The Other Side of Nice

Author: loriday1974

  • “Because I Said So” Isn’t an Answer

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    I grew up in a time when parents weren’t expected to apologize to their children. Adults were adults.Kids were kids.Questioning authority usually wasn’t encouraged. If a parent lost their temper, made a mistake, or handled something poorly, the expectation was often that everyone would simply move on. As I reflect back on that, I don’t…

  • Lucky Girl Syndrome

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    I’ve said before that how you talk to yourself matters. Your inner dialogue shapes more than you realize. Lucky girl syndrome is kind of the same thing but different, if that makes any sense.  I stumbled across this new phenomenon on TikTok over the past year and it isn’t something I just came to understand……

  • Why repeat it?

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    Have you ever had someone tell you something that another person supposedly said about you, and the whole thing felt… unnecessary? Like, thanks, but that was not helpful, not constructive, and quite frankly, just hurtful. Often they’ll say  “I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but…” Or “I thought you should know what they said about…

  • Missing a Time, Not a Place

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    When my kids were little, I spent a lot of time looking ahead. Like most parents, I thought life would get easier as they got older. I imagined a time when they would be independent, successful, and building lives of their own. I pictured family dinners without homework battles, less financial stress, and more freedom…

  • In the end, it doesn’t matter

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    A friend of mine lost her ex-husband recently. That sentence sounds simple enough, but their story wasn’t. Like many couples who have spent any amount of time together, they had a history. The kind that couldn’t be summed up in a sentence or two. There had been love, dreams and memories once upon a time.…

  • When nothing gets resolved

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    I think most of us have experienced a blow-up with someone we love—a moment that could have led to resolution, or at least an honest conversation… and then nothing. The tension fades, the topic gets dropped, and life quietly goes back to normal.It’s almost like there’s an unspoken agreement to pretend it never happened. But…

  • A Psychic Told Me to Throw Rocks

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    A week ago, I booked a reiki session that quickly turned to a psychic reading. Now, before you roll your eyes or assume I’ve gone completely off the deep end, hear me out. I’ve always been fascinated by the idea that sometimes people can see things differently than we do. Whether that’s intuition, energy, life…

  • The Cat Didn’t Second-Guess Anything

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    Recently, my daughter’s boyfriend sent her a picture of the most beautiful little furball. She showed up on the steps of the cottage he’s staying at and helped herself to his lobster fishing gear like she had an open invitation. Make no mistake, this was no stray cat. We’re assuming it’s a female, she was…

  • The Noise Isn’t the Destination

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    “You will never reach your destination if you stop and throw stones at every barking dog.” — Winston Churchill I read this quote recently and found it profoundly interesting, it hits a little harder when you’ve lived long enough to know exactly what those “barking dogs” sound like. They aren’t always the obvious critics or…

  • The Quiet Strength of Resilience

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    If you had asked me years ago what resilience meant, I probably would have given you a textbook answer; something about bouncing back after hardships. But life has a way of teaching us lessons in the most personal ways. For me, resilience has become less about “bouncing back” and more about finding a way through.…

  • Waiting for the Bus: Recognizing Codependency and Choosing to Walk

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    My therapist once gave me a simple image that stuck: You’re standing at a bus stop, waiting to get somewhere you really need to go. The problem? The bus isn’t coming, who knows, maybe it’s delayed; it might come…eventually. So, you stand there. Waiting. Watching. Hoping. You don’t actually need the bus; you can walk.…

  • Under a full moon, a simple reminder

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    There’s something about a full moon that makes me pause. Whether you believe in the energy behind it or not, you have to admit—things just feel different. This past Friday night, with the full moon in Scorpio hanging quietly overhead, my daughter Jordyn and I found ourselves on FaceTime. She’s a night owl, and I’m…

  • Has Worrying Ever Changed the Outcome?

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    Has Worrying Ever Changed the Outcome? I used to worry myself sick about everything. It wasn’t until I started therapy—after one long session where I poured out all my fears about my dad’s cancer and watching my kids struggle through different stages of life—that something shifted. My therapist paused, then asked me a simple question:…

  • The World Feels Like a Dumpster Fire — Here’s How to Take Care of Yourself Anyway

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    It’s hard to ignore it. The constant stream of bad news, division, uncertainty. The feeling that no matter where you look, something is burning — and not in a way that brings light or warmth. It’s exhausting to exist in a world that feels like it’s always on edge. Calling it a “dumpster fire” might…

  • The Quiet Power of Walking Away from Gossip

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    Gossip is one of those things that slips into everyday life so easily we barely notice it happening. It can start as concern, curiosity, or even connection but in the mix of all of that, it often turns into something heavier. Something that doesn’t sit quite right. I’ve been on both sides of it. I’ve…

  • Proof that hard seasons end

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    There’s a morning every spring where I get up for my daily walk and there’s a noticeable difference in the air, today was that day.  There is usually still snow piled along the driveway, although most of it has melted here on the east coast where I live. Mornings still bite a little when you…

  • Your Body Remembers What Your Mind Tries to Forget

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    We like to think that when something bad happens, we can just “move on.” We tell ourselves, it’s in the past, I was overreacting, or I shouldn’t feel this way. But in reality, your body remembers. Even if your mind tries to reason it away, even if you tell yourself it “wasn’t that big of…

  • You Are Not Everyone’s Emotional Lifeboat — Let Them Learn to Swim

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    Depending on where you are in your own healing journey, you may or may not realize that you’ve spent a lifetime treading water for everyone else. Whether that means you were the one who stayed calm in chaos, or listened without interrupting when a friend or family member needed to vent, or maybe you’ve just…

  • The Woman I Raised Is Teaching Me How to Be One

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    When I was growing up, being a “good woman” meant being agreeable. It meant keeping the peace and not making things awkward. There was an unwritten expectation to smooth things over when someone else made a mess and to carry more than your share all the while calling it love. The word no didn’t come…

  • The Overburdened Woman

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    If you’ve ever felt like you’re constantly running on empty — juggling work, caregiving, friendships, appointments, emotions — and still feeling like you’re not doing enough… you’re not imagining it. I once heard Elizabeth Gilbert say: “Nearly all the women I know are stressing themselves sick over the pathological fear that they simply aren’t doing…