Tell Giselle: Divulging tender truths

A young adult is wondering whether or not they ought to reveal to the rest of the family something unpleasant they learned while exploring their genealogy.

G: Taking the 35,000-foot view when coming to a decision that can affect others is not always the optimal position. Here, that view would be something like, “But it’s true and we all need to live in truth.”

Just because we learn something is true does not mean that it is essential information. It might be, but more times than not, what we find out is true is only necessary, helpful or beneficial to an individual or a select few.

Think about it: Do you really need to know what mistakes your grandfather made that are now decades past and no longer factoring in anyone’s life?

Unless that information concerns the existence of some certain genetic predispositions, and even that bit of medical information can be cause for debate, what we may find out about someone else’s life can often be boiled down to gossip rather than being useful to the here and now.

Discovering one has a family history of particular disease does not necessarily mean doom and gloom for the descendants. Sure, it can be another metric to be used in determining one’s life style choices and medical screenings or future treatment plan, but it can also work toward destabilizing one’s peace of mind. To be clear, if your father or brother has prostate cancer, the stats show you may be at double the risk of the disease. People with a 1st degree relative (parent, sibling or child) who has colon cancer or even pre-cancerous polyps are at a higher risk for these diagnoses. So, yes, it would appear reasonable to me for those folks to get regular screenings, in hopes for early detection and a better prognosis.

Medical research is discovering that diseases require a multitude of conditions to make their mark on a person. Some who are infected with a virus or cancer, for example, will succumb to them, while others remain immune. There is still too much uncertainty about a person’s risk factors to know for sure an outcome to many conditions.

As to the information that is gleaned through genealogy it is wise to remember that much of what is recorded is not firsthand data. Too many documents are not accurate or even real to be considered gospel. Names are often inadvertently misspelled due to human error or from not hearing correctly the pronunciations of foreign languages. This happened during my grandmother’s intake at Ellis Island, so I know it is a serious glitch in our family’s “recorded” past.

Coming down from the high-altitude view of a situation to a more granular understanding of consequences is a good rule of thumb for determining a course of action.

There is a simple three-step formula that I have found useful in arriving at a “best” choice when it comes to divulging delicate information. It goes like this: 1) Is it true? 2) Is it kind? 3) is it necessary?

However, simple does not necessarily mean it is easy.

I say this because what you may determine is necessary (by that I mean valuable to living as our highest best selves) may not in fact be useful to someone else.

You may want to know that your grandfather was senile at the age of 53, so that you can be tested for any genetic precondition and perhaps modify your lifestyle to reduce your risk of succumbing to said condition, but another person in your family may not be ready to know or deal with that information, and find it destabilizing.

Determining what is kind is a whole ‘nuther conundrum to consider. For those of us who ascribe to living in truth, and nothing but the truth, it may be a bit easier to discern what is kind from what is potentially hurtful.

My first book was what I describe as my father’s memoir. In it I shared some of my family’s history that was difficult even for me to learn, and yes painful for some of my relatives to read. I did this knowing that it was relevant to conveying the wisdoms that my father had wanted expressed, as his intention was for this to be an opportunity for others to learn from missteps and misunderstandings of himself and members of his own family.

To some, any backstory may seem unkind to reveal in such a public form as a book, but to others it will be life changing in the most positive ways possible.

It is true that sometimes we have to see dirty laundry between the sheets of a book, in order to clean our inner and outer selves and develop our capacity for compassion and forgiveness.

The decision to divulge most sensitive information is a personal one that often comes with unforeseen consequences. If you are unsure of what to share, the best thing to do is wait while you work on the answers to the questions posed above.

Growing peaceful is often as simple as not indulging or engaging in gossip disguised as essential information.