Do you avoid drama? Do you seek it out? Are you a drama queen? Who's the emotional vampire in your life?

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

Answers

I used to try and "take people as they came" and be all peace-and-love about it. Then I took a few steps back and realized that some folks were just sucking the life out of me and there was no potential for joy in those relationships. So *snip* I cut them out.

FYI - A pretty quick way to get yourself cut out of my life is to have a screaming hysterical fit in my presence over something inconsequential I did, like using too many towels. Yeah, maybe it was annoying but it did not merit a verbal ass-chewing. Buh-bye!

I, too, am a bubble girl these days. Nice, calm, consistent folks get to come into the bubble and hang out, but all of the drama freaks have to find somewhere else to play their reindeer games.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

I hate it. I flee from it. I run screaming in the other direction and hide.

Seriously, though, I do my best to avoid it. I've cut the emotional vampires out of my life as I've discovered them, stayed away from situations and people that I've finally learned to spot as drama magnets, and spent most of my time with fairly low-key people. It's been REALLY nice. I'm definitely not a drama queen, by any stretch of the imagination, to the point of avoiding dating or relationships to keep my mellow existence just that - relaxed and mellow.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

My mom isn't exactly a drama queen, but something is always wrong with her. She's always miserable, she hates her life, she hates her job, she hates everything. Nothing makes her happy, ever. I must call her at least once a week. If I go 4 or 5 days without calling her, she will call me and ask if I am angry at her. If I manage to avoid her calls for over a week...well, I can forget having any sort of normal conversation when we do talk. It will be all about how I am so mean, ungrateful, inconsiderate, etc.

One time my husband and I decided not to visit her for Easter. (This is when she lived about 1 1/2 hrs away from us.) She had a screaming fit at me on the phone about what a horrible daughter I was, etc. (This after three weeks previously, I drove up there every day to take care of her after surgery. When she yelled at me because I bought the wrong brand of paper towels at the grocery store when I did her shopping and I put her towels in the linen closet instead of the bathroom after doing her laundry.)

Sorry - that still makes me so angry when I think about it!

My husband doesn't understand why I just don't cut her off, or at least not call her so often. I just don't want the confrontation. And the latest joyous news? She's moving back to the area. Yippee.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

Avoid it. Used to seek it out. Made me miserable - but at the ripe old age of 31, I think I've finally kicked the habit. My boyfriends have been my emotional vampires (saying things like "If you would just agree to change and be a nicer person, our relationship would be fine." Swear.) I liked difficulty, glamour, intrigue, and lots of alcohol to mix it all up.

Now I am in the bubble-construction phase with my latest, and I believe last, love. For the first time in my life I feel capable of setting boundaries, and helping drama-afflicted friends without losing myself in them or their problems.

I still like drama - always will. But I've learned that the best drama is the kind that, for instance, finds me in Italy on a last-minute trip, because my boyfriend is learning Italian and I could just about swing it, money-wise and other-wise. Drama that adds to life and makes it fun is the only kind I'll have now.

I have a sister somewhat like yours Beth - although not nearly as vicious. Sorry to sound like a polyanna, but try to *not* stop caring. Caring does not mean that you agree to be abused, or even to be "there" for someone. But she is your sister. Try to keep caring and hope that she gets the professional help she so obviously needs, and then if/when she does, you will be there caring when she comes back.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

With all due respect, Lynne, this is the best decision for me, and not something I can really help, anyway. She's not someone I grew up with; she's a half sister who has been in and out of my life and who causes great pain for everyone around her every time she shows up. She's forty-three years old and she is not going to change, because she doesn't want to.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

Oh, I really hate the "You must care *because* s/he is you (insert family member)."

WHY? Why must you care *just* because this person is related by blood? That doesn't give them free rights to trample on your feelings and demand respect without giving it and still have you be there for them.

I think Beth's decision was very smart.

I'm in a similar position to Lynne. I used to love drama. Used to thrive on it, but I'm trying very hard to change that now. My mom is a total drama queen. Always has something to say about everything. Finds tragedy in the most innocent of situations and I strive to be nothing like her when I'm her age.

So, yeah. My bubble is under construction as well.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

The drama queen/emotional vampire in my life is my older brother, with whom I have only a superficial relationship. I cut him out of my life when he didn't come to the service where we spread our brother's ashes. He didn't come because he was trying to get back at Mom for not inviting his girlfriend to dinner. I just can't understand that. He has always created situations that ended up being detrimental to other people. I'm a lot more content now that I don't have to worry about what shit he will attempt to pull next.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

I think "Drama Queen" is just another term for "Pay Attention To Me!" - that kind of all incompassing, it doesn't matter what kind of attention, postive OR negative, as long as the focus is on me, ME, ME sort of behaviour that is only acceptable in very young children, and housepets.

I have a mental checklist when I meet new people...do they have long term friends in their lives, or are all of their friends newly made? Do they seem to learn from their mistakes? Is every headache a brain tumour? Is every twinge and ache a serious medical problem? Do they start conversations with the phrase, "Oh my GOD, you will not believe what just happened to me?", are they able to see that everything that happens doesn't automatically relate to them, do they carry grudges?

I have no patience for these people. None. I used to never be able to get why people would behave this way, and I still don't, really. I cannot for the life of me understand why anyone would voluntarily describe themselves as a drama queen, or want to be one - why not just get a t-shirt made up that proclaims, "I am an Emotional Cripple, and I am PROUD of it!".

I avoid drama like the plague. I don't want to be involved, I don't want to hear about it, or know about it, or waste my time with it. Drama isn't crisis - I will always be there for a friend who hit a downturn, or a crisis, or a rough patch, but I won't waste the energy on people who thrive on the attention a crisis gains them, or who put themselves deliberately into situations that become crises, for attention.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

The way I see it is I am a drama queen in my own head. I blow up enough superficial stuff in my own head as ultra-important and meaningful, both good and bad. When I have a problem, I mull over it constantly. But quietly. I would have to shoot myself if anyone actually heard me speak the words I think to myself. I realize I am a wee bit psycho.

That said, I occasionally freak out an have a moment or two of drama queen-ness to my partner, who has learned when they are coming. That's ok, I get to tolerate his blood sugar level.

At this point, its getting hard for me to handle reading about artists who feel they have lives full of drama. I love the idea of artistic torment but the truth is, I like it in teeny tiny bursts in the pages of the new york times.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

I don't have any particularly dramatic people in my life (my real life, that is, not my internet life), but I just had to post to say that reading the phrase "post dramatic stress disorder" made me groan out loud.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

If I can touch just one person with each bad pun, then my work here is done.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

I think "club" is the more appropriate verb for the situation, and I think you were admirably and resoundingly successful in your quest. Yay, puns!

As for dramadrama, I tend to be, as jen bombpop up there mentioned, crazy in my own head. Sometimes - not always, but sometimes - things can get blown out of proportion and there is heart-rending, soul- ripping agony and pain and ache and misery and I may as well go cram my head into the electric oven and wait for something to catch on fire.

However, I would rather be hung naked outside the DMV in Newark than ever, ever let anyone see me lose my mind like that. I try very hard to suffer the slings and arrows of my own stoopidity in silence, and try very hard not to be the happiness-sucking demon in any one's life, or a martyr.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

Avoid it like the plague. I didn't used to, and it played hell on my emotions and eventually my physical health. I refuse to play the games now. They can't involve you if you refuse to participate. I feel like you, Beth, living in a bubble, but at least any stress I have is of my own making.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

It can be amusing to watch from a safe distance, but it's hard to be emotionally close to someone for whom every minor glitch is a major crisis. I had a former boss like that, and (in the context of my interaction with her anyway) the drama was about work-related or office-politics matters rather than strictly personal.
It was especially obvious when she thought her authority was being challenged, which all of us on her staff were tempted to do daily because she was clueless. When I worked for her, I was constantly anxious and on edge, because I never knew when she'd go off next, or on which one of us on her staff, just that it was as certain as sunrise that she would. Now that I'm long gone from that place, I hear second-hand stories from people still there and just laugh.

-- Anonymous, June 25, 2001

I'm not a drama queen but I am definitely an emotional vampire. I try very hard not to be but I am. I have Asperger's Syndrome or high-functioning autism. I have no friends and very little contact with my family. Partly because they find me too difficult to deal with, partly because I cannot bear to be such a drain on them. I genuinely cannot change the way I am. No one wants to put up with a difficult person but I don't have a choice. I have to live with myself.

-- Anonymous, June 26, 2001

I used to be quite a drama queen, but I take antidepressants now and react to things very differently.

But I still enjoy drama. I don't find that drama queens or anyone have a vampire effect on me. I follow along with the drama till it gets boring (it always does) then I just lose interest. Luckily, none of my close friends conduct their lives this way.

There were people in my family with whom we had no contact, because of reasons like alcoholism, retardation, or flakiness. I guess it's because it's the way I grew up, but it makes total sense to me. I try to keep people I don't like out of my life and the fact that they're related to me makes no difference.

My husband has an obnoxious and stupid brother and I can't fathom why he stays in contact with him. Luckily he lives out of state so the issue rarely comes up. Not my problem, anyway.

-- Anonymous, June 26, 2001

I think it was Brett Butler who said, to a friend who had a tendency to turning small things into big dramas, "Call me when [your husband] is beating you up and fucking your sister", and that's becoming my stance.

When I see-- as I did this weekend-- a woman in the shelter who is 21 years old, 3 months pregnant, and has been off meth for 2 weeks... well. Listening to yet another verse of the I'm So Mistreated Blues grates something fierce.

-- Anonymous, June 26, 2001