley

"The fact that she wont let me put any of my hobby stuff (mostly miniatures and random knickknacks) in our shared spaces without it being in an approved location, meanwhile the entire house is her canvas for her aesthetic. Makes me feel really lonely and small sometimes and like she doesn't care. It's been a topic of conversation, she just doesn't get that delegating me a tiny shelf in her curio isn't the same as letting me actually decorate some." —Kimblethedwarf

“That she is bad at taking criticism, even about the most minor of things. And even saying so is itself a form of criticism she cannot handle. And this has very much hindered our ability to talk to each other.” —Aechzen

"I keep my regrets from her. I worry she’ll think less of me if she knew all my past mistakes." —Suspicious-Factor362

“Literally anything that isn't within the realm of her personal interests. Otherwise, she makes it clear that she's not really interested in what interests me. Sometimes I do, because I can't keep everything to myself forever, but it just feels like I'm a child bothering their parents talking about how cool their toys are.” —ChefBillyGoat

man, lonely, alone, communication, spouse, secretsFeeling lonely in a shared home. Image via Canva.

“I’m scared of not being able to provide a half decent life for her and my kids. Life’s getting so expensive and challenging.” —Arent_they_all

"Sometimes, the food she cooks isn't great. I will never tell her this because she goes out of her way to cook, and I'm not ungrateful. I can live with bad food that night over her getting upset." —CaptainAwesome0912

"That if I speak to her the same way she speaks to me she would probably spend her whole day in tears. It’s definitely a case of “familiarity breeds contempt” as she does not speak to any of her friends like this (who come over to help with furniture moving, for example), and occasionally it comes out with her family, but the unfettered torrent of complaints and abuse is reserved only for me, regardless of what I do. It’s like she looks for imperfections and mistakes just to point them out." —MusicusTitanicus

“How sad I am that my life isn't a grand adventure but a series of choices i made in order to be able to form and provide for a family…I know there's adventure and excitement to be had still, but I wanted to continue my family line. And dearly love my family. Anything available in that vein will come at cost to my wife and children. So I'm stuck playing rise through the ranks, build the better mouse trap and look good to the suites for another raise or step up the ladder. It's going well, but as it goes well it feels more hollow. I could become head honcho, or start my own enterprise and find massive success, it'd still all been to just provide. Collecting wealth is such a boring pursuit, I hate our society.” —BodyRevolutionary167

wealth, work, corporate, working, gaining wealth, statusBored Season 5 GIF by The OfficeGiphy

"I let the kids play Roblox beyond their allowed time." —chelhydra

"She's always in the way. If she's in the kitchen when I'm cooking, she's always standing in front of the next place I need to be. If I'm working outside, she's always in the next place I'm going to go. If I'm fixing something, she's always standing right in front of whatever I'm going to be working on next. If I'm trying to leave a room, she's always in the doorway. I realize she wants to spend time with me, but I really wish she'd just get out of the way when I'm doing something." —Lonecoon

"That when I’m not with her, I put ketchup on my hot dogs." —bipolarcyclops

The secrets shared here range from benign to heavy, silly to heartbreaking. Though it may be hard, studies do show that open, honest communication is vital to building a healthy relationship or marriage. In her 2021 TEDxTalk, award-winning communication strategist Sandy Gerber broke down how open, honest communication can lead to successful romantic relationships without secrets. Watch:

- YouTubewww.youtube.com


This article originally appeared last year.

Parenting

Mom's adorable 1993 baby picture is a modern pediatrician's worst nightmare

Our parents were really doing their best with the information they had.

Canva Photos

Blanket, pillows, and toys in cribs used to be totally normal back in 1993.

I love learning about common parenting techniques from generations past. We've probably all heard some of the classics, like giving baby a tiny bit of alcohol to get him to sleep, or rubbing whiskey on sore gums to soothe a teething infant. (Upon reflection, it seems that a lot of parenting hacks back in the day boiled down to giving children liquor). These weren't hush-hush under the table tactics. Doctors frequently recommended these things to new parents. Now, of course, we're horrified at the thought and we know the significant risks of alcohol exposure both in the womb and out of it.

Crib set ups are similar. Decades ago, parents were hyper-worried about baby's limbs getting caught in the crib bars, so the solution was to line cribs with thick, soft bumpers. Inside the cribs, pillows and blankets kept baby comfortable and from rolling around too much. It made sense! At the time at least. But, wow, have times changed.

One mom is going viral for posting a fascinating side by side. Her as a baby in 1993, sleeping peacefully in a crib, versus her daughter in 2025.


babies, parenting, motherhood, fatherhood, pediatricians, newborn safety, SIDSThis was basically parenting in the 1960sGiphy

The comparison is definitely illuminating.

In 1993, there's millennial mom Alanna Clark, sleeping comfortably on her back in her pajamas. She's surrounded by a cocoon of comfort. The key thing to note is the fluffy crib bumpers to keep her from reaching through the bars. Bumpers were meant to add decoration and comfort to a baby's crib while also keeping them from getting injured by the bars. This was especially true back when drop-cribs, or cribs where one wall could drop down, were popular. The American Academy of Pediatrics officially began recommending parents never use crib bumpers in 2011 due to their being a suffocation risk highly associated with SIDS.

The photo of Clark's daughter from 2025 is striking. Her crib is completely empty! She's sleeping on her back with a fitted sheet on the mattress and a snugly-fitted sleepsack containing her legs. That's it. There are no bumpers, toys, pillows, or blankets according to the latest pediatrician guidelines.

As a bonus, Clark shared a picture of herself riding in a (rather flimsy looking) front-facing car seat while her daughter in 2025 rides in a rear-facing "tank," as she calls it, which fits current standards.

Clark's caption captured a beautiful sentiment about the "outdated" standards. Instead of judging her parents for dangerous choices, she understands that they were doing their absolute best with the information they had at the time:

"When I explained modern sleep practices to my dad, he explained to me that the bumpers were to keep me safe from breaking an arm or a leg. I’m glad that when my family talks about the 'new' way of doing things we focus on how much more information we have to keep babies safe. Anyways, enjoy these little snippets of me as a baby with my parents doing what they were told was best. I wonder what practices will be outdated when I’m a grandma one day"

See the fascinating photos here.


tiktok, babies, 1993, 2025 , parentingTikTok · Alanna | First Time Mom 🇨🇦www.tiktok.com

Clark's post went viral and commenters were so appreciative of how infant safety standards have improved. They were also grateful to previous generations for trying their best:

"yep, and hopefully our kids have even better info and technology when they raise their children."

"Doing their best back then, so we can keep doing better today!!"

"I love your take on this rather than bashing practices of the time which genuinely were what they thought was best"

"It's reassuring knowing that our kids will look at their baby pictures in the future like 'We're you trying to kill me?' and proceed to do differently, as will be best practice then"

"I was trying to explain to someone the other day that our kids are going to say they can’t believe our recommendations were legal it will have changed so much"

Others shared some of their favorite parenting methods from their own parents and grandparents. One commenter wrote that her grandma would put her babies in dresser drawers to keep them safe. Another said her grandpa "didn't believe" in car seats! Somehow, they both lived to tell the tale.

Are there things we're doing with our babies now that will one day be viewed as Hard Nos?


babies, parents, moms, dads, infants, newborns, safety, infant safety, parentingThis baby has nothing in his pack 'n play at all. Well done parents! Photo by Alex Bodini on Unsplash

Again, you have to remember that doctors, pediatricians, and fellow parents were all telling the older generations that this stuff was not just OK, but highly recommended. They really believed those death-trap crib bumpers were safe! You can't help but wonder what kinds of things parents today take for granted as safe, that our kids will look back on one day as reckless and dangerous when it's studied further.

"I'm 100% convinced that 'cry it out' will be the thing that future generations are appalled by," one commenter opined, referring to a controversial method of sleep training infants.

Another user joked that in a few decades, babies will sleep levitating in mid-air via magnets to avoid contact with potential hazards.

Me, I think it's likely that the next generation of parents will be appalled that they were ever allowed to watch cartoons or use a screen, as more research into screentime begins to take shape. I also wouldn't be surprised if pediatricians decide we can't be trusted to make our own baby food at home anymore. But these are just guesses. We won't really know until the science rolls in.

Overall, there's a powerful message here for parents and even those grandparents who might insist on being defensive about the older ways:

"What some grandparents don’t understand is that following modern standards is NOT a condemnation of their parenting," one commenter wrote. "They did what was best according to contemporary standards too." That's all any of us can do.