18 Apr Winging It: Needing Help in Being Helpful
From the backseat, Ella exclaimed, “There’s a goose in this parking lot!”
Sure enough, a lone goose sat in the middle of a parking space, a few spots away from our car.
Questions flooded our minds. Was it hurt? Unable to fly? Something had to be wrong, Ella and I reasoned. Why else would there be a goose in a parking lot?
We didn’t know what to do, so we did the only thing that seemed helpful in the moment: We positioned our car to protect it from passing traffic, feeling helpless yet compelled to act.
I found the number for a local bird rescue center and left a message on their after-hours emergency line. The sun had set and darkness was creeping into the sky, adding urgency to our concern.
Finally, the phone rang. But the response from the volunteer at the bird rescue center wasn’t what I expected. The volunteer chastised us; her voice dismissive and annoyed. The woman explained that for the past week their center has been receiving many calls at all hours of the day and night about this very goose. The problem, the woman explained, was that people are feeding and bringing water and protecting the bird, so the goose now lingers comfortably in the parking lot and is lacking motivation to go back to where it belongs. The woman said she would not be coming to pick up the bird and with a huff she ended the call saying she wished that everyone would stop aiding and enabling the goose and that she is surprised people don’t know better.
I put down my phone in the car’s cup holder.
“What did she say?” Ella asked, “Are they coming to get the goose?”
“No,” I said slowly, still reeling from the sting of her accusatory words, “She’s mad that we are enabling the goose by trying to protect it and told us to stop it.”
I’m sensitive to the term “enabling.” In addiction treatment, “enabling,” while thankfully becoming less frequently used, is a pejorative term that stigmatizes the already-suffering concerned loved ones by accusing them of behaving in ways that promotes the continuation of substance use or shields people from experiencing the natural consequences of their behaviors. It places unnecessary and unhelpful judgment and blame on loved ones who are simply doing their best in attempting to adjust and cope with the challenges of someone’s substance use. Research is clear that there’s nothing pathological about the behaviors of these well-meaning family members.
As we drove away, leaving the goose and our unintended “enabling” behind, I thought about the power of words and the responsibility of those with expertise on what helps and what gets in the way when it comes to helping to see it as part of their task to educate rather than blaming people for not knowing.
In the same way that well-intentioned family members might shield their loved one from experiencing the consequences of their substance use behavior out of compassion and concern, the actions of community members bringing water and food and shielding the goose from traffic stemmed from a place of genuine concern and a desire for help. We didn’t know our actions were inadvertently causing harm.
It is a good reminder that we don’t always know what helps and what gets in the way.
At times, the actions we take out of compassion have unintended consequences. Yet, criticizing actions borne out of empathy and concern isn’t helpful.
Sometimes we need help to learn how to refrain from doing things that are unhelpful.
Sometimes we need help in learning how to be helpful.