I am back, after a long Hiatus. I never do seem to be able to stick to these things. Anyway I'm trying.

So today my sister and I got into a huge argument? She says it was a "conversation" to me it sounded more like an argument since, she started throwing insults my way and ended up hanging up the phone on me. Yea my sis is 6 years younger than me. But she is very smart and very interesting to have conversations with. The only thing is that she can act like a little know it all. I think she has reached some kind of "enlightened" stage in her life and she is now trying to spread this to other people. Or she thinks people need to think the way she does. I don't know.

It is very interesting and it got pretty heated but now that it's over I want to it back and evaluate what exactly happened so I can really understand what went on. Was a wrong in any of the things I said how can I change my behavior, what would I do differently if presented with the same situation.

How it started, and I notice my sister likes to do this a lot, when you are talking to her she likes to disagree with certain points I you make. Now sometimes I can see this as her begin a little arrogant. But perhaps like she said, she is just trying to have a conversation. I think I get a little defensive when she does this. Next time I will take a step back, think about what she said and then present my side, or opinion. But to be honest I think I did get defensive which may have been part of the reason the argument escalated as it did.

Anyway it started off with us talking about Bernie Mac and how he died ( I recently watched soul men) and she made the statement that he didn't look like he was 50. My sister stated that our mother doesn't look her age either. Anyway somehow this got to us talking about how people feel about themselves when we look in the mirror. Oh yea she said she doesn't think people should lose weight just for vanity reason. And I said, "well I don't see anything wrong with losing weight if you don't like how you look in the mirror. Why not? "
"Health is a better reason to loose weight". she says.
And I go "Yea but still if you feel fine with the way you look and you are overweight there is nothing wrong with that." I wasn't really talking about health since we were talking about appearances in the first place.

So somehow we got on the topic of plastic surgery, I think I brought it up. I made a statement, somewhere along the lines of "Those doctors like the ones on the TV show Doctor 90210, are bad doctors for treating people who have psychological issues, and don't need plastic surgery the need therapy." I gave the example of the couple who came on , the woman was like a size zero literally and wanted to get some extra love handles removed. And I said that was crazy she looked fine. To me it reminds me of people who are anorexic and can be skin and bones but still look in the mirror and say they are fat. My opinion is that a good doctor would not perform surgery on that type of person they would at least send them for psychological evaluation first.

For some reason she decided to argue with me on that and say, "Oh how can you know that...your wrong" And I said I'm sorry but as a doctor it is your duty to help people with their health and if you are using your skills soley for the purpose of making money, that is wrong.

But she went on to disagree and say that I cant know if those people are bad doctors because I don't know them and I have never gone and spoken to them in person. Then I said I was making and educated guess from my observations. Apparently she felt it was wrong that I use the word "educated guess" because when you make and educated guess you must have legitimate sources from which you are making this guess. And then I laughed.

Now I will give you the reason that I laughed, because she was getting into semantics. We are having a silly discussion about something that has no bearing on anything. I mean I am not planning to publish this in JAMA or something. So I laughed partly to show that I am keeping this light, (not taking it too seriously) and at the situation because now, on top of her telling me I was wrong about what I thought about the doctors, now she's telling me I don't know what an educated guess means. Honestly I thought it was funny.

So then I told her that she was getting into semantics , obviously I meant an assumption made from my observations. Oh don't remember what else I said but I do remember her at that point telling me that I sounded like an idiot. Now here is where I got a little upset. I mean she takes everything so personally. Later on she told me she felt I had insulted her by laughing. She didn't even know why I laughed but she said it was an insult because I was laughing at her. This is where I have to realise that yes my sister is smart but she is still very sensitive and childish in many ways. She believes she is right about everything, thought she won't say it and that everyone she view things the way she does.

We ended up calling my mother and getting her into the conversation. I just wanted my sister to understand where I was coming from. My mother of course agreed with me, and said that those doctor's that use there skills to make money off of people's insecurities and body image issues are unethical. But my sister kept arguing that "No we don't know what those doctor's think. They could really think that they are helping people."

Now looking back on it I think my sister was generalizing my statements on these type of doctors, to my opinions on all different types of people. Later on she told me that I was being closed-minded. And she kept trying to apply my statement about bad cosmetic surgeons to other people.

For example she said" people who commit civil disobedience are bad people" I told her I never said that.

So I think I know what was happening but I'm not sure. She believes that I am a closed minded person from my statements and she was trying to "show me" as she said that I don't know everything and that I can view things from a different point of view. She said she was trying to get me to admit that I could be wrong and that my opinion is not the only point that could exist. Now if that is honestly what she was trying to do, that's not really a bad thing. It was how she went about doing it. To me it felt like she was attacking me, and trying to tell me basically, that "You don't know what you are talking about".

See what I don't get is why she took this opportunity to do it. I am no idiot or fool. I know that there are different ways to think about things. What happened was I was trying to get her to understand my opinion. When she understood it, she was just trying to get me to say that I could be wrong. So it turned into an argument and her calling me closed minded. And I said maybe I am close-minded about this specific situation, but that doesn't mean I a am close minded person. It just means that I have formed an opinion about this topic and there is really no changing my mind. Now that does not mean that I am not aware of the fact that other possibilities do exist. Like yes, maybe the doctor's on Dr. 90210 use there skills in other ways, maybe there are cosmetic surgeons who truly think they are improving the self image of people by giving them cosmetic surgeons. But I was using those doctors as and example just so she could see what I was talking about. But she turned it into something entirely different, and I went along with it.

I do not like the fact that she wants to critique everything I say, analyze it, turn it into something else, and disagree. Something is weird about that. I am not sure why she does it. It makes it hard to have a pleasant conversation with her. It's like you have to walk on eggshells and be careful what you say. I think of my sister now as my , friend, a very good friend but this behavior makes it hard to talk to her like one. It's like talking to your English professor or something. He He.

If anyone reads this I'd appreciate some opinions on what you think happened.

I mean even when I made the statement about our mother not having the willpower to stick to a diet and exercises plan so that she can loose weight she said..."She has four reasons why she doesn't want to work out". She was talking a bout us, her kids. That was after I had said she works long hours so I understand it's hard. Its kind of scary. I mean if she thinks that our mother having kids has been such a detriment to her life, well then how must she feel about herself. Not very good eh. I told her that no, its not her having kids, she just has to muster up the extra strength to do it and being tired after work isn't really a reason its and excuse. She could do it if she really wanted to.

I guess I just have a more optimistic view on life than she does. She truly is a pessimist.

So the conversation ended up with her hanging up on me. She had said earlier that my opinion was wrong.

I feel better now after talking to my mom. She does that to her and my brother a lot so it's nothing to worry about. I guess from now on I'll just let it go. The only thing is I don't like to be told that I'm wrong either. LOL

So next time I see her getting like that I won't take offense. I have no problem debating with her, It's kinda fun to me too. But I have to remember that she is kind of insecure. Maybe that's where the passion comes from. I really don't know. At the same time though I am her sister, so like my ma said I have to tell her about herself. I wonder if she does it to other people though.

If she was trying to tell me that I was close minded, which I am not, I will keep in mind though that there are other possibilities. That is a good thing to keep in the back of your head when considering any situations. But I do think we should have our own morals and standards that we stick to. You can't be too open minded in other words, or else you get your self into trouble. And that's the moral of the story.


Good night world