How's She Doing?

I have had this post floating in my head for a while. Let's see if it can make it's way out clearly or not...


Sometimes I will go spend time with a friend that is in the midst of a difficult time in her life and if someone knows that I was with that friend, they might ask, "How's she doing?" I find this question interesting.

My first instinct is to say, "Fine."

Why do I say that?

Maybe I say that because I want to protect my friend. Maybe I say that because it will end a conversation that is more of an exercise in fishing for information than anything else. Maybe I say that because I know that the real answer would make the one asking the question very uncomfortable. Maybe I say that because that is what we say in our culture... We're "fine".

Are we really though?

And what is that "asking person's" frame of reference?

If I had just spent a few hours with a friend that cried the entire time, does that mean she is not fine? Or if the entire time that I was with her she stayed composed, does that mean that she is doing well?

I think it could very possibly be the opposite.

At least sometimes.

Perhaps that friend that can fully express her emotions and look grief and pain straight in the eye - as painful as that might be - is, in fact, doing "more fine" than anyone. Maybe in her vulnerability she has found a way to live more healthily than if she were not that way.

Perhaps the friend that has mustered up the will to compose herself is suppressing her hurt and pain, and she is dying to share her burden. Perhaps she is actually weaker than the friend that seems more outwardly so.

And maybe not.

I am not pretending to know anything here. I just think that we all need to be a little more in tune to what our loved ones are feeling.  (though I know that I fail at this all of the time) Anticipate. Assume that they are hurting as badly as we would be in their situation and love them accordingly.

And maybe next time that we ask someone how they are doing and they say "fine"... maybe we should ask them again.