A question about complaining: Your input is invited

There is a question here... eventually... on which I would like your opinion. Stay with me for a moment even though there are no laughs today.

Tomorrow I have three credit cards due. Since becoming self-employed I have become something of an expert in figuring out how to use each and every day of each credit card's grace period, walking the check in to the bank or the store on the due date (unless I forget, of course).

I know I won't be able to pay all of these cards in full tomorrow. What eats at me is the fact that I settled a PI case in late October. While the settlement was not large, I was obliged to expend a relatively large amount on an expert. But between the modest fee (diminished further by payment of a referral fee) and the recoupment of my costs, I was looking forward to a decent payday. Only I'm still looking forward to that day because the claim person for the defendant's insurer does not understand that a med pay subro claim is not the same thing as a lien. She wants to finance the settlement of that claim from my client's proceeds -- but she made her settlement offer on the carrier's behalf with knowledge that a subro claim was pending.

This kind of stuff makes me crazy -- and, worse, it keeps me from focusing on the very real work I have to do. And to do my work I need to be focused... which is not easy for an easily distracted person such as yours truly.

Now you may call this whining and self-pitying... and I can hardly dispute that.

But I set it out because it provides necessary background for the question I have for the group.

When I vocalize these kinds of feelings at home, Long Suffering Spouse will tell me about someone else's problems... and these are always much worse than anything we're going through.

You don't have to go far in the world or in the Blogosphere to find people worse off than Long Suffering Spouse and myself. For all of my cash flow problems, at the end of the year I'll have made an income that a lot of people would envy. Too darn much of it will be eaten up in late fees and interest... but that's a digression. And most of my financial problems are self-inflicted: If I could concentrate on tasks at hand instead of fretting about things over which I have no control... working instead of just waiting for return telephone calls... I'd surely earn more money. And I've chosen to send my kids to private schools because it's a sacrifice I think and I hope and I pray will pay off for them... so I know I shouldn't complain that my checking account is on life support.

But I do complain, of course. I think complaining is a fundamental human activity. If you are unsure, click "next blog" (not now!) and you will see someone else's complaints. Probably in a different language.

But I don't like it when people respond to my complaints by pointing out that others have it worse: I know, I say, but that doesn't make my complaints any less valid. Long Suffering Spouse begins to doubt my sensitivity... and I begin to realize that I'm not articulating what I really mean.

Yesterday I was kvetching with a friend and he brought up the horrible ordeal of a former colleague of his. This man's wife is dying. It is his second marriage; he lost his first wife to cancer. And he lost a college age son in a senseless, stupid auto accident. Job might think he's got it better than this man. And my friend told me about the second wife's illness, and I choked up... but I flared up when my friend then said something like, "Compared to our problems...."

And an explanation began to take shape: I think I get upset when I'm asked to find solace in someone else's suffering. That seems ghoulish to me. I don't want to feel better because someone feels worse. I want to feel better because I solve my own problems, or work through them... or at least because I've vented.

So my question: When you're complaining and people remind you that others have it worse, does that help you regain perspective or a sense of proportion? Is that what it's supposed to do? And why is that not the same as finding comfort in others' misery?