Rant VIII: The Reckoning

figmentPez

figmentPez

Staff member
I almost had a panic attack during play rehearsal tonight. Or, at least, what I call panic attacks. It's a little weird for me, because if I get to the point where my heart is racing, and I can't breathe, and my thoughts are running out of control and I feel like something is horribly wrong and I might die from what I'm feeling... I just hit the "repress" button on my emotions and it all goes away, to be replaced with horrendous amounts of pain and often paralysis as well, but it stops the emotion and I'm very calm about hurting and not being able to move.

In any case, the play I'm in requires me to grab the wrist of my female co-star... and not let go. It's not a long struggle, maybe about 20 seconds, but she's wrenching and trying to pry my hand off of her wrist, while begging me to snap out of it and let her go. And I have to say lines in a threatening voice while this is going on. Inside me there is a part that is screaming about how wrong this is, and the conflict between intellectually knowing that I'm not hurting her, and what my emotions are telling me about the situation is severe. Along with all the other emotional stuff I've been having trouble processing lately, this was just too much and I had to take a break from practice to compose myself. Even now my legs are partially numb, I feel dizzy and I'm sick to my stomach.

Deep breaths, and I think I'm going to play games for a bit before trying to process this more.
 
Ravenpoe

Ravenpoe

figmentPez said:
I almost had a panic attack during play rehearsal tonight. Or, at least, what I call panic attacks. It's a little weird for me, because if I get to the point where my heart is racing, and I can't breathe, and my thoughts are running out of control and I feel like something is horribly wrong and I might die from what I'm feeling... I just hit the "repress" button on my emotions and it all goes away, to be replaced with horrendous amounts of pain and often paralysis as well, but it stops the emotion and I'm very calm about hurting and not being able to move.

In any case, the play I'm in requires me to grab the wrist of my female co-star... and not let go. It's not a long struggle, maybe about 20 seconds, but she's wrenching and trying to pry my hand off of her wrist, while begging me to snap out of it and let her go. And I have to say lines in a threatening voice while this is going on. Inside me there is a part that is screaming about how wrong this is, and the conflict between intellectually knowing that I'm not hurting her, and what my emotions are telling me about the situation is severe. Along with all the other emotional stuff I've been having trouble processing lately, this was just too much and I had to take a break from practice to compose myself. Even now my legs are partially numb, I feel dizzy and I'm sick to my stomach.

Deep breaths, and I think I'm going to play games for a bit before trying to process this more.
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You seem to have a difficult time seperating yourself from your character, and rationally seperating the emotions you're pretending to have for the scene, and the ones you're actually having. This seems like it could be troubling for someone that is pursuing life as an actor.
 
figmentPez

figmentPez

Staff member
Ravenpoe said:
You seem to have a difficult time seperating yourself from your character, and rationally seperating the emotions you're pretending to have for the scene, and the ones you're actually having. This seems like it could be troubling for someone that is pursuing life as an actor.
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I'm not pursuing life as an actor. This is just for fun. I really enjoy it, except for this unpleasant conflict between what feels real and what I know is true. Yeah, it's a problem, but I think I can work it out.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
figmentPez said:
I almost had a panic attack during play rehearsal tonight. Or, at least, what I call panic attacks. It's a little weird for me, because if I get to the point where my heart is racing, and I can't breathe, and my thoughts are running out of control and I feel like something is horribly wrong and I might die from what I'm feeling... I just hit the "repress" button on my emotions and it all goes away, to be replaced with horrendous amounts of pain and often paralysis as well, but it stops the emotion and I'm very calm about hurting and not being able to move.

In any case, the play I'm in requires me to grab the wrist of my female co-star... and not let go. It's not a long struggle, maybe about 20 seconds, but she's wrenching and trying to pry my hand off of her wrist, while begging me to snap out of it and let her go. And I have to say lines in a threatening voice while this is going on. Inside me there is a part that is screaming about how wrong this is, and the conflict between intellectually knowing that I'm not hurting her, and what my emotions are telling me about the situation is severe. Along with all the other emotional stuff I've been having trouble processing lately, this was just too much and I had to take a break from practice to compose myself. Even now my legs are partially numb, I feel dizzy and I'm sick to my stomach.

Deep breaths, and I think I'm going to play games for a bit before trying to process this more.
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Even Chris Tucker had problems with his lines in Rush Hour two where he's supposed to call the chinese girl "but you a crazy ass bitch!" They wasted several takes of him stumbling over and flubbing his lines, and somebody explained to the chinese actress what the problem was, and she hugged him and told him via interpreter that it was ok, so he could do the line.
 
Bubble181

Bubble181

I've lost somewhere between 12 and 15 kilos (say 25-30 pounds) over the last year. If I were in the market for weight loss, hey, great, except that I'm not. I'm trying to eat enough and often; I've taken to really not looking out at all and always just taking the extra cookie you might want but don't take "because", I put extra spread on my sandwiches, I eat lots and lots of fruit and candy between meals and I try to actually eat 3 or 4 times a day, and i(m still losing weight. As in, my girlfriend complains that I hurt her when she's lying on my shoulder because I'm too bony, and I've noticed my muscles are actually starting to waste away as my body is looking for nourishment. Or something. I'm 1m88 and about 72 kgs now (6ft2, 158 pounds) - not anorexic by any stretch of the imagination, but still. I don't seem to have much fat, if any, left and I simply don't have any energy whatsoever. I'm not lazy (okay, I am, a little bit), but I literally can't find the strength to do some fairly pedestrian tasks these days.
Combined with a still-lingering depression and my high stress levels, I just don't see this going anywhere positive in the near future. Gah. I just want to have the energy and the mental strength to actually get up and do something, but....Ugh.
 
LittleKagsin

LittleKagsin

Bubble181 said:
I've lost somewhere between 12 and 15 kilos (say 25-30 pounds) over the last year. If I were in the market for weight loss, hey, great, except that I'm not. I'm trying to eat enough and often; I've taken to really not looking out at all and always just taking the extra cookie you might want but don't take "because", I put extra spread on my sandwiches, I eat lots and lots of fruit and candy between meals and I try to actually eat 3 or 4 times a day, and i(m still losing weight. As in, my girlfriend complains that I hurt her when she's lying on my shoulder because I'm too bony, and I've noticed my muscles are actually starting to waste away as my body is looking for nourishment. Or something. I'm 1m88 and about 72 kgs now (6ft2, 158 pounds) - not anorexic by any stretch of the imagination, but still. I don't seem to have much fat, if any, left and I simply don't have any energy whatsoever. I'm not lazy (okay, I am, a little bit), but I literally can't find the strength to do some fairly pedestrian tasks these days.
Combined with a still-lingering depression and my high stress levels, I just don't see this going anywhere positive in the near future. Gah. I just want to have the energy and the mental strength to actually get up and do something, but....Ugh.
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*HUGS** I'm sorry you're feeling so lethargic. In my experience, I'm betting your stress levels have more to do with the weight loss and feeling so tired. On the food front, I would try and sneak more veggies into your diet - when I'm feeling slow, it's normally because I haven't kept up my veggie intake. I'm really not sure what your diet is, and you are probably not looking for advice, but if you're eating lots of candy/cookies, your body probably is looking for nourishment that it's not getting.

List of snackie foods that should give you some more energy:
apples
bananas
blueberries
watermelon
nuts - almonds
red bell peppers (this has so much vitimin C in it, it's insane)
carrots
cucumbers
avacados

Foods to help give you more strength:
eggs
fish - salmon, trout, tuna
skinless chicken breast
beans


And...if you could, maybe exercise a tiny bit? Just to at least get those endorphines going...which could possibly help with the depression. =^^=

(I feel like I'm giving you advice when you're not asking for it, so I apologize.)
 
Bubble181

Bubble181

LittleKagsin and stienman : thanks :) I have been watching my calorie intake for a while, and I easily go over 2000 kcals a day - I'm usually over 3000, in fact. Lots of empty sugars and such, of course, mind you. Which is why I try to compensate with fruits and vegetables. I do try to snack continously while watching TV, usually a mango in small bits, or some grapes, or sliced cucumber. Red bell peppers are actually among my favourite foods, though I have the feeling they, err, pass right through.

As for exercise, I know I lack it (greatly - my job is sitting still for 12h straight and most of my hobbies involve sitting still and either watching a screen, or sitting and shouting numbers, or sitting and reading,...Ahum). that said, I usually lack the motivation to get up and actually do anything, and if/when I do, I have the feeling I'm exhausted before I begin - 10 or 15 lengths of a pool (so about 300 or 400 yards) have me sinking to the bottom and having to cling to the side to keep my head above water.

I'm also having trouble keeping up my body heat and my breathing tends to go through the roof at the slightest provocation, so I'm actually beginning to wonder whether it might indeed not be something slightly more physical (as in, anemia or some variation) instead of just stress and mental issues as I've been telling myself....

And Kags, don't worry, I don't mind getting advice - if I didn't want anyone to say anything, I wouldn't post it ;-)
 
LittleKagsin

LittleKagsin

You know, anemia is quite possible. And would explain the lack of energy. If you're looking for foods with iron in them I would add mollusks to my list. Along with the nuts and beans.

A lot of the time I don't have the motivation to exercise either. What I find helps me is to find something I enjoy doing that involves moving around. My friends and I love to go disc golfing and the course here is on the side of a mountain, so it's quite the exercise. But I don't feel like I'm exercising because it's just good fun with friends. I'd encourage you to find something you like to do that involves moving around. =^^=

Also, please don't drown. I would be sad. :(
 
Bubble181

Bubble181

LittleKagsin said:
You know, anemia is quite possible. And would explain the lack of energy. If you're looking for foods with iron in them I would add mollusks to my list. Along with the nuts and beans.

A lot of the time I don't have the motivation to exercise either. What I find helps me is to find something I enjoy doing that involves moving around. My friends and I love to go disc golfing and the course here is on the side of a mountain, so it's quite the exercise. But I don't feel like I'm exercising because it's just good fun with friends. I'd encourage you to find something you like to do that involves moving around. =^^=

Also, please don't drown. I would be sad. :(
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No intent to drown, I stay close to the pool's edge on purpose ;) Mollusks, beans, lentils, nuts: throw in peas and oysters and you've pretty much made a list of all the stuff I don't like to eat :p
 
LittleKagsin

LittleKagsin

Bubble181 said:
No intent to drown, I stay close to the pool's edge on purpose ;) Mollusks, beans, lentils, nuts: throw in peas and oysters and you've pretty much made a list of all the stuff I don't like to eat :p
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Well, eat them you beautiful fool!!

I forget a lot of the time that people have foods they don't like. Mostly because I eat just about everything - there are two foods I don't like, chocolate and pizza. But other than that, I eat like a monster.
 
Gared

Gared

Ok, so now that I am officially no longer employed by my former company, I can post that rant. A lot of the anger and venom has gone out of it - both because it's been a day and because it's a beautiful day outside, and who can stay extremely angry on the first gorgeous day of Spring?

So, I heard from my contract manager a few weeks ago that my contract hadn't been renewed, because my Microsoft manager had found enough wiggle room in his budget to hire someone full-time who was better qualified to handle the business intelligence duties that he'd been previously having me handle. It kind of came as a surprise, seeing as how I'd never had any complaints from my manager about my reporting skills or my main job duty. I suppose it should have been a warning sign when my contract manager wanted me to be the one to contact my Microsoft manager to discuss the ending of my contract, rather than him contacting me, but I was oblivious. Oh, and at the time that she called me, she also told me that the hiring of the FTE had already taken place.

After that, I expected at any time to be told that I needed to schedule some time with my replacement to train him how to do my job. It's an easy job, but it does require 7 or 8 different Microsoft internal tools, some external software, a bunch of legal information, etc. Never happened. Meanwhile, my Microsoft manager is getting angrier and angrier by the day in his (very rare) emails to me, and curiously, none of the other managers that I report to for my various other projects have been advised that my contract hasn't been renewed, so as soon as I tell them that I'm leaving, they're left scrambling to find someone to take over the jobs that I do for them. Shouldn't be a problem for an FTE who has a solid background in BI, right? This is the second clue I missed.

Everything kept on just fine until yesterday afternoon, when one of my co-contractors, a guy I've worked with for over a year, one of the ones who took me out to lunch today to say goodbye, got back from a meeting with my (now former) Microsoft manager. Where he'd been told that he gets to train the guy who's replacing me to handle some of his reporting so that he can go on vacation this year. Oh, and the training is going to take a while, because the new guy doesn't know Excel. And he's also a contractor. Who works for the same company that I no longer work for.

So no, Microsoft didn't replace me with an FTE who was more qualified for the business intelligence portions of my job. My contracting company replaced me with a cheaper contractor who doesn't even know Excel, then lied to me about it.
 
Gared

Gared

blotsfan said:
Did you do complicated stuff with excel or can he not grasp how to handle a simple spreadsheet?
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Apparently he has little to no history of using the program. I have no idea what he can do, I still don't even know his name, and probably never will. And while I don't really consider it to be terribly complicated, there were a lot of vlookup tables and PivotCharts/PivotTables.
 
DarkAudit

DarkAudit

Yay! Three day weekend!

Boo! Kidney stone flareup. Woke up to feeling I was being stabbed in the gut. Repeatedly. Can hardly move. Had to tell mom that if it wasn't urgent, she'd have to do without for a couple days. If it was, hit the LifeLine button.

So much for a BBQ run tomorrow.
 
Gared

Gared

DarkAudit said:
Yay! Three day weekend!

Boo! Kidney stone flareup. Woke up to feeling I was being stabbed in the gut. Repeatedly. Can hardly move. Had to tell mom that if it wasn't urgent, she'd have to do without for a couple days. If it was, hit the LifeLine button.

So much for a BBQ run tomorrow.
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Dude... suck.
 
Bones

Bones

DarkAudit said:
Yay! Three day weekend!

Boo! Kidney stone flareup. Woke up to feeling I was being stabbed in the gut. Repeatedly. Can hardly move. Had to tell mom that if it wasn't urgent, she'd have to do without for a couple days. If it was, hit the LifeLine button.

So much for a BBQ run tomorrow.
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man I have had and passed an actual dozen, i am 26, thats one almost every other year. I always love the doctors, "What!? you want pain killers!? YOU MIGHT ABUSE THEM!"
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Gared said:
So no, Microsoft didn't replace me with an FTE who was more qualified for the business intelligence portions of my job. My contracting company replaced me with a cheaper contractor who doesn't even know Excel, then lied to me about it.
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I feel your rage. I had experiences with headhunting/contracting companies early in my career that taught me to do everything in my power not to go through it again. Yeah, the money was good while it lasted... but it never lasted.
 
Gared

Gared

GasBandit said:
I feel your rage. I had experiences with headhunting/contracting companies early in my career that taught me to do everything in my power not to go through it again. Yeah, the money was good while it lasted... but it never lasted.
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You know the worst bit? I would have been OK with it if they'd told me the truth. If they'd come to me and said "Chris, we're real sorry, but Microsoft's putting the screws to us and we have to bring in someone cheaper," I would've understood. I was a contract employee, my contract was bound to expire at some point and not be renewed. But to lie to me and tell me that the reason I'm being let go is because Microsoft hired an FTE, and then have me find out differently the day before my last day (which I'm sure they never intended to happen)? That's not right. Coming clean would have made it just another business decision. Lying made it personal.
 
Ravenpoe

Ravenpoe

Gared said:
You know the worst bit? I would have been OK with it if they'd told me the truth. If they'd come to me and said "Chris, we're real sorry, but Microsoft's putting the screws to us and we have to bring in someone cheaper," I would've understood. I was a contract employee, my contract was bound to expire at some point and not be renewed. But to lie to me and tell me that the reason I'm being let go is because Microsoft hired an FTE, and then have me find out differently the day before my last day (which I'm sure they never intended to happen)? That's not right. Coming clean would have made it just another business decision. Lying made it personal.
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I know this feel. It sucks.
 
Gared

Gared

Ravenpoe said:
I know this feel. It sucks.
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Yeah, I told my wife you and I should go out for beers. It would be someone difficult, us being in almost polar opposite states and all, but we both just had the same thing happen to us, aside from you not being a contract worker.
 
Dave

Dave

Staff member
You know you're going to have a good day when you answer the phone while getting your mail. The phone call was telling my my aunt had a massive heart attack last night and passed away, and the mail was a letter from my landlord telling me I had to pay $900 for a plumber bill or be evicted.

I'm going back to bed now.
 
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