If You Care About Someone… Show Your Work

Your Social Meme isn’t cutting it.

I used to cry when I watched TikTok.

It was from videos where people talk to the watcher to tell them it’s okay, support them, and are there for them, that people care. Videos that are supposed to be inspiring and help people not feel alone.

However, things become hollow and sounding insincere when you see it repeated over and over on social media as people pay lip service to the faceless masses.

We need to know you see our face. So I’ve been telling people that I need people to show their work when they say people care about me. I read a tweet about this issue and feeling alone in general. How people say they are friends, but it doesn’t feel like it?

I’ve been thinking about the topic for a long time. There are people I know that I only hear from then when I put the effort in. I can think of people in my past, who I still love, that our relationships started with an equal back and forth. However, that shifted to me putting all the effort in until I stopped.

The spotlight is brighter due to the mixture of COVID and mental issues.

COVID (and it’s variants) made people isolated and many are still recovering from that isolation. If it wasn’t bad enough, it worsens for men who already have issues talking about their emotions and feelings.

Add to that issues that one may have with depression, bipolar disorder, PTSD, ADHD (and its lovely additions of rejection sensitive dysphoria, and emotional and object permanence). You wind up drinking a toxic loneliness cocktail that can be fatal if you imbibe too much.

So I look at things like this now and say, “show your work.”

“People care about you.” Show your work.

“People will miss you.” Show your work.

“I will miss you, I care” is usually from someone who has shown their work in the past but hasn’t done it recently. They usually don’t understand emotional permanence. It’s less a show of your work situation than politely showing the lack of recent involvement and current work.

My love language is not words of affirmation. In fact, I don’t think words of affirmation should be a love language. It should be in addition to everything else. Yes, you give an act of service, but also, when that act of service is done or is being done, let them know that you care. If a love language is touch, let them know with words along with the hug. With mental disabilities, sometimes you need to double down.

I’m lucky. If I got kidnapped by aliens trying to get me to visit my real father out in space, I have one person that I know would start trying to track me down if she hadn’t heard from me in a couple of days. The woman who we both call each other our sib from another crib, who I will list as the Notorious DRP. We usually have weekly video chats to talk about life and writing. Before I moved, I would visit for holidays as they are just a train ride away.

That being said, I hope I give as much as I get out of it. I care about my friend-sib’s ongoings in life as much as she points out when I’m being an absolute dick in my writing courses. We have valuable debates about marketing as a writer like SEO and book covers and the issues with being a writer. We’ve chosen each other as family, so I know I have one person.

What sucks is when you put energy into someone, and they only respond when you put energy into them. These friends will respond back only when you show your own work to them. If you stop putting energy, they don’t put it back.

So if someone tells me they care, I stop and see if I can determine that they do or not. It’s easy to tell someone you care when voicing your displeasure. Still, it falls on deaf ears if you haven’t done anything before or after, on your own, without prodding, without it being a response to an action.

Think about people that you care about. How do you show your work? What do you do to let the individual know you care?

It may be as simple as just sending a meme in private because you thought of them and explaining why. It could be more complicated than that. Sure, retweets, liked posts, and shares are nice, but it’s the equivalent of lip service.

(Quote retweets differ from regular retweets as you’re paying attention. You have things to add or show support beyond spamming a button, as frequent retweets can be turned off.)

People think they show their work by posting what sometimes feels like “guilt” memes — You’ve seen them.

I bet 5 people won’t post this suicide hotline number on their newsfeed.

You’re probably too afraid to show your support for (blank) by reposting this.

Before you hurt yourself, talk to me. I care about you! I’m there whenever you need to talk! Time is not a factor!

Many people I know have talked about these public displays and see that they may never have spoken with the person in private before, so it’s not about them.

I’m not saying a random thought that letting the masses know that somebody cares for them is wrong.

However, I’ve never heard of someone who stopped doing something terrible for themselves because of a guilt meme.

But maybe before you do, take time to individually, one on one, let the people you care about know, and not in response to something else.

People need to know that they aren’t face blind to you. That they are individuals. It is even more important to show your work in an age where people are even lonelier because they don’t have people around them because of pandemic spikes.

Investing in people, working with people, showing people individually that you care about them is fucking brutal and can drain people. However, individual attention is meaningful if you genuinely care about someone. It goes both ways, but mental illness can be a charismatically persistent lying fucker.

So show up and work… or people will just think you quit and finally quit on you too.

If you are feeling like you want to swallow down that toxic loneliness cocktail, please consider calling the suicide prevention hotline in your country.

Maybe afterward, put some work in yourself by letting people know, individually, what you are going through that they can’t see. They might just need a push to put their own work in…, or you can close the chapter with the lack of response.