It’s a Friday night after an especially crazy week spent trying unsuccessfully to balance work, kids, committees, extended family, our spouse — you know, the typical week for many, many women out there. So what do we want to do tonight?  Get out of the house for a few hours!  Find an escape.  Spend some time with our girlfriends. We want some wine, or margaritas, or martinis. We want to vent our frustrations and complain about our kids and our husbands and our bosses and our mothers. It’s a fun way to end the week.  Laughing and having a good time with our friends - friends who understand exactly what we are going through.  

So why do we complain?  Because it feels good.  We are looking for catharsis, to vent our frustrations and release the pent-up emotions that have been building in us all week.  It also makes us feel like we aren’t alone in our stress, anxiety or unhappiness.  We complain to our friends to make sure we are not the only ones who feel this way.  We want to hear that we aren’t crazy.  We want validation in our feelings.  We want our friends to join us by sharing how difficult their toddler is to get to bed every night.  We want to know that they also secretly want to quit their jobs.  We want to know that they also feel the “mom guilt” when they have to miss a soccer game or dance recital.  We want company in our struggles.  

We also want to try out solutions and problem-solve.  Our friends might be able to help us figure out a problem.  We share our struggle because we trust our besties and value their advice. They know us well and can help us see a logical way forward.  When we go home at the end of our Friday night with the girls we feel better.  We have some new ideas to try.  We don’t feel so alone in our complaints.  We feel refreshed and ready to head into the weekend unburdened.

But did you ever have that one friend (or maybe it’s you) who takes the complaining a little too far?    She dominates the Friday night “fun” night out with constant negativity without truly listening to anyone else’s comments or suggestions.  She always tries to one-up everyone’s story with an even bigger one, “oh yeah, you think that’s bad, let me tell you about my . . . “  She even brings it out of the Friday night gathering and calls you on a Wednesday to complain about how hard she is working to balance it all, and that no one in her family helps her do anything.  She might also reject any suggestions or advice on how to make it better, by commenting “yes, but . . . “  She might not really want to solve her problem, but might be simply looking for sympathy or attention. She’s circling in a complaint loop and can’t figure a way forward.

How can you tell if your friend (or you) has gotten stuck in a complaint loop  and can’t get out?  Licensed psychotherapist, Whitney Goodman, in her book Toxic Positivity gives these signs that your friend (or you) is stuck:

• Repeating the same problems over again like a broken record.

• Feeling stuck.

• Very black and white thinking with no room for gray, using words like always, never, or can’t.

• Friends are tired of hearing the same thing over and over again.  They roll their eyes and become annoyed.

• Not feeling better after you’ve complained.

• Unable to break free.  It cycles through your comments (and thoughts) on repeat.

Complaining on its own isn’t a “bad” thing.  It’s when you feel out of control that it becomes something you might want to address.  Trying to deny your true feelings and the reasons for your complaints is not the way to go either.  It won’t work.  So what can you do?  For starters, begin by identifying what the true problem is and why you are complaining.  Are you truly trying to solve the problem, or are you simply seeking sympathy and attention?  If you truly want to solve the problem, choose an audience that can support you and make sure you are open to solutions.  If you have burned out your friends at this point, maybe enlist the help of a life coach or therapist to help you see a way forward – they will be less likely to simply tell you what you want to hear.  Journaling is another strategy to help release you from the complaint loop.  Simply writing down your complaints will help get them out of your head so you can see them more clearly.  You could then reframe them into something more constructive and brainstorm solutions.  

It’s important to understand that everything is not black and white.  Know that you are not a horrible person for complaining and having negative thoughts about your life.  You can love your kids unconditionally AND be frustrated that they leave dirty dishes on their bedroom floor.  You can be grateful for your career AND still want more or wish you could stay home.  Sharing all of it with our friends on a Friday night is healthy.  As friends we want to support one another and help each other through life.  Support that friend who seems to be stuck, and be aware of the signs of struggle in yourself.