"Are you Against Trans?"

"Are you against trans?"

I said, "What do you mean 'against'?"

"What do you think of trans people?"

I thought for a moment and then replied, "I believe that a biological man is a man and a biological woman is a woman. I disagree that a man can literally be a woman or vice versa just because they say so or they say something to the effect that they are in a foreign body or that they just feel like the opposite sex."

They then said with a finality in their voice, "So, you are transphobic then."

I asked, "What do you mean when you say the word 'transphobic'?"

"Well, you don't like trans people."

"Oh, Okay . . . then no," I said. " I am not transphobic."

"But you just said you hated them, " they argued.

"No," I said slowly with a hint of a question, "That is not what I said."

"Yes, you did," starting to work themselves up. I could tell they were getting ready to pick a fight.

"No . . .  I said that I didn't believe that a person can be a different biological sex just because they say so or if they say they feel like they are a different sex. I never said I hated them. You know, I can disagree with a person's philosophy or feelings and still not hate them for their views. Right? "

"Then you are transphobic."

I started to understand now where they are coming from. "Look. When a person says that word - 'transphobic', they are talking about a fear that is in another person that causes them to want to harm or commit acts of violence on the group of people solely because of some belief those people hold.. . .  I . . . do . . . not. . . . feel that way.

"I don't hate these people. I don't want harm to come to them. I don't want to hurt them at all. I don't want anyone else to hurt them either. I am not grossed out by them or want to avoid them or shun them in anyway whatsoever. But, I am a science guy, and I just don't believe that a person can literally become the opposite sex just because they don't think they are the one they were born as or because they say they are in the wrong body. That is just absurd. I think it is impossible for a man to say they are literally woman because the only thing about their body that is a woman is their thoughts and feelings. They can say it all they want but, in reality, every single cell they are made up of is screaming 'male!' because they have Y chromosomes in them. They will never ever truly feel what a woman feels like no matter how much they argue to the contrary. It is unreasonable for a person to force me to believe and agree to something that is not true. I mean, it is not even a belief because there are measurable observable differences between men and women. To me, it is impossible for a man to literally be a woman or vis versa because of what I know about genetics and biology."

"Then you are against them."

"There is that word again . . . 'Against.' It depends on what you mean by the word 'Against'," I said again. "Am I against them being able to express whatever image that fits the way they feel? Nope. Am I against who they choose to love and have relationships with? Nope. Will I vote against them being able to marry the opposite biological sex or even the same biological sex? Nope. 

"You see, these are freedoms that don't get in the way of my freedoms and there is no reason to stop them from those choices or discriminate against them in these instances. 

"On the other hand, am I against a trans person using a bathroom that is not their biological sex? Yes. It does not matter to me at all personally, but it does invade people's personal privacy. And the law protects your privacy. There are also other choices for using the bathroom like stalls and unisex bathrooms to use as accommodations to not being able to use your 'preferred' bathroom and locker rooms. I am against gender affirming surgeries for anyone that is under the age of 21 because they are still children and need to mature to the point where their bodies and brains are fully developed. These treatments are irreversible, and children are fickle when their brains are not fully developed. Dress and act how you want but don't allow children to permanently change their bodies when they are not even fully grown yet. After 21, go for it. I don't care, it is your body and your money and you are an adult. "

 I saw that if I disagreed with some of these crazy ideas . . .  that if I didn't accept trans people and what they believed wholly and completely that I was against them in all respects and "transphobic". But I grew up in an age where differing views were just that, differing views. We are all people and have our own thoughts and beliefs. To call someone a "phobic" anything just because they disagree with you is just crazy talk. Like I said to this person, I can have differing views and still treat you as a human being. Seriously. I am not going to stop being kind and considerate of you just because I am not going to agree that you are a woman when you are literally a man. 

"Look," I said.

"I can disagree with them and reject their philosophy as false and still understand that they have freedoms given to them and are free to make their own choices. I also can disagree and want them to not get in the way of other people's freedoms - like personal privacy of the sexes and deciding on behalf of children to have sex changing surgeries. Hell, I can disagree with their beliefs and still be friends and kind to them. Disagreeing with a person does not mean you hate them. It just means you disagree with them. It does not mean you want to harm or hurt them. There is a difference. Until people can go back to understanding that, the better off our whole society will be."

Mom

    I was talking to mom the other day and she said something that really hit me hard in the gut. She said that since she didn't have a college degree or went to school that she felt that she was not as accomplished or successful as dad or any of her children. And my first thought is that she had no idea what she has done in her life that carried as much (if not... More!) importance to the world as the rest of us. 

    My mom set her lot in life to be a homemaker and there was a time in which this was kind of looked down upon. But you know what? Look at how our society is like now with all these working women. Look at how feminism and economy has driven the mother out of the house into the work place. I don't think the average person has any idea of how pivotal that change in our social values, that being a stay at home mom being frowned upon, has on the health of our society. 

    This entry though is about my mom. And even amongst all the moms in the world, she really is one of a kind. 

     I have been fortunate to experience parents that are very different from each other in their approach to raising their kids. I have posted about dad already and this one will be about mom. As I was growing up, ma was a stay-at-home mom and she not only took care of my brother, two sisters, and I, she also sitted for about ten to 13 other kids during the summer. So, she was a mom to lots of other kids. Ma understood the uniqueness of each of us and also took a lot of time to work out how each of us "ticked."

    My brother needed a firm hand and needed a lot of tools to control and regulate his anger and emotions. Ma really had a knack on him with that. My sisters had a lot of restrictions on them. One needed to understand that being strong willed and stubborn did not mean that you could just go all wild and do what you wanted. The other struggled with esteem and motivation which required a whole other set of tools to deal with. 

    And then there was me. I was the black sheep of the kids. Seriously, ma said that she would have thought I was switched at birth if my brother and I were not the only ones in the nursery at the time. I was the one that had a brain that never stopped thinking and wondering and exploring. I think Ma loved to just watch me do my thing and really enjoyed seeing how my mind worked. She is often heard saying, "Before you get mad at him, you need to ask him why he was doing what he was doing. Because he always had a reason and his reasons usually made sensed to a little boy even if they were not right." That is where my mom really was set apart from other moms. She knew her kids and she knew that they all had different needs and boundaries. And I can't thank her and appreciate her enough for never putting me in a mold. She let us carve out the mold that suited us best. 

    As I grew older, I found that ma (and dad too) was always going to listen and hear me out.  I would call her at all times of the day. She would listen to me vent and yell and cuss and cry my frustrations out. She would listen to all my excitement and giddiness for some nerdy thing or other. She never rushed or avoided us at all. She always had the time and now that I look back, I really needed that. I needed her a lot to bump me onto the right path and to guide my thinking and actions so that I could figure out my world. I needed her to listen and not mock anything I was curious about until I learned how to find out stuff for myself. 

My mom is a unicorn now and I don't think there are enough of us left that know the value of a mom like her. It is very rare to have a mom that is kind, intuitive, nurturing, loving, and best of all . . . . present. And that is truly a missing part of our society that is telling when you look at our youth today.  

Dad

 I want to write about my dad but how do you put into words a million of reasons and feelings that have no words? 

I have to try. I have to write something. . . when I started this journal, I never thought how raw the words would pour out and scar the page. But now..... Now I need it to see in black and white what my mouth and voice could never put a sound on.

How do I even begin? I mean...... Where do I start? 

Ok, lets just put on the table what my pain really is..... Dad is elderly. And he is feeble. And it is breaking me. 

God! Can anyone understand? I don't even know how to put into words how it is shattering my mind and spirit. 

I visited dad last week up in Michigan. I am from Tennessee now and it is quite a trip to get to him and there are times I don't physically see or hug him for over a year. The last two visits though have been in six months because before last Christmas, my dad had a stroke. Not a major make him paralyzed or disabled one but a big enough one to change him. . . to change him from the man I know and grew up with. After looking at the MRI, that stroke was not the only one.... He has had others too. They were silent thieves stealing from him without any sign whatsoever that they had been there. And it is eating away at me each time I talk to him. 

My dad was the type of dad that lead his house. And my dad's house was not a building, it was his marriage and his children and his family and his friends and his grit and his whole way of life. His house was not things, it was people and his deep down core values that he pulled from to lived by. 

Do you see? Can you understand why I am breaking?

My dad is the type of man that couldn't give a care in the world about a broken toy but would get in a rage if his boys were fighting with each other. My dad was the type of man  that would fight an insurance company tooth and nail over a bill but wouldn't blink an eye to buy his friend a set of tires they needed for the upcoming winter. My dad would take a belt to my behind for lying or stealing but would drive three hours up to my college in order to surprise me with my dog after I called him defeated in tears and rage about failing the third test in a row in quantitative analysis.

My dad was the type of man that didn't keep score or thought anyone of his friends owed him for anything. My dad was the type of man that always made the right choice in all his decisions. My dad was the type of that drew good men around him that would literally do anything to help him.... No strings attached. My dad was the type of man that was intelligent and wise but was humble enough to know there were others that he could learn from. My dad was the type man that could be hard as steel but also was kind and accepting of anyone at face value. 

My dad was the type of man that would answer the phone to his broken down crying son whether it was one in the afternoon or one in the morning and give him calm and reassuring comfort and wisdom when his son didn't know what else to do. . . . When I didn't know what else to do. 

That is the type of man my dad is.... Was.....

Can you see know? Can you understand why I am breaking? 

My dad was the type of husband that was so loyal that no woman ever tested him but in which all women envied his wife. He was the type of husband that showed his love to her without shame and made sure his children knew that she was a priority in his life. He would be a partner in caring for the house and the kids. . . especially his boys. . .me. He would be flirty and playful. He would be giddy when he would surprise her with gifts or flowers. He would care for her tenderly when she was sick or had surgery. And, he would brag to others about her. I saw it all and I took careful note of it. 

Dad spent time with us and talked with us and expressed his views and feelings with us. He knew that we all were different and set different boundaries for us as he saw what we needed. He trusted mom's advice for us and would take her lead when he was unsure. But mostly, being a dad was just part of his being. It was like he was born to be a dad and was so confident in all he did with us and for us. 

That was the type of man my dad is. . . was

I visited him again so soon after I visited him six months before and he is not the same man I knew. He seems less confident. He seems frail and unsure of himself. He slurs his words and he loses his train of thought. He doesn't laugh as easily and he is more quiet than he ever was. He rambles his thoughts as he is thinking them and they seem so random and disorganized. It's like he is another person. 

He seems so different from the man I knew growing up. 

And he doesn't whistle anymore. 

And that thought alone catches in my throat and pulls tears unbidden out of my eyes. 

How can he not feel like whistling?

God! I am feeling the loss of never hearing his whistle again!

Then I think about what type of man I have become. And I know without a shadow of a doubt that he is tickled and proud of who I am and what I have done with my life. But in my mind, I think that I will never be the man he is.... Was. This feeling I have... This unworthiness plagues my journals. And I look up to my dad and can only hope to grind my teeth and dig in my heels and pull up the grit I need to hit this life full in the face just like he did. I want to be the husband he was and the father he was when I was growing up. I want to be the man he was, the man I knew, the man I experienced. But I just don't feel like I am there. I just don't feel like I am getting it done like he did.  

Did he worry and think like that? My head and reason say yes but my eyes and gut can't believe it. I don't want to know. I don't want it to be true. I want to remember him as I do right now. I want to remember the leader I have in my memory. I want him to stay that man in my child's mind that never saw weakness in him. 

I could only hope to feel like I am the man I know my dad to be. 

So today is a hard day. I am trying to let go. I am trying to let go and admit to myself that my dad is not that man anymore and to admit that he is elderly. I have to admit that he has had several strokes and will not be the man I knew growing up. 

And I don't want to. I don't want to face that truth. I'm not ready. I will never be ready.

So, I am struggling. I don't want to admit it.  Because of the type of man my dad was. 

Homeland - R.A. Salvatore

 

I read this book when I was in my early teens and I was in middle school at the time. It was not a good time for me in school because I was a socially awkward, large for my age, uncoordinated, not cool , not in the “in crowd” kid. Yeah, I was one of those. If you were not in that group when you were in school, then just let me tell you a little secret. . . It was like having my own little piece of hell. Things did get better as I got closer and closer to graduating though.

        I had some pretty good things going for me. My home life was fine with great parents that were supportive and involved. They had a very strong marriage, and they were all in when it came to their kids. So, my home life was really great. It was just those hours I was at school that were difficult. And my mom with her superpowers of just knowing that I was struggling but not wanting to put it all out on the table, pushed me into reading which was a great way to just take mental breaks from the chaos of school.

        And that is where this book comes in. It resonated with me and really encouraged how I was already feeling about myself. First of all, the whole fantasy elf magic multiple gods thing was just the carrier of the content that resonated with me on a very personal level.

        First of all, just like Drizzt, I understood what it was like to be an individual with a different set of core values living in a society that was so contradictive to what I was holding dear in my heart. I understood the “man against the machine” stresses of holding true to who I was. I knew first hand how they attack you and scorn you for not being like them. . . . not following their stupid social rules. I truly could sympathize how my inner feelings and core spirit would never change to the dogma and wrong that was a socialized norm for them. I saw how others would bend and fall into being one of them and for me, I just would not fall. I would not trade who I was to have an easier life in school. I knew deep down that I would never be one of them. I could never be like them.

        I truly resonated with the thoughts and actions of Drizzt and how he looked at things like family and love and courage and strength and power. And those concepts were not the same as those around me. I had my family and my life outside of school and great mentors that were guiding me in lots of different directions counter to the culture and whims of the school. What I saw and felt and experienced outside of school were so contradictive to what I saw happening in school. . . All of the blind following and false grabs at attention and status. It was pretty sad to see from an outside perspective.

        I looked at how Drizzt soul searched and really dug deep into who he was as a person and what he had to offer to himself and to the world as a whole. He questioned himself and his motives all the time. He questioned a world view of status and evil his people had with skepticism and judged if it was right or wrong based on his own feelings of right and wrong. He learned how to trust and not trust. He also held true to himself and focused on what it was about himself that made him worthwhile in the grand scheme of the world and his place in the universe. As I read the pages of his thoughts and actions, I would gravitate to wanting to do the same thing and started to look at those around me with a different set of eyes.

        I also believed that there was another side in which I could escape if I just had the patience and the sight to know when it was time to take a step out of the line and into a different lane. I always thought, “I will make my own fork in the road of my life and then make a right turn.” And you know what? It did happen. It was inevitable. People have choices even when it feels like they don’t. It all has to do with having the courage and the grit to see the choices you have and then to take that one step forward.

        Now that I look back, it was not so important that I fit in and went with the flow. It was more important to always become the adult I was meant to be. I had to dig deep and really explore and develop and spend time on who I was and who I would be. I am a much better adult now because I chose to work on that awkward targeted teen back then. All those things that held me back and singled me out as a teen in school were actually productive and needed as an adult. Who would have thunk it?

 

I don't know what to call this post but it is about marriage

 You know, my marriage is strong. Like unbreakable strong. 

And I know that there is an overall mindset that no marriage is unbreakable. Most people believe at least one of a married couple will cheat if they have the chance or one will leave because of this reason or that. Someone will inevitably fall out of love or they will want to find their own happiness or ..... Or..... Most people just believe that it is pretty much inevitable if there is a chance or opportunity to cheat that it will happen. Look on Facebook or Tic Tok or snap chat or Instagram.... failing relationships and divorces abound all over. There are pages and pages of these people making videos about what a "Good Man" is or how to recognize a keeper or how to keep your relationship together or how to recognize if someone is going to leave..... ect. . . Ect. . . And why is that? Well, I am not sure but maybe these short social media videos and pleas for change are a thermometer of how far wrong our public mindset has gotten. 

When my wife decided to marry me, she decided to build her life around me and I decided to build my life around her. 

It was a choice.

A choice that turned into a lifetime of wanting it not to be a choice . . .but wanting it to be a non-negotiable. 

I have written of it before that finding your love of a lifetime should be the most deliberate endeavor you should ever take. It starts with knowing yourself and loving yourself deep down (Loving yourself first blog) to knowing what will make you happy to understanding that life will beat you down (we have a hard life not a hard marriage blog) to actually knowing how to make sure you have found the one (My advice on love post and Why I married her blog) to understanding your role in your marriage (marriage roles - an unpopular view blog) and the list goes on. A lot of my blog is about my marriage. 

I think what it really boils down to is that my wife and I, once we really took the time . . . and I mean really took the time . . . to get to know each other and truly bond with each other, made a decisive and purposeful choice to build our lives and our happiness around each other and with each other.

No matter what. No matter who pushes from the outside. No matter what life threw at us. No matter what horrible advice our single friends or unhappy married friends said. We have grown to understand that at the end of the day, we had each other and we would cast all that outside crap aside and keep the focus of what we wanted on us and our goals and our connection. 

And this is vital to the success of a marriage. 

My wife and I have had extreme trials to our marriage. Trials that can . . . and have . . . broken lots of other marriages. I lost my job, and she couldnt find one. We made a hard choice to leave the state we lived in and our family when we didn't want to. We had trials of infertility and then the difficult (almost fatal) births of our children which has affected our intimacy life permanently. We had to go through bankruptcy and money issues. Hell! She now makes more than me which is one of the common reasons women leave their marriages. Health issues have been a bane. You could say they were the true tests to our marriage. . . our commitment to each other. You could say that they were the thermometer of the strength of our relationship. No question though, many of these issues have and will break a marriage, but we are still going strong. And why is that?

It is because what she and I were building together was more to us than what was happening to us. We were (have been/are/will be) putting so much into what we wanted of each other out of life that we were unwilling to give it up on those things. I call these times seasons. These hard times in our lives come and go. Some are temporary and some are permanent, but they all are on the outside and they try to get in and push you apart. Christians would call this the Devil trying to destroy.

The security of not being alone when taking on the world is the payoff here. That's it. That is what keeps us strong. You know? I mean, yes, we took the time to make sure our lives and our vision and our goals of what our lives will look like coincided. But once that was established, it is how you, as a couple, hit life with your vision in your minds. It is the idea that you are taking on the world together..... Not alone. Do you hold onto it making steps toward it with all you do or do you jump ship when it gets hard? 

Obviously, a lot of couples jump ship. 

I just find comfort and strength knowing that she is there.... That she will be there . . . that she will fight for me . . beside me. .  when we are in hard seasons. Because there will be hard seasons. It is inevitable. It will happen. And you can either trudge through it alone or take it on with someone backing you. I rather take it on with someone I love with all my heart and trust to be right beside me. 

It comes down to having that vision together and building it together. How much you each make even if one makes considerably more or less doesn't matter because you are building it together. People trying to pit you against each other will fail because you are building it together. Life hits you in the gut with hard times and it doesn't matter because you are building together. What people say or do or try to break us will fail because we are building it together. 

You get it? Take the time on the front end to find the person that will go through hell itself to take on the world because the vision you both are heading for and the bond you create that holds you together is worth more than anything that tries to pull you guys apart. 

I truly believe the Bible is right in this matter. It doesn't even matter if you believe in God or Jesus. It's this idea of "one flesh" in the Bible that is right. When you marry a person, you become "one flesh" meaning that the two of you basically become one person with the same goals. You will be loyal to your life together and always be looking to make each other happy as you would make yourself happy. Everything you do is to move yourselves forward with the strength you both have that will enhance and not take away from your union. You embrace each other and be intimate with each other and you connect with each other because you technically are literally representing being one person, neither one being separate from the other. Because nothing is more important than what you are building and your connection to drive your desire to build. When you talk of your marriage, it becomes talking about the two of you as being one person.... us. And that is the foundation of it all, don't you think?

And that is why we are so committed, where the strength in or marriage comes from, and eternal love comes from. And that is what is missing in current times.

Mind games - I am still not ok.

 God I'm in such a mess that I don't know what to do . . .  it's again and again and again and again . . . the the shouting and the yelling and the . . .  the threats and the . . . the threats of killing themselves and it's too much for me. I  . . . I'm shaking again tremors. I don't know if I can . . . I don't know if my mind is stable enough to even deal with this anymore because it goes away for a while and then it comes back.  Like . . .  like I'm always . . .  I'm always scared. I'm scared of it coming back and then it does and then I know it will start all over again and I don't know what to do. I have a son that literally abuses me emotionally and mentally and I lay boundaries down and he doesn't like them, so he falls into this "I'm autistic and I . . .  I might as well kill myself and I don't want to be alive" and I don't know what to do. I just don't know what to do and I don't trust him now. I mean I . . .  think maybe I feel . . . and I'm scared that maybe he'll hurt his mom . . .my wife . . . oh God! If anything happened to her and he did it and I wasn't able to stop it and I wasn't able to fix it and he hurt her or  . . . or worse  - I'd never forgive myself! And what am I going to do? Stay up 24 hours a day and run myself into the ground? Hell, I'd be killing myself! Who knows? I might be killing myself right now with all the worry and high blood pressure. I could stroke out or something. 

I had to get out of the house. I'm just walking now. I don't know what else to do. I can't be there . . . he's there. He's there ready to keep this fight going . . . ready to . . . ready to torture me with some other mind game.But I don't know if it's a mind game or if he is serious. I mean if you are serious when will you do it already but if he's not serious then then how do I tell? How do I get out from under this? I feel trapped in my own home with . . . with the kid that just will not grow up . . . will not be independent. A kid that expects me to be his soul provider like a slave. . . almost like a he wants me to be the dad of a baby giving him everything he needs so that he doesn't have to do anything. And he's 21 effing years old! And here I am walking out on the street because I can't face him, and I don't know what to do. I don't know how to solve it and I've tried to get people to help me. I just need someone to take him away  . . . someone to just take him and turn him into a man because we can't do it. And he doesn't want to and he just wants to kill himself. That's what he says but he doesn't do it so I don't know if he's serious or if he's just playing mind games with me. And if he did . . . what would I do? What does that say about me as a father? What will that do to my . . . to my mind? What will it do to my marriage? What will it do to the rest of my life if . . . if he actually went through with it? Then all . . . all those problems will just go away but then what . . . what will it do to my mental health? That I have a son that had killed himself? Either scenario is horrible. To even think about . . .  just for him to be alive and still abusing me and making my life hell or for him to kill himself and then I'm a childless parent who wasn't able to keep his child alive. So I'm stuck and I think . . . I don't know . . . I don't know how I'm not in the hospital myself yet because I don't know how much strength I've got left. I don't know why I haven't had a mental breakdown yet. I don't know why I'm not depressed. Maybe I am depressed, and I just don't know it. Maybe I'm just . . . you know . . . functionally depressed, but if I go to the hospital nothing will. . .  nothing will change. They'll just release me, and they'll send me back. And he'll still be doing the same thing. I won't escape. I will still be in the same turmoil. I'm living in a jail of whether. . . whether I live one hell of . . . of him and his manipulation and his mind games, and the other hell of him killing himself and me living with the fact that I wasn't able to stop it. What then? What? How. . . how am I supposed to go on if that happens? How am I supposed to go on when it doesn't happen? So, here I am walking and walking and walking until I probably will collapse. I'm walking because I can't go back. Not right now. Not with the way he is right now and if everything's okay when I get back home, how long will it be before the next time? How long will it be before he . . . he throws his games on me more because I don't know how much longer I can do it. I don't know how much more I can shake it off. I don't know how much longer I can keep it together.

I'll give respect when I get respect.

 I will give respect when I get respect.

How many of you have heard this nonsense? Seriously, if the person you are interacting with has the same philosophy, think about that. These two will never ever be cordial to each other no matter how much they could enrich each other's lives just by being individuals with their own personalities. This whole way of thinking seems to be a bit of a paradox. 

I have been thinking about this for a while because I read a passage in a book that got me to thinking about the motivations behind why I would or would not give respect to a person. Honestly, I still hold to a very deep belief that the way you treat others is a reflection of the type of person you are rather than bringing to light the type of person you are interacting with. Calling out another person for faults or wrongdoing or being judgmental shows more about you than it ever does for those people. 

And it is not just calling them out, it is the way it is done that is most telling. Publicly shaming them or trying to ruin their reputation with malicious gossip and intent (no matter how true it is) is not a very good character trait to have. Rather, instead of broadcasting, you can be indifferent or aloof. If asked directly, you can just say a quick statement of why you are not supportive of them or why you will not associate with them and just leave it at that. 

But why not give a person respect until you get respect first? Is this person not a human being? Have they not a spirit and a personality and thoughts and feelings? Does that in itself not warrant the dignity of being treated as a being with a sentient mind? 

I understand that first impressions and the way a person presents themselves can be off-putting. It is true that people can be mean and confrontational and rude when they first talk to you. Think about the way you respond though. If you respond in kind, is that not a reflection of where you are maturity wise? Or is it more respectable for you to show compassion and empathy and acceptance. I personally don't have it in me to be mean or rude or unkind with a first interaction no matter how I have been approached or treated first. Honestly, the way a person treats me with no knowledge of who I am most likely has nothing to do with me personally. Maybe I triggered a memory of how they were treated by another person. Maybe they just finished a particularly bad commute. Maybe they had a fight with their spouse earlier. Maybe they are having problems with their job. Maybe they are angry deep inside because they have a sick loved one that they feel helpless about. Hell, maybe they are just defensive because they have never been treated like a human being before! Whatever it is, the way they treat you has nothing to do with you. And if you keep that in mind, the way you respond is critical to how the rest of the interaction will go. 

And seriously. It is really simple. If you have lost all respect for a person, why is it necessary to waste your time and energy running them through the ringer? Just step back. Give space and distance. Cut off ties. If you work with them, keep all interactions strictly business and then go your separate ways. But, alas, people can't let go that easily. 

It has to do with pride and arrogance. Seriously. People that demand respect in order to get respect are those who feel as if they deserve it (arrogance) or they feel like they have been judged unworthy of receiving it (hurt pride). These are signs of self-worth are they not? Demanding respect from someone that is unwilling to give it is like demanding an apology. It means nothing because the person in not genuine. So why demand it in the first place? Just move on to those who know your worth and leave those others behind. 

So, be kind . . . don't respond in kind. Show respect to another person just for the reason that they are a human being with feelings. Show respect to them no matter how they are treating you because you are reflecting who you are and not who they are. Have the confidence and the character to show respect even if it is not given to you. 

Excerpt from The Halfling's Jem by R.A. Salvatore Copywrite 1990 by TSR:

What keeps Captain Deudermont safe is his ability to show respect for anyone he meets. He is a man of charm, who holds well his personal pride. He grants respect at the outset of a meeting and continues that respect until the person forfeits it. This is very different from the way most people view the world. Most people insist that respect has to be earned, and with many, I have come to observe, earning it is no easy task! Many, and I include my friends in this group, demand that anyone desiring their friendship first earn their respect, and I can understand their point of view, and once believed that I held one similar. On my journey south on the Sea Sprite, Captain Deudermont taught me better, made me realize, without ever uttering a word on the subject, that demanding of another that he earns your respect is, in and of itself, an act of arrogance, a way of self-elevation, implying by its very nature that your respect is worth earning. Deudermont takes the opposite approach, one of acceptance and one lacking initial judgment. This may seem a subtle alternative, but it most certainly is not. Would that the man be anointed a king, I say, for he has learned the secret of peace. When Captain Deudermont, dressed in his finery, enters a tavern of common peasant thugs, most within the place, and society at large, would view him as superior. And yet, in his interactions with these people, there is no air of superiority about the man at all. In his eyes and in his heart, he is among peers, among other intelligent creatures whose paths have led them to a different—and not better or worse—place than his own. And when Deudermont grants respect to men who would think nothing of cutting his heart out, he disarms them, he takes away whatever reason they might have found to fight with him. There is much more to it than that. Captain Deudermont is able to do this because he can honestly attempt to see the world through the eyes of another. He is a man of empathy, a man who revels in the differences of people rather than fearing those differences. How rich is his life! How full of wonder and how wide of experience! Captain Deudermont taught these things to me, by example. Respect is one of the most basic needs of reasoning creatures, particularly among men. An insult is just that because it is an assault upon respect, upon esteem, and upon that most dangerous of qualities: pride. So when I meet people now, they do not have to earn my respect. I grant it, willingly and happily, expecting that in doing so I will come to learn even more about this beautiful world around me, that my experiences will widen. Certainly some people will see this as weakness or cowardice, will misconstrue my intentions as sublimation, rather than an acceptance of equal worth.