- So I texted him. Listen here, (bleep).
(text message sounds)
(laughs)
- Welcome to Therapist Reacts Raw,
where I react to something
that my producer has picked for me
that I've never seen before.
Today, I am doing...
People Read Their Biggest Fights Through Text Message.
Ow, I could never do this on camera. No, no.
(mischievous music plays)
- [Video] Have you ever gotten into a fight
through text message?
- Yeah. (laughs)
- Sometimes, I...
- If Nate from Euphoria had a baby
with Edward from Twilight, it would be this guy.
That's the look.
Don't feel bad, bro. Those are two good looking men.
They're hella toxic, both of those characters,
but they're good looking, so good for you.
- Yeah, it's, like, a little...
I guess argument between me and my girlfriend.
- She looks like Lady Gaga.
- So she had a show that night. She's a comedian.
I was gonna go to her show, and then sleep over.
You know, classic relationship.
(text message sound)
Oh no, baby. I forgot.
Two of my friends are doing a bday thing
at a bar after the show. (text message sound)
I said, "Guess I don't really get an invite.
It's cool." (text message sound)
She's like, "To what? The bar?
- It's kinda passive aggressive.
- I feel like you wouldn't wanna go
'cause you won't know anyone.
Of course you can come. (text message sounds)
Maybe I'm being sensitive.
But sometimes I feel like
you don't want me to come places with you.
(text message sound) You can flaunt me on Instagram,
and to your friend,
but, like, you never wanna bring me out in places.
Oh my God. I feel like what's wrong with me?
- So this is why it's important to stop and self soothe
before you engage and talk about here's a grievance,
or here's a problem I have.
I guess I didn't get the invite. That's cool.
She gets super passive aggressive,
instead of just saying...
I mean, I do like that she says
it feels like you don't want to invite me places.
But she doesn't give her partner the benefit of the doubt.
Her partner is automatically gonna be on the defensive,
because she's basically saying
you don't want me to come with you.
Healthier way to approach that would be to say, "Hey.
I don't think this is what you're intending,
but I feel excluded," right?
Because then I am giving you the benefit of the doubt
and I'm not accusing you of anything.
I'm just telling you how I feel,
and then you have a chance to, you know,
make things different.
- And when we moved out,
I guess he didn't notice
that he took some of my boxes with him.
I feel like he did that on purpose.
So I texted him, (text message sounds)
"Listen here, (bleep).
I dunno who you think you are,
but I know you have (bleep) my Gucci bags and my LV bag.
Freaking give it back to me or I'm going to choke you."
(laughs)
- Points for directness.
You know, maybe leading with profane insults
and threats of violence...
I mean, I don't know all the details of the relationship.
All I could say is that
if I were with someone who spoke to me like that,
I wouldn't be with them anymore.
So I understand why that relationship didn't make it.
- And he responded with a Kanye emoji, and said,
Are you okay? Lol. (text message sounds)
And I said, "Mind your business." (laughs)
When he responded to me, like, LOL,
it kind of got me mad, 'cause I was actually really mad.
But he thought I was joking around.
(sigh)
- So this couple doesn't really have any
healthy communication skills.
Like, it's all gifs and threats,
and I do feel like that is where our society is headed.
I feel like pretty soon, it'll just be gifs and threats,
and if you send me the wrong gif,
I'm gonna cut you up in the parking lot.
- I have one friend that he thought it would be funny
to go back in Facebook,
and like some of the comments
that my ex-girlfriend made on my wall. (text message sounds)
She said, "Your friends are children.
Daniel literally went out of his way to go on your photo,
and like my comment from months ago. (text message sounds)
It's so rude and annoying and immature.
I'm dating someone new. I moved on.
I would love to be left alone. Thanks."
Just didn't respond.
- What? I mean, I know I'm old, but I do social media.
She seems very sensitive.
He liked your comment from months ago,
and you feel the need to text your ex-boyfriend
about his friend liking a comment?
Like, there are better things to worry about, aren't there?
Like, do you need to...
How does this hurt you personally,
to see this happen on a social media page
that you have to go hunt down your ex
and confront them about it?
Like, what do you expect him to do?
Text his friend and be like,
"Bro, you gotta stop liking on social media, man.
You're leaving a trail of devastation in your wake." (swipe)
This video is brought to you by Hello Fresh's recipes,
which are oh so delicious.
Hello Fresh delivers fresh, quality produce from the farm
to your door in less than a week.
So you can savor summer flavors right from home.
Also, I'm a man that needs
a variety of yummy meal choices in my life,
and Hello Fresh now has 30 dinner recipes
to choose from every week.
That's the most choices of any meal kit.
It doesn't stop there.
Hello Fresh helps you to reach your goals,
and eat more sustainably.
How, you might ask? Great question.
Fit and wholesome recipes make it easy to eat well
without sacrificing flavor.
So you can maintain your goals,
and feel good about your food choices with Hello Fresh.
Plus, Hello Fresh recipes include pre-portioned ingredients
that mean less prep for you, and less wasted food.
I'm walking the walk, and I'm eating the food, folks.
Let me tell you why I love it.
I have five kids,
and sometimes I don't have the time or the energy
to, like, prepare stuff for them or cook for them.
So I love Hello Fresh 'cause I get all of these meals,
all of these delicious things just sent to my home.
This is John O approved, and if John O can do it,
you can do it.
It comes with a little step by step guide
telling you exactly how to make it in what order,
what temperature.
I mean, I know this is how cooking works, but trust me.
I'm very inexperienced. Perfect.
Let's see how close I can get. Nailed it.
Go to hellofresh.com and use code MENDEDLIGHT16
for up to 16 free meals, and three surprise gifts.
Surprise. (swipe)
It's okay, Edward.
- We were at a restaurant and my sister has social anxiety,
and so she wanted to know if her dish came with potatoes,
but she didn't wanna ask the waitress.
So she told my dad, like, "Nevermind, I don't wanna ask."
And then when the waitress came by,
my dad asked like, "Does this dish come with potatoes?"
My sister got mad and my dad for asking,
but she was just acting really aggressive towards him.
(text message sounds)
I said, "I'm disappointed in you.
I apologize for bringing it up in front of everyone.
That was not cool of me.
But I also want you to recognize that what you said
was not cool, too."
She said, (text message sounds)
"All I said was that I was uncomfortable with what he did.
Like, I could thank him for asking,
but I'm not gonna thank him for putting attention on me,
and asking her a question
when I said that I didn't want him to."
And I said, (text message sounds)
"I didn't ask you to thank him for the negative thoughts
that you put into his actions.
He had the right intentions,
and that's all I want you to recognize."
She put, like, spaces between each letter.
So just imagine this. (text message sounds)
The intentions don't matter when the actions
have a negative impact.
And I said, "Yes, they do." (text message sounds)
(laughs)
And eventually, we just decided to agree to disagree.
- So there is a a gap between intentions and results,
and I wouldn't say that intentions don't matter.
But, it's both.
If I have good intentions, those should be recognized,
because I don't deserve to be vilified
for trying to do something kind.
At the same time, if the result of my actions was hurtful,
I also need to own that as if my intentions
aren't the only thing that counts.
Social anxiety is a very real thing. I get that.
You don't want any attention put on you at all,
and you told your dad, "I don't want you to say anything,"
and he needed to respect that.
At the same time, he's asking if a meal comes with potatoes.
I don't see a universe in which the server
is going to think this or that person is so weird.
They're gonna think a customer asked me a question
about a dish, and I answered the dish.
Am I missing something? Some of you can let me know.
Am I missing something? I'm happy to be corrected.
- [Video] Why didn't you say that to her face?
- Because she has social anxiety.
She just isn't able to communicate things
face to face as much,
and so text just made it easier for her.
- That's true for a lot of people, yeah.
That's considerate.
- I do wish I had the conversation, like, verbally,
because I think the texting made it worse.
- Which is often true. It's hard to read tone.
- This happened when I first moved to LA.
One of my friends was helping me with my move,
and then he and I are supposed to meet up
after I was meeting with a recruiter.
I was telling him I'm done. (text message sounds)
And then I said, "Sorry about that.
The recruiter was also running late.
So he pushed our meeting back, but now I'm done.
Hello?" (text message sounds)
20 minutes later. (text message sounds)
"Hey, what's going on? Where are you?
Call me."
And he says, (text message sounds)
"I decided to go home 'cause I don't wanna wait two hours.
Don't be confused. It was just terrible planning."
And I'm just like, I apologized.
I said, sorry about that. (text message sounds)
I was with the recruiter, and he's like,
"Right, of course. (text message sounds)
But I also sat at Starbucks for two hours,"
and then we just go at it. (text message sounds)
"Brie, this isn't going to go your way
if you don't try to be civil.
Maybe this is why you have problems with other people.
You don't try to see where they're coming from."
And I took...
I was so upset with that because
if I tell you something in confidence,
don't use it against me when we argue.
- True, true.
- I apologized, and you keep going. (text message sounds)
And you say these things that just hurt and upset people.
This is not what friends do, but that's fine.
We're all different, and we all respond differently.
- Okay, you can't have it both ways, right?
This is not what friends do, but that's fine.
We're all different, and we respond in different ways.
You're saying what you feel,
and then you're saying what you think you should feel.
What you feel is this is not how friends treat each other,
and what you think you should feel is
we all respond differently and do things differently.
But you need to pick a lane,
because those are two conflicting things.
If you believe this is not how friends
should treat one another,
say so and leave that there.
Don't soften it with the other thing,
say this is not how friends treat each other, right?
Or this is not how I treat my friends,
or put that to the side.
It is true. Different people see things different ways.
Hey, I guess we'll just agree to disagree.
The other thing is,
they're both right and they're both wrong.
By that, I was with a recruiter is valid.
I sat in a Starbucks for two hours is valid.
They're both talking past each other,
trying to get the other one to acknowledge
their side of things.
But as long as each one isn't doing it,
the other one refuses to budge, right?
So they just keep...
You come over here. No, you come over here.
Instead of, "Hey, I'm sorry I got upset and impatient.
How did it go through recruiter?"
And, "Hey, thank you for waiting for me
for two hours in Starbucks.
That means a lot to me."
- We're not friends anymore, which sucks.
I miss him sometimes. Yeah, like, a lot actually.
Sometimes I'll think about it, and I'll just be like,
that was a friend, yeah.
- Well, people get to this place where they're, like,
"We're not friends anymore, but what can you do?"
You can call,
and you can take ownership for whatever your part was,
and you can express understanding
of where the other person was coming from,
and then express the positive need, right?
I miss you in my life, and I want to have you back,
and I would like for this type of thing to either
not happen in the future,
or for us to handle it differently when it does.
What do you think we can do about that?
And maybe the other person is too pissed,
and they don't want to go there.
That's fine. That's on them.
But at least you tried.
But right now, she's just like, "We're not friends anymore.
And I miss him, but..."
- You know how things get misread via text,
and you get so heated that you just go at it
with your thumbs and you don't even have a chance.
- Yeah, stop and calm down. Talk face to face.
- Yeah, I think if we were in front of each other,
or even just over the phone,
I think it would've been a much better situation.
- Still can be. Make that call.
Why doesn't she make that call? That's what I want to know.
She clearly misses her friend.
Go ahead and extend the olive leaf.
Go ahead and take accountability.
You don't have to take ownership for all of it,
but you can take ownership for what's yours,
and my mom used to say that even if you don't feel
like you have anything to be sorry for,
you can be sorry that there was a disagreement.
You could be sorry that things went badly,
and you can start with that,
and you can express to someone
that you want things to be okay again.
It makes me sad,
and it is very wise
not to have important conversations through text message.
Text message, in my opinion, is for,
"Hey, I'm picking up pizza on the way home," right?
It is for coordinating things. It's for...
Or it's for sweet little I love you. I miss you.
Things like that,
but I wouldn't propose to someone via text.
I wouldn't tell them that we're having a baby via text.
I wouldn't break up via text.
I wouldn't try to resolve a longstanding issue via text.
This young woman...
Another young woman brings up that her sister
has social anxiety so texts are just easier for her.
Like, I get that. I understand that.
But even then, sometimes you gotta say, you know,
I don't think this is gonna be productive.
Can we come back to it in a little bit?
Then always come back to it.
Speaking of text and things that shouldn't be done via text,
check out this one.
Therapist Reacts Raw to Break Up Texts,
where people read through the worst breakup text
that they've ever received, and ouch.
What do you think? What conversations are good for text?
Are they all good for text?
Is that where we are as a society?
Or should we reserve some things for face to face,
or over the phone?
What do you think?
Let me know in the comments below.
What would you like to see me react to?
Let me know in the comments below.
What is your worst text argument that you've ever had?
Let me know in the comments below.
I hope you've enjoyed this.
As always keep shining. We need your light.
I'm Jonathan Decker. We'll see you next time.
(mischievous music plays)