Comments | gement: Emotional labor and building support networks

gement

Emotional labor and building support networks

Jul 28, 2015 14:13

I ended up reading a lot of this thread about unpaid emotional labor (which has a wonderfully moderated comments section, this is a "do read the comments") and it's speaking to something I've been struggling with ( Read more... )

Comments 8

pielology July 28 2015, 21:30:25 UTC

Hah, I was just thinking "gee this care team volunteer management thing is sure sparing me a lot of emotional labor trying to figure out how to offer help, this is great!". Without it I probably would've spun around trying to figure out what kind of aid would be appropriate for our level of social bond and not figured it out and then felt guilty forever. So I'm glad you've made the effort on that front that you have.

There was one comment in that thread from someone who'd basically avoided learning how to emotional-labor, because of how her mother resented the role of sole emotional laborer in the family, and... oh man yup yup yup. I have some balls of feelings to unwrap.

gement July 28 2015, 23:07:53 UTC

Excellent, I'm glad it's having the intended effect! It's been a useful structure for me to be very specific about needs, while allowing people to opt into my "interested in being part of these requests" connection level.

I'm realizing my mom actively opted out of the family dynamics by moving 100 miles away from the apron strings (she's talked about it repeatedly, how it felt like swimming out of a whirlpool), and that has had profound effects on my understanding of extended family interactions.

maribou July 28 2015, 23:59:37 UTC

It is generally my impression that people in our mutual friend circles have a reasonable amount of emotional-labour awareness (we know what could be done, and probably even feel an "ought" about doing it) and not a lot of emotional-labour energy (we have chronic illness that make functioning hard and/or jobs that drain all our extrovert and/or children and/or and/or ( ... )

gement July 29 2015, 04:44:26 UTC

That was pretty damn coherent and incredibly helpful. I think the sheer head-count of people we expect ourselves to keep track of, sans the yesteryearly Feminine Kin-Keeping Training that some people on the thread are talking about their families expecting, goes a long way toward explaining my expectation gap.

So, yeah, I could be doing better, but it's telling that I felt like I should personally notify nearly a hundred people about my diagnosis before splashing it on social media, and then some of those have been getting back to me a week later saying "I kind of fail on keeping up with communication lately sorry" and are clearly feeling the same way I do.

Thank you.

randomdreams July 29 2015, 05:01:27 UTC

I feel like we're an entire culture that is so overwhelmed we have trouble keeping up with all the stuff we want to do.

plantae August 2 2015, 22:41:13 UTC

Yes.

gement July 30 2015, 03:36:26 UTC

For my later reference, the comment where someone said something close enough to the thing I was feeling so I could finally breathe again. That particular expansion stays central for about the next 20-30 comments.

It doesn't cover the "I see these things need doing and then my anxiety is a train wreck," but the discussion really begins to get to the fact that *knowing* it is an issue that takes up bandwidth is the real bridge to be crossed in most of the complaints. Yes, some of us are really bad at this for a variety of reasons. Meaningfully acknowledging that is, sadly, enough, a big step up from what most of this thread is talking about.

gipsieee August 9 2015, 05:34:58 UTC

You were someone I wanted to get to know better when I was living in town. Busyness, lack of free slots on (my) dance card, and not wanting to impose got in the way of that. After I moved across the country, LJ and fun reading (did I ever tell you how much I smile when I have a patient named Gerard come through at work? It's actively hard not to giggle) did a LOT to cement our friendship for me and at this point, our interaction level seems pretty evenly matched to me... We ping at random and interact when it lines up well (which is shortly after most pings), but it helps a LOT that I'm in a later timezone than you are as I have stepped on your bedtime pretty regularly every time I've tried to communicate with you or set up getting together when I'm actually in town (except this last visit where we stayed at your place and (I think) didn't keep you up tooooo late every night ( ... )