“‘Should’ is the most self-defeating word in the English language” – Steve Chandler.
I bet it wasn’t always that way. Linguists could tell us the origin of “should” and how it was really meant to be used. Somewhere along the line, however, we turned it into a judgmental, shaming word. It assumes right and wrong – who’s definition, though? There’s even a thing about “don’t should on me,” which I’ve used in a past blog post.
Imagine yourself living with a disease that leads people to say things like, “You should just stop eating/drinking that.” “You should lose weight.” “You shouldn’t eat that.” “You shouldn’t do that.” “You should just…” And then we start to should on ourselves too. Talk about self-defeating.
While there are still some appropriate uses for “should” in other areas, I’m glad people are catching on to how negative “You should/shouldn’t…” is in diabetes. The next step is to replace it. Here are some options:
- Have you considered?
- What about…?
- May I suggest something?
- Do you want to…?
- How can I help?
- I’m going to…
- I want to…
- I will…
Now imagine a world where people with diabetes don’t hear “should” anymore. That will be amazing – can’t wait!