WORDS ARE LABELS

Labels are given us in many ways. We have a first name, possibly a middle name or more, and a last name usually taken from our 'family' name. Some are ethnic or racial labels that follow one where biases predominate. With multiple marriages, adoptions of some but not all step-children, names within a family unit may be different, as when a wife chooses to keep her maiden name.

Labels are also diagnostic, often misused. People are called paranoid, mental, schizo, and many other names in an attempt to be descriptive, rather than clinical. The worst of them, though, are the pejorative terms used when someone is actually suffering from an illness. In my experience, families struggle with the only language they know. When someone is unable to help with the chores (though they may be severely clinically depressed) they are given labels like 'lazy', 'selfish', 'into themselves' and similar descriptions of behaviors out of a context that might make the behavior acceptable or understandable.

'Unfaithful' is often used when, in fact, a person has never committed to another so that no promise of faithfulness was actually given. This person rarely feels they have violated anything important because they feel that it was never an agreement in the first place. 'Ungiving' is often another pejorative term. It implies selfishness and retentiveness. Often a contract of cooperation was never discussed or roles never spelled out. This, then, leaves partners operating under a totally separate and different set of rules.

'Controlling' is another often misused label. One should always control themselves and be in control of their boundaries. Yet the term implies someone who knows no boundaries and wants to control others. It does not take into consideration that one who is insecure or feeling overwhelmed and out of control of their life may try to maintain some order by trying to control some aspects within their existence. Those with OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) may find their symptoms potentiated when feeling their world is collapsing around them. Terms are used to manipulate others. By calling someone a name like 'controlling', one might cause the person to allow anything to shed the label.

One's boundaries should start with themselves first; their body, privacy, safety and such. One without boundaries who is near you may have you feeling as though you perpetually live in a college dormitory. To the degree that one is somewhat territorial of sound, space, material possessions, clothing, money or whatever, intrusions that violate boundaries can make life fairly grim.

So when one shouts 'sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me', that is not often true. Names and labels can be extremely hurtful, shake self-esteem, shake self-confidence, and make one doubt intelligence, creativity, and their own abilities. We know this more as 'emotional abuse'.

People tend to take words too loosely. Words are weapons or comforts, depending on who is using them, with what intent and what the words are..