Person in Charge
Did a work thing today that was technically easy but that lots of people thought was emotionally hard. I’ve gotten more recognition for being confident about a shitty plan than I have about any actual work I’ve done for years.
Realized that one of the reasons I hate recognition is that it means we’re in a crisis. When we’re not in a crisis I am invisible (by design) so me being noticed or in charge means things are terrible and I am alone. It’s sort of the same feeling I have about my friends only noticing me when they’re in crisis. And definitely the same feeling I have about all the times I was in charge of household responsibilities or parenting when I was 9.
Talked to DerbyK about lots of things, but this isn’t the Screed where I write about them. Talked to Cowboy for a minute too, to practice the art of care through technical support.
Talked about fleeing in therapy, but this isn’t the Screed where I write about that either. I’m trying to imagine a life where I raise the bar a bit – fleeing was an improvement from my previous life, but it’s not the target I should be aiming for anymore. Just like “I’ll do it alone” was once a good stress reduction plan for you – an escape from responsibility for others – but probably isn’t as good as the “we’ll do it together” you could have today.
Made plans for soccer with L. Didn’t get to watch this [fig 2] but might check the VoD based on the stills. Did finally change this [fig 1] with pretty minimal fuss; it is a little hard to want to use pliers on your face but once it was lose the rest was pretty easy. I like the dots-only look, and I’m super excited to finally have color, which is the main reason I imagine for piercings.
Yelled a thing today about having help just because you’re too close to the thing that needs doing. Sometimes what we need to do is hard not in a technical way but because it’s adjacent to other feels and stress. When that is happening it can be much, much easier for someone else to do it – to help you with it – just because they have some distance from it. You don’t need help because you’re incapable or lazy or weak, but you should have help because the same task will be easier for or with someone else. It’s how I helped at the day job. And I yelled it at DerbyK. I tell Shanda and M all the time (but not in a way that works very often). Today though I saw it for me – that I should let Shanda help with “my” responsibility because, at least right now, it’s eaiser for her than for me. And later when it’s not we’ll do something different.
I could stand for it to be the end of the week, after the feels Shanda and I did today. But I’ve got a bunch of SRs (though I think mostly easy ones), C is coming over tonight, I need a haircut, and there are some chores sitting on my counter. There’s robots and soccer and health insurance and I need to rent a car to get shit out of my house. There’s the pressure of finding a path that encourages the care people need without making them feel like they’re a disappointment. It’s a less stressful week than the last couple, but there’s also some recovery from things we gave up while stress was high.
ZiB
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Sent from a phone.
