Dear Neil: A couple of months ago you wrote about a retired woman who was financially supporting a man who could not support himself, but she described him as a great guy who was loving and kind. I am in a similar situation, but I feel financially taken advantaged of by the man I’m involved with. The kindness he is showing me actually feels like he is going through the motions so I will continue to support him.

If I were without work, lost my retirement, in debt to the IRS, barely holding onto my business, and was being housed, fed and mostly financed by a man, I would be doing everything I could to change my financial situation so that I could contribute more equally, and I would also help with household responsibilities and care of the home. I would think twice before I turned on the jacuzzi, opened an expensive bottle of wine or invited family over, expecting the dinner to be prepared and paid for by the man I am living with. Kindness and love go only so far. There also needs to be mutual respect.

Fed Up in California

Dear Fed Up: You don’t feel respected by the man you’re living with because you feel you’re being used—and it sounds like you don’t respect him either, because you think he is in the relationship way more to receive than to give. You need a serious talk with this man about what your needs and desires are, and about what you are wanting to see changed. It would also be appropriate to tell him that you are hurt, angry and disappointed in how he is handling his financial affairs, and that you feel he is acting entitled to perks that do not belong to him.

Although you are obviously complicit in the arrangement the two of you have, you sound resentful, and resentment poisons love. Have this conversation with him right away, or your resentment will ruin the relationship anyway.

Dear Neil: Having made poor choices in two relationships, I’ve learned the hard way about people who act entitled. One was a functioning alcoholic (who has since joined AA), and the other was an extremely demanding woman. I went above and beyond being supportive, but in both cases the more I gave the less I was appreciated.  Eventually I had to wake up and smell the coffee. Childhood trauma may explain a lot of their abusive behaviors, but if you can’t take responsibility for your own actions, you become a bottomless void. I have learned that you have to respect yourself first, and placing yourself in an abusive relationship is no way to respect yourself.

Learned the Hard Way in Scotland

Dear Learned: Although we are all in a relationship to get our needs met, some people are far more likely to be givers, and some are clearly more likely to be takers. Givers tend to be people pleasers, and takers tend to act entitled. Takers seek out givers, which makes sense if you think about it. So if you’re primarily a giver, be on the lookout for signs that someone is acting entitled or expecting to be catered to. We all broadcast to others who we are. You just have to get adept at learning how to read the signs.

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Dear Neil: I have recently declined opportunities to spend time with my father, and I told him that it was because he has been acting very entitled, and is therefore not a very enjoyable person to be around. I wasn’t rude, but I explained how I felt and I set limits on what I would accept. The end result is that my dad apologized and changed his behavior so he could be with me. Also, a tenant I rent to will be getting the boot in 3 months, even though she has said that she loves the place and wants to stay. Acting demanding and rude has cost her staying at the place she wants, and I will be more than happy to share with her why she isn’t getting an extension or a longer lease agreement. I am simply going to remove her, and maybe I will teach her a bigger lesson at the same time.

Learn how to deal with people who act entitled. It doesn’t work to threaten or punish them. But you can set effective limits on them and their behavior.

Setting Limits in New York City

Dear Limits: Whether we know it or not, we teach people how they may treat us every day. Setting effective boundaries is simply being clear about what your expectations or requirements are, because people who act entitled tend to not listen to what other people feel or want. As a result, it may be necessary to be unambiguous and clear-cut about what you are asking for, expecting or requiring.

And don’t take their actions personally, as hard as that may be to do. A person who acts entitled is not doing so simply to irritate you or to be selfish. The entitled person very likely feels inferior or that s/he doesn’t measure up. Understanding his or her behavior in this context is one of the keys to dealing with it effectively.

To illustrate the point, think of the behaviors that you associate with a healthy adult with reasonably good self-esteem. Some of the characteristics of such a person may include self-control, the ability to delay gratification, being dependable and reliable, able to take personal accountability and control his/her words or behaviors, has a sense of gratitude, can cope with adversity, and can cope with disagreement—to name a few.

Now think of the characteristics of a person who acts entitled. The words you are likely to use to describe that person include demanding, blaming, shaming, has a need to be right, has an intolerance of criticism, has a hard time acknowledging fault or errors of judgement, and has a tendency to overstate abilities and accomplishments. If you look closely enough, you will notice that this person is very insecure and has low self-esteem. That’s why he needs to continuously build himself up or she needs to put other people down and be so demanding and self-centered. Secure people with positive self-esteem don’t need to prove to the world how great they are. Insecure people do.

You can’t have a good relationship with a person who acts entitled. A relationship requires that both people’s needs, wants and desires are treated equally important. Someone who acts entitled will place their wishes/needs above yours.

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Dear Neil: I have an adult stepson who is 37. He and his wife have 3 kids (6, 5 and 3). Since I retired in 2012 they assumed that I would be their on-call babysitter. One day he brought his daughter over to my house first thing in the morning for me to babysit, without calling or asking me first. I wasn’t feeling well, and told him so. He got angry and left with his daughter—and I didn’t see them for 2 years, even though they live 10 minutes away from me. Now that I am retired, no one is entitled to my time. When they discovered that their emotional blackmail wasn’t working, they have come back around.

Time is My Own in South Carolina

Dear Neil: I had a spouse that acted like it was my life’s mission to afford her as much spending money as she wanted. After I became ill and had my colon removed, I cut down on work—and she cleaned out the house of all furniture and belongings and left. When we divorced, she expected me to surrender my entire engineers paycheck to her, and she requested lifetime alimony/maintenance, which was denied by the court. She then demanded that I co-sign her new mortgage. It this doesn’t illustrate an attitude of entitlement, I don’t know what does.

Expected to Work Till I Drop in Michigan

Dear Time and Working: People who act entitled often believe that they are the center of the universe. They are demanding—obsessed with their own needs and desires to such a degree that frequently they ignore the wishes of others—or treat the desires of others as much less important. They are not very sensitive to someone else’s feelings, wishes and aspirations. They are takers, not givers.

Here are the behaviors of someone who acts entitled:

• They are controlling, manipulative or bullying in order to get their way.
• They will make demands or ask for sacrifices of others, which are essentially designed to benefit them.
• They are extremely impatient.
• They get angry easily—and show it.
• They will act punishing of people who oppose them or who attempt to interfere with what they want.
• They will often be critical of you (and others), because they do not tolerate disappointment well.
• Their happiness and well-being comes first.
• They take more than they give.

Acting entitled is alienating to almost everyone, and it insures that the entitled person will have unhealthy relationships with others. I will address what you can do, or how you might respond to someone’s sense of entitlement, in next week’s column.

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Dear Neil:  I read an article written by you about entitlement.  I am wondering if you have some specific, defined actions one can take in dealing with entitled people.  I work with two of them, no less, and I dread it, as any little thing that goes wrong can turn into a major problem.  When forced to work with people who act entitled, what is the best approach?

Dreading It in Longmont, Colorado

Dear Dreading It:  People who take a position of entitlement act contemptuous of others.  Superior.  They become offended when somebody objects to their behavior, and have a very difficult time apologizing when they make a mistake or act inappropriately.  They may easily blame, criticize, shame, humiliate or judge others—or demand that others meet their needs or live up to their standards—but are resistant to meet your needs or to live up to your standards, and they aren’t empathetic.  The act as if they have the right to do or say whatever they want, and you have no right to object.  So says psychotherapist John Mariner of the Relationship Resource Center in Denver.

Frequently this behavior comes from people who were shamed as children. Adults shamed as children frequently get angry and feel defensive when someone challenges or disagrees with them.  They suffer feelings of humiliation if forced to look at mistakes or imperfections, and they often feel judged by other people.

Author John Bradshaw argues that the core of feeling shamed comes down to my sense of inadequacy.  Feeling inadequate, in turn, makes me feel afraid that I will be discovered to not be good enough—and that I will never measure up.  Avoidance of negative judgment or criticism—or any suggestion that I’m less than perfect—therefore becomes the organizing principle of my life.  So I must cover up my mistakes at all costs, and one way of doing so is for me to judge, criticize or get angry at you.

So what can you do if you live or work with a person who frequently takes a strong entitlement position?  You can:

• Use praise and admiration whenever you can.
• Remove the criticism and blame from your comments.
• Don’t take an adversarial position unless you have to.  Verbalize what you agree with, what makes sense or what you think is a good idea.  Then say what you want—but say it as tactfully as you can.
• Ask questions that encourage teamwork:  “Where do you think we’re in agreement?” or “How can we put our heads together and come up with a solution that all of us can live with?” or “What could I do that would assist you?”
• In cases where it’s not appropriate to agree with someone, at least acknowledge his/her emotions.  “So you’re feeling we should go in a different direction.  Is that correct?”  As soon as the other person feels heard and understood, tension and conflict are likely to be reduced.  By choosing to respond to a disagreement with a non-adversarial, empathetic approach, you can often transform the defensiveness, anger or hostility into teamwork and cooperation.

I also discuss this in a more recent column called People Who Act Entitled.

“Treat people as if they were what they ought to be, and you can help them become what they are capable of being.” —Goethe

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Because of this, I feel a fair amount of resentment and distance toward him.  It feels as if he doesn’t care about me and my feelings—certainly he doesn’t treat what I say I need as important.  I know this doesn’t sound very promising for a long-term future together.  Is there anyway out of this?

Forlorn in New Jersey

Dear Forlorn:  Among other things we could say about this (his self-esteem is very low, he’s fragile, feels inadequate and inferior, was likely shamed as a child, is defensive, a control freak, possibly a narcissist and has poor relationship skills), your boyfriend has taken a position of entitlement.

Entitled people act intolerant of anyone that dares to say anything they interpret as criticism.   They act grandiose and aren’t empathetic to other people, especially an intimate partner who has the power to criticize, judge or reject them.  They act above reproach.  Even minor requests (“Would you please blow your nose rather than sniffle.”) can be met with a huge defensive reaction.  Their behavior appears shameless, because they themselves are not above shaming, blaming or criticizing others.   And because they act one-up, they put their intimate partner in the position of being one-down.

If it’s not already obvious, an entitled one-up position works poorly in an intimate relationship.  An entitled person adopts the attitude that “my needs and wants cancel your needs and wants.  My rights cancel your rights.”   In a recent interview, John Mariner, a psychotherapist at the Relationship Resource Center in Denver, says that the one-up position is a defense designed to help us survive.  But survival skills are designed for survival, not for intimacy.  Mariner advises that we need to honor our defenses without letting them drive our car.  He says, “Picture a five-year-old behind the steering wheel of a car.  You need a functional adult to drive the car, not a child.”

Among the skills we need as functional adults is to be able to replace our defenses with boundaries.  Boundaries are far more flexible than defenses, because can open up and let intimacy in.   Mariner says you can’t have a real dialogue with a person who is in a strong entitlement position.

How do you get out of this dilemma?  Relationships work best when we honor our own feelings and needs without claiming that those needs are the only ones in the room.  You must find your voice and speak up—regardless of your boyfriend’s reaction—or you’ll never feel valued in your relationship with him.  Your boyfriend must adopt a willingness to hear your emotions or issues, and to allow your feelings, needs and desires to have leverage.   He must learn to care about you enough to contain his own reactivity and defenses in order to hear what you have to say.

The main piece escaping your boyfriend is that survival is necessary to grow up safely, but it doesn’t work for an intimate relationship.  For intimacy to work, we need to have an adult driving our car.  “For every hour of entitlement I take, I’m going to get one and a-half hours of resentment,” says Mariner.

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