jinian | bad roller coaster (Reply)

Well, that was fun.

I posted a thing to the Emotional Labor thread, which was basically two links because they came together on my friends page this morning, and mentioned Kate Beaton's mom as an EL master.

And when someone disagreed with me that she was a martyr not a master, I tried to acknowledge her point of view while expressing my own more clearly. Of course, she appreciated this zero and came back at me again like I didn't understand. I stayed careful and reasonable, and I apologized. I did not silently leave, I did not flounce off, I did not complain that I expected the same consideration that I'd seen in other parts of the thread even if we disagreed. I was very nearly crying, and I was fucking nice. I explained as best I could. I did my best to maintain the tone of the thread, which... well, it's been really important to me. Having that be a place we could respect and listen to each other was a really big deal.

Of course, that used up nearly my entire emotional capital for the day. Barring an important personal email that I was almost done with, and a small but frustrating thing that I decided was easier to just do than ask someone else to address, I have gotten hardly anything emotional done today. (At least I managed to start some DNA preps. It wasn't easy.) I couldn't even sit outside the lunchroom and eat, I tried it but people were -talking- nearby, so I had to go hide in the seminar room, which was almost not far enough away. Re-re-rereading Touchstone because I can't handle another damn thing and I have run through all the comfort reading I've got more recently than I've read this -- and my reader already had it in memory so it hasn't been that bloody long at all.

And eventually I realized, I just did exactly what she was mad at me for not hating. I spent myself recklessly for someone who didn't care about me. Which, I guess, good on me for not hating myself? But I do wonder if she is angry with me specifically -for- being considerate when she was angry.

I feel like I have a standard for correct behavior, and I apply it to myself. That's all. That thread is full of people who overextend themselves way more than I do -- I would not put up with a lot of these horror stories! -- and now I feel like the one who's beyond the pale is me.

Does everyone feel like this is what always happens? I go to Wiscon and get talked over by dudes, science fiction fandom tries to tell me how I feel and is super wrong, and apparently I can't be safe in this other place that seemed like it ought to work either. I know I wouldn't feel this bad if I hadn't had The Worst Year, but I fucking do feel this bad. I feel like I ruined it myself and also like it's not my fault at all, but either way something I was feeling good and hopeful and happy about is gone. And it pretty much sucks that trying to console myself that it's only gone for me (because I did a good job trying to fix it for everyone else) now leads back to why I am wrong and bad.

...

Some hours and a nap later, I see that I did exactly what I was trying to do. No one would get that I was upset and feeling attacked, and the other person doesn't even read as all that aggressive. Maybe I could have asked for help after all? But I don't really know those people, so I think I did a really good job. This is why we keep it together when we feel bad: because sometimes things that feel terrible are not objectively terrible.