**WARNING** touchy subject-How to do this politely?

[smidget23]

**I put this here because while several of us are friends in RL and have regular get togethers, we all initially "met" through an online forum. **

BG: Roughly 3-4 years ago (not sure of the timeline as it was prior to our friendship), one of my friends was raped by a former coworker. She never went to the police, so no evidence was collected. It was during her time in the military and she did go to her first shirt and inform her chain of command. However with no evidence, it was just a case of conflicting stories and their hands were tied. They tried to make sure there was little to no contact between the two individuals from that point on. She is currently out of the military and has moved several states away with no contact. It should also be noted that she has refused to go to individual counseling/group therapy, online support forums for survivors/victims, all offers of assistance. I actually made her lists of places to contact (physical, phone numbers, or online) to seek help in dealing with her situation for her prior and current locations. I've also talked to her husband (who in turn urged to to seek help) to no avail. No one can make her and she refuses. 

The problem that I have is that her trouble dealing with the trauma is starting to affect her friendships with other board members as well as the atmosphere of the forum. She's becoming more and more vocal about her past trauma to the point that she brings it into unrelated topics. Someone could post about the weather being warm and she will post about how it was warm the night that she was attacked. It's even worse when people are posting things where they're upset (one of our members recently lost her father to cancer), because then she will tell them that no matter how bad they have it, she's had it worse because she was raped. We try to beandip and ignore her posts like this, but she just keeps on. She's escalated now to the point that if her posts aren't acknowledged, she will make a thread about how she isn't appreciated. I'm sick of the emotional blackmail.

Normally, a mod would take care of this, however she IS a mod. The rest of the mod team appears to be of the "ignore it and it will go away" mentality, but it's not going away. We've had a member tell her to basically knock it off and get help because she's making everyone uncomfortable, but it's just getting worse... I hate sitting around and watching a place that I loved to be a part of grind to a halt because no one wants to post something for fear of what she will say next. Short of creating a new forum and giving everyone BUT her the link, I'm not sure what to do. As her closest friend there, I've been "elected" to approach her about curbing her behavior, but I'm not sure quite how to do this without offending her.

So basically, I need help in how to politely ask her to not talk about her traumatic experience PLEASE!

[familyfun]

Well there are 2 different issues here:

1) Your friend is going through PTSD and refuses to get help.  You've done what you can by listening and providing resources.  There's not really much more you can do there except continue to be there to listen.  Though if she's treating you badly, you will need to set some firm, but fair boundaries.  

2) Your friend's behavior on the board.  I'd be highly wary of getting in the middle of this.  Really, it's up to the mods to address it.  It's their board, their rules.  Who exactly has "elected" you?   When she invariably gets angry at you for approaching her, which it sounds like will be the most likely outcome, will they back you up?  Or will they disavow all knowledge?  One possible outcome is that you will be painted as unsympathetic to a rape survivor and a accused as being wannabe mod.  It's likely to interfere with your other rel@tionships on the board.  And confronting her in this capacity willl likely undermine the friendship which means you won't be able to offer support as a friend in the first issue.  Which is far more important than any forum.

If it's mods who have "elected" you, I'd put the responsibility back on them.  If it's fellow members, I'd tell them to take it up with the mods.   The fact that your her closest friend doesn't make you better suited for this job.  In fact, this "job" could compromise the support you can and do offer her as a friend and I'd point that out to the electorate.  It's also harder for you to be objective. The person who does approach her might want to point out that it's unfair for her to chastize a grieving member.  

Sounds very tough for all involved.  Hope it works out and I especially hope your friend is able to get some help.  

[JoanOfArc]

Who owns the forum?  If possible, you should approach them and ask them to remover her as a mod because she is not staying on topic.  If it is sort of co-owned by the mods, the other mods need to get together and take action.  

From what you have written here, she isn't going to stop talking about this, however you ask her.  She is dealing with a trauma.  She is hurt and not acting completely rational.  I feel a great deal of sympathy for her, but if she isn't willing or ready to seek help, there is not much anyone can do.  

Joan

[familyfun]

PS, what is the purpose of the board? Is it a small board where friends get together online? Or is it a larger forum devoted to an interest or hobby?

Also, if/when the mods address it, rather then telling her not to talk about it, they may want to point out how some of her comments are affecting other members.  For example, the member who couldn't get community support after losing her dad to cancer without being told she didn't have it as bad as your friend referred to here:

It's even worse when people are posting things where they're upset (one of our members recently lost her father to cancer), because then she will tell them that no matter how bad they have it, she's had it worse because she was raped. We try to beandip and ignore her posts like this, but she just keeps on. She's escalated now to the point that if her posts aren't acknowledged, she will make a thread about how she isn't appreciated. I'm sick of the emotional blackmail.

Honestly, if I were that member, chances are I'd be taking a bit of a break from the board.  I know what happened to your friend was horrible and she needs emotional support, but so does the member who just lost her father to cancer.  Giving support to one doesn't mean taking away from the other.  That was rather cruel on your friend's part.  If you do decide to address that, as a friend, not in a "board" capacity, you may want to ask her if she really means to say that and treat the other member that way.  And if so, why?  It may be tempting to "correct" her, but just try to listen.  Maybe hearing herself talk like that might trigger some recognition into how her behavior is affecting others.  

ETA:

A "please be considerate of our other members" from the mods with examples like the woman who lost her dad to cancer will probably be better received than a "please stop talking about your trauma" from the mods.  Also, there may very well be other rape survivors on the board.  It could be triggering for them to read about it without warning.  It may be a good idea for the mods to ask her to put a warning in the heading of her posts.  

Also, there is a forum for web admins.  It may be a good idea for the mods to post a message to get some feedback from other admins to see if they've had any experiences like this and/or how to handle:

http://www.theadminzone.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=3

[Calypso]

Is there a way to contact lots of other members of the board without doing it ON the board? By PM, maybe?
Try to get a group of you to coordinate this response, to be used immediately when she inappropriately starts posting about her traumatic experience:

"Friend, I'm glad to see you're able to talk about an event you've been avoiding dealing with. If you can post about it here, I think it's a good sign you're ready to take steps to heal. For that, you need to talk to a professional---not to us, who can't help you."

And then leave the thread immediately, and don't respond to her posts---or, go ahead and respond to the OP, but not to her as long as she brings up this topic.

If enough people meet her misplaced attempts to talk about this the same way, she may get the message.
And don't think you or anyone can do this without offending her. She WILL be offended, no matter what anyone says, because she doesn't want to hear it right now. I think the choice is, either live with the status quo, or live with the possibility of (hopefully temporarily) hurting her feelings.

[Lisbeth]

I think that the owner of the forum and the other moderators should be the first people to discuss this with her.  Other members should not be brought in to fight this battle.

If they're not willing to do it, I would then say to your friend, "Friend, several members of the forum and I have noticed that you're discussing what happened in many posts.  All of us care about you, and I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but the forum isn't a support group for what you went through, and we find it off-putting that you're posting so much about it but not willing to get professional help.  We'll respect whatever decisions you make about getting treatment for yourself, but we need you to stop posting about it-it's alienating our membership."

[TootsNYC]

I like the "please be considerate of our other members," instead of "shut up already."

And maybe even a "that wasn't very supportive of you," "that wasn't nice."

And I also think that it's past time for her to be a mod. We rely heavily on our mods to be the grownups here; to be the cool heads who can think about "what is good for the forum?" and the "should this thread be locked so the sniping doesn't contaminate the atmosphere?"

She can't do that; she's in too much pain right now. It's time for a leave of absence.

And then the mods should do w/ her posts what they'd do here. Say something sympathetic, and then lock the thread; or send her a reminder that she's being unkind to other people.

Another message that might work is the "I see you are bringing this up on every thread; I think that's a sign that you are finally ready to work on this with a professional; time to get going, right?" Bcs maybe it *is* progress for her, sort of a boil coming to a head, and there's more pressure and it hurts.

[smidget23]

OP here with more info:

*The forum itself is a smaller forum with only roughly 25ish members. We originally started with one "theme" and have really branched out into all aspects of life with the major theme ultimately going into the background. The problem with us being so small and close is that when we lose someone, it's felt. We've had three members post that they were opting to take a step back since Christmas. They didn't *say* that it was because of her behavior on the board, but have stated as much in personal conversations.

*I say that I was elected, but really it wasn't like anyone posted a poll. I've just recieved several PMs/IMs/phone calls asking me to see if I could talk to her again about her behavior. I've directed everyone to talk to the Mods/Admin, but to no avail. Basically what we've been told from the three of them is that they're afraid of upsetting her and losing her as a member. [Which annoyed me, because it seems like they're going to sacrifice the rest of us in order to keep one...GRRRR!] So far the only times that threads have been locked have involved her ultimately posting about how little she is appreciated on the board and threats to leave. That is when a mod will come in and say how much everyone loves her and basically beg her to stay. When approached, they asked everyone to ask me to talk to her since we were "so close". [Personally once her emotional manipulations started (on the forum and in RL) , I opted to really take a step back from our friendship. I still consider us friends, however we're FAR from being as close as we once were.]



Thanks for the suggestions! I am going to ask other members to call her on her online behavior as it occurs. I know that she will more than likely be upset and while it's something that I would have liked to avoid, that's going to be impossible. I just felt odd having to do it alone and I was afraid that I would come across as "being mean to the rape victim".

[Goog]

I like the responses of "It's good that you seem ready to deal with your experience......" and then redirecting to the original topic.  Maybe you can draft up several versions of the same type of response so you have them ready to use, so you can give her an immediate response when she tries to tug the heartstrings. 

Has anyone ever told her point blank, 'This is obviously still profoundly affecting you.  If you aren't willing to help yourself by talking to a professional about this, then how do you expect ME to help you?'

I know how it is when everyone goes back to 'real life' but your hurt and recovery goes on longer.  But really, FOUR years?  Yes, she really needs to see someone, and constantly inflicting her pain on everyone else and alienating her friends isn't going to make it go away.  I hope it doesn't sound too callous, but it sounds like she needs so tough love right now, b/c kind and gentle obviously isn't working.

[NestHolder]

OP here with more info:

*The forum itself is a smaller forum with only roughly 25ish members. We originally started with one "theme" and have really branched out into all aspects of life with the major theme ultimately going into the background. The problem with us being so small and close is that when we lose someone, it's felt. We've had three members post that they were opting to take a step back since Christmas. They didn't *say* that it was because of her behavior on the board, but have stated as much in personal conversations.

If all your forum members are female, it is extremely probable that the person you're talking about is not the only member who has been raped.  She really needs some help in coming to terms with what was done to her, and I hope you can find a way to help her.

[familyfun]

PPS,  I hadn't really thought about this aspect of it, but given she's a mod, that's all the more reason for the mods/admins to be addressing this. If she gets angry/lashes out about being confronted on her behavior, she may take it out on the members, who don't have the same rights, responsibilites and privileges as mods & admins do, in modding decisions. 

I agree with the PP who said perhaps she should be taking a break from her modding duties.  Of course, you can't "make" the other mods ask her to do so. But you can decline to put yourself in the middle of this.

I think some of the PPs have some good wording about how it seems she might be more ready to talk about it.  And maybe with some reinforcement that while you all care for her greatly and you're willing to give emotional support, talking to someone with professional training might be helpful for her as none of you are trained to help trauma survivors.  A combinantion of the 2 responses might be written up and used as the response. 

[TootsNYC]

maybe you should suggest that all these people who are contacting you should say to the mods, "If you are choosing her over me, then I'm gone, too."

My goodness, the mods have lost TWO people, to her "one person."

Have you told the mods this? I think i would; or at the very least, I'd be asking those people who left to now PM the mods and say, "I hear you're struggling with how to handle this situation. I want you to know that it was a HUGE factor in why I left.

and also, your friend may be wanting someone to save her from herself. She knows how bad those comments make her feel, when she makes them.

[ilrag]

I'm actually a part of a small close knit forum which was started as a spin off from another small close knit forum.  The majority of the core group of posters left to get away from 2 other posters.  We got a new url, put up the forum, only sent out invites to people who were welcome and then password protected the site. It was for a completely different reason, but still necessary for people to want to continue posting. 

Since many people had met up at different places around the country there were a lot of hurt feelings for a while, but after the drama died down it was clear that we made a good decision. 

[cass2591]

Where is the owner of the forum, and why isn't she the one to address this with the mod, privately of course.

[DavidH]

As a friend, you may be able to say to her that bringing this up constantly does not seem to be helping anyone.  It alienates her friends and ultimately is painful for her when she doesn't get the support she is expecting.  You could suggest again that since she is obviously ready to talk about it (since she is at every opportunity) that the best place to do so would be in a group or forum dedicated to providing support for those in her situation.  It's not quite saying that she can't post about it, but leading her to that place.

After four years, and consistent refusal to seek any type of help offered, I would have to question whether being the victim has become her identity and has some ultimate value to her.  If so it is quite sad, but she would probably need professional help to address.