Many of us have been hurt by the words of so called friends since losing our loves. I've been hurt by the words of my father. This Saturday I ended up in ER because of his constant hateful words to me. Than I had the week that changed me. I posted about that, but today I had another ephiphany and wanted to pass this alone.

My doctor told me point blank either I get rid of the stress or I end up back in ER, maybe with something worse. I'd told her about my hateful father. Well, the battle continues with a difference. Again he called to scream at me. But this time I had a plan. This is what I did:

I put the phone down on the table and got on my stationary bike and biked while he shouted and screamed. No. I did not have him on speaker. And he never noticed. I merely picked up the phone every five minutes and said, mmm, mmm. Then I sat the phone back down. According to my bike I did 25 minutes. He never noticed. At the end I said, well, I've got to cook something so I'll talk to you later. He sounded happy like he'd told me off. I sounded happy because I didn't hear any of it.

All and all one of the best conversations I ever had.

So for all of you that have difficult people in your life. Put the phone down and relax. You don't have to excercise. You can read. I did that too, studying a few lines of Spanish. And I feel great.

Why didn't I think of that before? Duh!