BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - A swarm of biting fish injured more than 70 people who were bathing at a popular beach in Argentina on Christmas, a medical official said on Thursday.

A seven-year-old girl had her finger partially amputated and dozens more suffered bite wounds on their extremities from the fish, a relative of the piranha called "palometas," said Federico Cornier, the director of emergency services in the city of Rosario.

"This is not normal," Cornier said on television. "It's normal for there to be an isolated bite or injury, but the magnitude in this case was great ... this is an exceptional event."

The attack happened off the popular beaches of the Parana River near Rosario, 300 kilometers (186 miles) north of Buenos Aires, where many Argentines were seeking relief from a heat wave over the holiday.

(Reporting By Alejandro Lifschitz, Writing by Mitra Taj; Editing by Kenneth Barry)

Depression: Unrealistic Expectations for Happiness?

In working with people who struggle with depression, there has been a noticeable pattern of how people tend to approach the idea of happiness. The fantasized expectation is that a person becomes happy, and then stays this way…forever. If, at any point, the happiness goes away, then it means they’ve become depressed again and have failed in their quest to maintain happiness, and are therefore “not happy.”

Sound reasonable? It isn’t. It’s a perfectionistic belief that is bound to cause defeat — which is what generally happens with fantasies of perfection. Though depression isn’t as simple as a product of a distorted perception of happiness, the mindset that people “become happy” and fully leave sadness behind can make it tougher to fight against depression.

States of happiness don’t last forever without interruption. Emotional states are temporary. It’s possible to be an overall happy person while still having days, hours, and moments of sadness or lethargy. Striving for happiness that will last uninterrupted can only result in failure, and only increase feelings that you can’t achieve happiness, which will only exacerbate the depression.

There are also varying degrees of happiness. People often mistake excitement for happiness. This is the fantasy that being happy means walking around in a smiley, energetic, overactive state, having engaging conversations with everyone, and nearly becoming the life of the party in all life’s contexts. This is the fantasy of manic happiness. If this was happiness, people would be exhausted from being happy, and also would be denying the experience of other necessary emotions. Happiness isn’t meant to be an exhausting feeling or even a constant feeling.

The lesson here is to learn to allow room for a range of emotions, and to take notice of the positive emotions you experience, even if they’re currently a smaller part of the picture. The ability to understand that emotional states are temporary will hopefully lead to more of an acceptance of all of our emotions, including happiness. The problem comes when we dismiss the other emotions and focus only on the feelings of depression. So, if you feel depressed ten hours a day, and feel balanced and content three hours of the day, and happy for a half hour, people tend to dismiss those balanced and happy hours and only count the depressed hours since it was the bulk of the day. In the end, this disregard of non-depressive emotions leaves a person under the impression that they’re constantly depressed, and only reinforces the depression.

Sounds too simple to really make a difference, right? However, taking more notice of positive emotional moments will start a process of opening us to other states of emotion we experience, which will eventually shrink the pressure of the sadness and depression. The more we can allow room for other emotional states, the less room there will be for depressive states. People are amazed when they find that they may have 30 minutes of happiness or enjoyment in their day, even if they felt down for the remainder of the day. The more we can regard the existence of positive emotion in our lives, and the more we learn what causes positive emotions for us, the greater the likelihood that we can come to experience more happiness.

Relationship Killer: “You should have known what I want…”

Mind-reading. It’s one of the easiest ways to cause ruptures in friendships or in relationships. It’s not the people who try to read minds that cause the problem, it’s the ones who hope or expect that the other person will read their mind that becomes problematic.

This is a very common phenomenon. It usually comes out as, “get a clue”, “you should just know what I want”, “can’t you take a hint?”, etc.

The hope is that someone will do something nice without being asked, or it can be used in the negative — hoping that someone will know when to give space or not do something. But it usually doesn’t turn out as hoped.

“Get a clue” is often used when someone hopes they’ve given enough signals to indicate what they want or don’t want. However, this is passive-aggressive, even when the clues are seemingly obvious. Passive-aggression will cause problems even if the clues are read “correctly” because it represents a gap in communication and leaves significant room for error in interpretation. It also means that something isn’t being communicated, even if the signals are being read as hoped — a person may figure out that the clues say to stay away from a person, but the reasons and motivation are still not being addressed. Generally, passive types of communication cause more trouble than being direct.

“You should just know what I want” is more of a wish of a fantasy. This usually comes out in relationships in response to one partner not coming through in the way the other hoped. “You should just know that I wanted to be left alone,” or “You should have just known that I want to spend Saturday with you,” or any others. It would be great if everyone always knew what their partners wanted, but it’s not always so simple.

The idea here is that whenever communication is indirect or based on clues and hopes, it’s likely that there will be disappointment and frustration when the clues are misread, or missed altogether. There are so many ways to interpret clues and hints, that even someone who knows you well can misread the intent. Though it may ruin the fantasy by directly communicating wants, needs, and desires — asking for a hug instead of the satisfying feeling of your partner just figuring it out —  direct communication will help ensure you’re on the same page. For how few times the mind-reading game actually works out, many disappointments, arguments, frustrations, hurt feelings, and even breakups could be avoided by remembering that people around us can’t always read our minds. There are other ways to fulfill fantasies than silently waiting and building frustration.

If you want something, or don’t want something, say it. If you want someone to figure it out on their own, be prepared for disappointment when it doesn’t go the way you want.

10 Signs You May Be in an Unhealthy Relationship

Technically, a relationship needs to only be defined by the people who are in the relationship. What is a “good (or healthy) relationship” for two people may be completely different than a “good (or healthy) relationship” for two other people.

However, there is a difference between a relationship having its own shape and character, and a relationship that is either harmful or generally unhealthy for one or both partners. These relationships can be difficult to spot from the inside because one or both partners grow accustomed to the life of the relationship. Denial can also be a factor due to fears of change, failure, or otherwise. So while it may seem like it should be obvious when you’re in an unhealthy relationship, it isn’t always so simple.

Here are some signs of concern within relationships. Note, the presence of one or more of the following signs doesn’t necessarily mean you should end your relationship. These are things to keep an eye on, and if they persist, may need further attention in order to improve the state of your relationship.

1) Hitting. Relationships are going to have their share of arguments and disagreements. This is normal. However, when one or both partners crosses the line into hitting, even if it’s just one punch and not an all-out brawl, this is a concern. One punch is still abuse, no matter the gender of the aggressor.

2) Name-calling. Arguments are rarely pleasant (though at times relationships tend to feed off of them, for better or worse). Name-calling, however, crosses the boundary from a heated disagreement into hostile disrespect and disregard for your partner. Name-calling is verbal abuse, is contemptuous, disrespectful, and only tears your partner down. It doesn’t have a productive quality to it for the relationship.

3) Lack of support. While it’s not possible for each partner to always be supportive in the desired moments, it becomes problematic when goals, achievements, desires, and other forms of personal life fulfillment are constantly met with resistance and negativity by your partner. While a partner can’t always be expected to be supportive of everything, a healthy relationship generally has a sense of overall support between the partners. Without this, resentment and frustration eats away at the relationship.

4) Forced to answer to your partner. There’s a difference between coordinating with your partner out of common respect for each other, whether it’s for scheduling social or work events, coordinating child care, or otherwise, and having to actually receive permission from your partner to see friends, spend money, etc. This is a form of being controlled, and often appears in the form of one partner controlling the other’s spending, who the partner associates with, and keeping tabs on everything the partner does. This is also a form of psychological abuse.

5) Feeling angry or resentful of your partner. It’s one thing to be angry or annoyed with your partner, at times. This is normal in relationships. However, if there’s a general sense of resentment and anger towards your partner that overarches your relationship, this isn’t healthy. Something is going on that needs to be addressed before it erodes the relationship.

6) Pressure to abandon children of previous relationships (often in second marriages). Second marriages, especially when children from previous marriages are involved, can add dimensions to relationship conflicts and boundary violations. These can range from forcing a partner to choose between them and the partner’s kids from a previous relationship (seeking relationship priority), and actually forcing a partner to change wills, assets, and other end of life plans into their inheritance priority and control. There’s usually an indication of abandonment if the partner doesn’t comply. While some people give in to this, whether out of fear of abandonment, or otherwise, this is a form of insecurity, entitlement, manipulation, and control that is a sign of an unhealthy relationship.

7) Ultimatums and threats. Healthy relationships tend to have healthy forms of communication. Ultimatums and threats signal frustration and resentment — an attempt to dominate and control the partner. There is more going on in the relationship that needs to be addressed if ultimatums and threats are being made.

8) Dictating discussions. Whether it’s through stonewalling or directly dictating when discussions end or begin, this is another form of control. This represents not only control, but a breakdown in communication. Dictating endings leaves one partner destroyed and impotent, and sets up a superior/inferior dynamic. While this dynamic can technically work for some relationships, it’s not a sign of a healthy relationship, as it sets up a destructive dynamic where one rules the other (forcing conversations on your partner before they’re ready to have them is also a problematic relationship behavior). The idea is to re-visit the conversation when both are ready. But if one hopes to end the conversation without revisiting the issues, the problems will remain present in the relationship.

9) Cheating. While this may seem obvious to some, people who experience an unfaithful relationship don’t always see cheating as a relationship issue as much as a sign of personal shortcoming or failure — that their partner had to make up for their shortcomings by going outside the relationship. This kind of rationale often covers the fear of losing the relationship. It is taken on as a personal issue, rather than an interpersonal relationship issue (or even as the cheating partner’s issue). While relationships can recover from cheating, cheating is a sign of something unhealthy within the relationship dynamic. The cheating partner may carry significant responsibility of the act, however if the relationship was functioning at a healthy level, cheating likely wouldn’t come into the picture.

10) Embarrassment of your partner. This shows up in various ways, but may come in the form of resisting having friends or family meet your partner, intentionally avoiding  mentioning your partner in conversations, or speaking negatively about your partner to people who aren’t close with you (as opposed to venting relationship frustrations to a close friend, which is a normal way to cope with stress). These are indications of desire to keep your partner away, rather than joined with you.

There are other issues that aren’t listed here, but the main themes that signal an unhealthy relationship are forms of abuse, control, and blatant disrespect and disregard of the partner (it can be from one partner to the other, or back-and-forth between both partners). It’s important to keep in mind that relationships can become healthy again, often with the help of couples therapy. An unhealthy relationship doesn’t automatically mean it’s time to break up. However, if the issues continue, or there is an unwillingness from your partner to work together on these relationship issues, then a decision will eventually need to be made.