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i want to be good but i am bad - help?
Help Wanted

i want to be good but i am bad - help?

a reader asks 'at what point are we no longer able to change our brains?'

Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar
Alex Dobrenko`
Aug 08, 2023
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i want to be good but i am bad - help?
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What’s up and HELLO. Let’s first and fourmost give it up for my best friends and groomspeople at my wedding, the newest Paid Subscribers to Both Are True: Heather, Kimia D., Becky I., Sarah M., Dobes, Robin G., Mills B., and Joseph L.

Want to support BAT and have your name memorialized on the Forever Wall (internet)?

I wanna pay! I wanna win!

Let’s get into it!! For those of you who are new here, this is Help Wanted, an advice column and the only place that I, a comedy writer with a psychology degree, am legally allowed to give advice.

Want advice? Your question/conundrum/pickle can be SS (super serious) or DAAD (dumb as a doorknob) or anywhere in between. I’ll answer them all.

Submit your questions to botharetrue@substack.com.

Q: At what point are we no longer able to change our brains?

Alex, I've always been a quiet, reserved, melancholy person. One of my main aspirations in life is to raise a family. But I come from a family dynamic riddled with mental illness, abuse, and generational dysfunction, which I've personally been addressing in therapy for about 7 years now (I'm 30). 

Still, I have a string of failed romantic relationships, unhealthy patterns and can't seem to keep up with neurotypical expectations. I try so hard to do better and change; to be the person I want to be -- loving, nurturing, fun, friendly, trusting, stable. But I always fall back into being a depressive, irritable, woman-who-can't-manage-her-own-shit adult child. My current partner is at their last straw, ready to leave, and I don't know what else to do with myself. 

Is there a point at which a human just can't improve their behaviors anymore? Am I stuck like this forever? What else should I do? 

- Lou (Portland, OR)

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