Good morning! We’re doing the thing today!
To ask a question, patrons can post to this thread and anyone can reach me on Twitter (@CAwkward, #AwkwardFriday). Submissions close at noon Chicago time, at which point I’ll answer as many as I can between then and 1pm.
Comments are open! So many great questions! Thanks everyone.
Dear Captain,
This won’t be the most dire question you receive today, but I’m writing in the hope that you can help me with scripts, advice, and encouragement as I convince my wonderful family that the sky won’t fall if I’m unavailable to them for an hour or so each day.
In a lot of ways, I’m very lucky. Privileged, in fact. I have a husband (he/him) I love, two teenagers (a she and a him) that I also love, and a menagerie of adorable animals who are oh so lovable. I have a full-time job. I also have a book contract! I’m writing about something I’m passionate about, and I’m really enjoying the research, the writing, and the editing as I try on new ideas, write things down, and then edit obsessively to get things just right.
However, whenever I shut myself into my messy little home office to get some work done, all hell breaks loose.
Things will be going along swimmingly at home, and then I’ll say those fatal words: “I’m writing now. Please don’t come in unless there’s blood, fire, or vomit on the floor.” The door closes, I fire up my computer, and then:
Daughter: Can I go to Friend’s house?
Me: Ask your dad.
Daughter: He’s meditating.
Son: Mom, can you come here? It’s important! (Spoiler: It’s never important.)
Daughter: I told Friend2 we could drive her to Friend1’s house.
Husband: A SPORTSBALL PLAYER YOU’VE NEVER HEARD OF WAS TRADED TO A TEAM YOU DON’T FOLLOW!
Me: I thought you were meditating?
Son: Mom! The dog’s doing something adorable! Come see!
Daughter (via DM): Mom whats for dinner?
Me (via DM): I thought you were going to Friend1’s house
Daughter (via DM): No, she and Friends 2-5 are coming here.
Daughter (via DM): Dad couldn’t drive me so I said they could all come here
Son: Mom! What’s for dinner?
(Enter two cats. One of them takes up residence on my lap; the other, on my keyboard.)
Husband: THAT GUY WE SAW IN THAT THING BACK IN 1997 IS ON SVU!
Editor (via DM): So how’s the book going?
Me: Jesus, take the wheel.
Captain, I have tried it all. I’ve tried closing the door (the doors in my house don’t lock, alas). I’ve tried putting signs on the door. I’ve tried responding with a vague “Mmm-hmmm,” I’ve tried yelling (“WHERE’S THE FIRE?”), I’ve tried talking at dinner about my need for JUST ONE LOUSY HOUR OF SOLITUDE. And I love my family, but if the only time I’m able to get work done is at 8 a.m. Saturday when everyone else is asleep (the rest of my family is apparently part-vampire because no one goes to bed before midnight), I’ll never meet my deadline.
So, from one creative type with a family including floofy animals to another: How do I stake out and claim the time I need to do this thing that I really, really want (and, not for nothing, am contractually obligated) to do?
Many thanks,
The Crowd in the Room of My Own (she/her)
Hi,
I’m hoping you can help me with some coping mechanisms for jealousy which will help me feel less like the shittiest friend in the universe.
Long story short, a friend got a job I wanted, and I’ve spent months failing to not let it affect our friendship. The whole story is long but the important details are these:
She got an early start in the “big leagues” of our industry because of connections I didn’t have, beating me out for jobs before I even knew her.
A mutual friend promised me I’d be his first call on a job I really wanted, but then hired her.
I had a hard autumn, and overwork combined with personal insecurity culminated in me, in tears, while she tried to console me over the job she was (very rightly!) excited to start the next day.
She’s just gotten the reiteration of that job I really wanted. I’m still angling to get them to hire me too, at a lower title than hers.
Last fall I tried really hard to be supportive and excited for her and mostly failed. I’m afraid to spend the rest of her time in our city (she plans on moving… eventually) watching her get jobs I am equally qualified for because her resume is better. I also don’t want to look forward to the day she moves, just because it means I won’t have to compete with her for work anymore. I don’t want to feel like a terrible friend anymore because I can’t be happy for her, and I absolutely don’t want to force her to console me on big happy occasions.
I think her fiance dislikes me and I worry she confides in him that she feels uncomfortable in our friendship, or that she thinks I’m an incompetent artist. I will never actually know without damaging the friendship by pushing the issue, but it bothers me anyway.
I have read your “focus on yourself and what you like” advice, and the “back off and gently let reconnection happen” advice and that has been helping, but I’m worried that watching her have a job I wanted will disintegrate our friendship, or worse, if she doesn’t, or isn’t able to hire me. I need a way to restructure what’s happening in my head so I’m not feeling overwhelmingly betrayed by this friend who hired her, and jealous of her all the time.
Dear Captain,
I’m in my early 30’s. Having spent my 20’s doing the ‘right’ things (college -> law school -> office job), I have now recognised what was clear all along, namely that this is not for me at all, and that maybe that’s okay. I’ve also realised that maybe it’s okay to not be making the maximum amount I possibly could be, and okay to say ‘no thank you’ to the budding career I have zero interest in in favour of pursuing my passions.
Passions, of course, don’t pay very well, certainly not at first and possibly never. If I quit right now, today, I would be living hand to mouth with virtually no safety net. If I hold on for another 22 months, then I would have a very substantial safety net, enough to cushion me for a decade or more to come (I would still need to work to feed myself, but I would be able to absorb a good number of unexpected financial blows before going into crisis mode), plus put me in a better position in old age. There is no in between here.
Herein lies the quandary: I could die in six months’ time, in which case I would rather quit now and take my chances. On the other hand, if I did quit now and then didn’t die shortly afterwards, 2020!Me’s life is likely to be significantly more precarious and uncomfortable than it would be if Present!Me stays for the 22 months. I should add here that I tend to be a lot more productive in the creative area I want to pursue when I feel immediately secure, so this isn’t even just about my own comfort, but potentially impacts the quality of the work I want to do (and of course the point of this whole exercise is to give myself a better chance of producing quality work).
Knowing myself, I will probably do the 22 months. I don’t hate my job, have no reason to expect my imminent demise beyond the fact that it could happen to anyone, and the job comes with a fixed end date at the end of the period, so I’m less likely to fall into the trap of just putting it off and putting it off until it becomes too late. I’m just having a hard time reconciling myself to the ‘what if’ part right now right now. Help please?
Readers! Especially Readers Who Are Also Writers! Here is a blog you might want to know about:
Dear Captain,
I’ll preface this letter by saying that I’m a chronically depressed woman with big anxiety problems and BDP (and one of the ways it manifest is a crippling fear of abandonment).
I have been dumped. By a theater group. I was friend or friendly with all the members (some before the theater). I didn’t see it coming.
We’re an amateur group, so each year our director is whoever volunteers. Someone, let’s call her Loki (I’m feeling petty) took over the job, was congratulated (it’s not an easy job and nobody else was rushing for it). She organized a few reading session over the summer; I attended the first, the second I was in vacation and the two last ones I was too depressed to attend, which I didn’t think would be a big deal. The decision was ultimately hers, she took it, chose a play with eight roles even though we were ten comedians. One week ago she announced it, and last night called me to tell me I was out because she has chosen “to keep the people most invested this summer”. Somehow I’m the only one out.
An additional reason I’m pissed: she chose to cut me out even though I was already a member of the group, but brought her brother in and in an subsequent text she sent me, she talked about the scheduling difficulties (why did she told me that??) (I had no schedule constraint as I have a job with regular hours, no partner or kid and no other activity).
She repeated she was sorry, and I could still be part of the group by doing the grunt work (my words, not hers) of building the set or sewing the costumes (not interested). She also repeatedly offered to me to talk this over around coffee, which I’m very wary about because 1)i don’t see the point beside easing her possible guilt 2)I get emotional real quick and rn all I could see happen is me crying or me yelling, which are both bad. 3)I don’t want to somehow get back in because she would take pity of my mental health issues.
The rest of the group probably doesn’t yet knows what she did and why, they would have said something and I assume she wanted to tell me first.
The final thing is that the scholar year has already started, so it’s gonna be hard to find another, if any, theater group (full of strangers!) I guess my question is: how do I deal with those feeling, how do I deal with Loki and the rest of the group?
Sad And Pissed the Hell Off (she/her)
Hello Captain and friends!
This problem has been sitting in my mind, waiting to pounce, for months. Recently it came to the forefront and shocked me a bit.
I’m a 24-year-old graduate student pursuing a career that I’ve wanted since I was a preteen. Grad school has been good overall, especially for my confidence. I have wonderful friends, good family relationships (I live with my parents), and artistic hobbies that I enjoy (although I don’t put much effort into them). I was diagnosed with severe anxiety in 2014, did therapy for a year, and went on medication this summer. Therapy reduced OCD symptoms and negative self-talk, and meds have reduced daily nervousness. I’ve had four part-time jobs in food service, reception, and retail respectively. I always put my best face forward at work, and I make up for school-related procrastination with anxiety-fuelled planning and get really good grades.
But the other day I realized that I’ve never been good at anything, and I’m probably not good enough for my career path. My first boss called me “inefficient”. I made more mistakes at my second job than the newbies, even after four semesters. (Same goes for the campus kung fu club.) I was frequently reprimanded at my third job and got a few serious talking-tos. At my fourth job I often felt overwhelmed and scattered, and they didn’t call me back to work the holiday rush. I’ve never been fired, but I had to quit all of my jobs due to going to/leaving school. I wasn’t very good at my volunteer positions or hobbies, either.
Two days ago I got a performance review at my school internship. My supervisors are excited to ramp things up with me next term. Although my technical skills are at par, I’ve made social blunders due to my habit of acting without thinking when I’m anxious. In general, I don’t have the professional conduct skills to “fit in” at the agency or truly connect with clients. With some wheedling I got one supervisor to indirectly admit that if this had been a job, I’d have been fired by now.
Realizing that I’m bad at the work I value and have wanted to do for so long was awful. And I don’t know why I make so many mistakes. I realize that anxiety sabotages concentration and motivation, but now that I feel less anxious the problems have not gone away. I’m nearly certain that these mistakes were/are due to unchangeable cognitive or personality flaws. I started self-harming this summer to make my self-hatred more concrete.
I just don’t want to be incompetent anymore. I don’t want to let people down.
Regards,
Tomato in the Mirror
