draconym - Tumblr blog

[draconym]

I am so sorry for you, sometimes. I wish you a safe haven from Tumblr Discourse™. You need it I think.

All things considered this is a pretty ridiculous thing for people to start Discourse about, so I'm not taking it personally. It is yet another example of people on tumblr turning a low-stakes matter of personal preference into some kind of moral issue. Many such cases.

[draconym]

Re the "are you mad at me" conversation, I think it's interesting and definitely important but it does need to be used effectively. My therapist had to get me to stop asking my partner are you mad at me, or at least use it in rare cases because I was beginning to use it as some form of self soothe for my anxiety, and it was becoming detrimental to our relationship. This ain't referring to like my partner slamming down cups and huffing around but refusing to talk to me straight, we always prided ourselves on communication and having difficult conversations. It was becoming almost ritualistic for me that several times a day, for no reason at all, my partner would get hit with the "are you mad at me?" And that must have been super exhausting for him. He'd just be having a great day, playing a video game or something and I'd come in with "are you mad at me" and my therapist pointed out that it was an affect of my social anxiety, and comfort seeking causing slowly escalating behaviours. Eventually I was able to break the habit with the help of my partner, the response to "are you mad at me" instead of a comforting no, became "Have you done anything I should be mad at?" And I'd have to reflect back and go no I haven't done anything wrong, and that would be the answer. This is absolutely a mileage may vary for sure, but I think it's interesting to note how it can become a self soothing behaviour to ask someone if they are mad at you.

I'm glad you sent this because it's a good illustration of how anxiety can cause an otherwise normal behavior to become compulsive and get out of hand, and how self-awareness and communication can change that kind of pattern for the better.

It sounds like a lot of people at tonight's Are You Mad At Me round table have had experiences with someone asking the question repeatedly or compulsively. And I can see how that would be really stressful for both parties. Wishing everyone a very Honestly And Gently Express Your Feelings evening.

[draconym]

hey, i didnt know asking someone that you're mad at them was bad until today so..... welp.

It is not bad. It is a fairly normal thing to ask someone if you think that they are mad at you and you want to see if they are willing to talk about it with you. Some people apparently do not like being asked this question, and they are allowed to say so. And then other people will treat it as a sleeper agent activation phrase to say the most bizarre things possible on anon in my inbox.

[draconym]

Surprising how a room temperature statement like "maybe you should consider being patient with people who ask if you're mad at them because it's possible they have anxiety" will be interpreted as some kind of apologism for manipulative social behavior on this, the excellent reading comprehension and good faith argument website.

[draconym]

if you think that the only people who have experienced child abuse in an "are you mad at me" social interaction must only be the ASKER it's DEFINITELY you who's flattening things, holy SHIT.

Literally where did I say that lmfao. Piss on the poor website.

[draconym]

“Are you mad at me?” is the sort of question a child asks an abusive parent. Adults bristle at it because it flattens complex interpersonal dynamics into an immature yes/no dichotomy that pressures the answerer to minimize their frustrations for the sake of comforting the asker. It’s not conducive to real conflict resolution.

I have literally been posting about and for people who experienced childhood abuse so this is an especially weird take. I think it may be you who is flattening interpersonal dynamics here.

[draconym]

hmm just spitballing here but I think sometimes the issue with "are you mad at me" is that it's a yes/no question where a yes is quite a strong statement.

like yeah people should be able to answer with "im not mad but im irritated" or "no but i do need you to take this seriously" or whatever and have that be accepted, but it can sometimes feel like an attempt to either get you to escalate (by saying yes) or drop the matter entirely (by saying no).

(apologies if you don't want your inbox to become Mad At Me Discourse central, feel free to ignore of course!)

I think that's a good point. I live in a house full of peacemakers with overactive conflict resolution glands and strong impulses to Talk It Out, and for that I am very lucky. But I think this has left me ill-prepared to speak to people with more indirect or euphemistic communication styles. I would have a difficult time living in the Midwest.

[draconym]

hey. don't cry. I went to Mad At You island and none of your friends were there :)

[draconym]

Re "are you mad at me" — I have CPTSD and being allowed to ask that question from my partner & close friends in a safe environment is a game changer. They know that I'm hyper-aware and that anything feeling even slightly off can send the alarm bells ringing, and they don't hold it against me. I appreciate it more than I can describe. This scenario is not impossible, the right people can have a discussion about it in a mature manner and recognise that it is a mental health aid (which will hopefully in time diminish).

Complete agreement. I was recently diagnosed (same hat) and personally, my asking if someone is mad (or if something is wrong, or if they are okay, etc) is a direct attempt to determine if I've simply overanalyzed the situation and can relax, or if there's an actual conflict that can be resolved.

I think a lot about that post (maybe you've read it) that describes the feeling of having someone wash a dish or set a cup down or fold laundry at you in a way that conveys anger. If you grew up with the expectation that this kind of behavior was an appropriate way to communicate and you were supposed to be able to interpret these oblique signals (and punished for interpreting them incorrectly), being able to just ask someone "are you mad" instead of looking for tea leaves in their behavior can be a huge relief.

This isn't to say that I think other people should be policing their behavior around me or anyone else with a form of PTSD: kind of the opposite, really. Other people are allowed to yell or swear or stomp their feet or be irritated in my presence. It's the open communication facilitated by questions like "are you mad at me" that enables me to be comfortable with them doing so.

[draconym]

Additionally, if you are the one asking "are you mad at me?" you do have to be prepared to accept "yes" as a possible answer, if you want people to answer this question honestly in the future.

The ideal outcome of an "are you mad at me?" is to accurately locate the source of tension in a relationship or conversation and resolve it, whether that's through soothing misplaced anxiety or through someone acknowledging that they've behaved in a way that's upsetting someone else.

in my experience, if someone is asking "are you mad at me" they've already decided I am and no matter what I do it's going to end in a fight.

Human behavior is vast and complicated. If you honestly tell someone you are not mad at them and they do not believe you, you may not be able to convince them otherwise. But usually when people ask this, they are not trying to instigate a fight. Usually when someone asks "are you mad at me?" it is because they are afraid.

When someone becomes hypervigilant about other people's behavior, whether that's due to present stress or past trauma, it's understandable that they would want to remove uncertainty from the conversation. This "are you mad at me" is a way of asking "are we both going to be calm about this?"

Perhaps the asker does want comfort and reassurance and is afraid to ask for that directly (although, yes, stating that need openly is usually more helpful). If you find yourself responding, "no, I'm not mad at you" often, you might consider asking if there are other ways this person in your life could ask for reassurance more directly, or if there's something you could say or do that would remind them that you care.

Or perhaps they aren't usually good at reading body language, or tone over text. "Are you mad at me" is not usually intended as an accusation--the asker may be trying to prevent a miscommunication.

Or perhaps you, the askee, are unintentionally giving off signals that you are irritated or stressed, and the asker is trying to figure out if their behavior is what's causing that so they can change it.

There is no one universal "are you mad at me." But it would be cool if there were and it always resolved tension and improved everyone's mood. That would be nice.

[draconym]

in my experience, if someone is asking "are you mad at me" they've already decided I am and no matter what I do it's going to end in a fight.

Human behavior is vast and complicated. If you honestly tell someone you are not mad at them and they do not believe you, you may not be able to convince them otherwise. But usually when people ask this, they are not trying to instigate a fight. Usually when someone asks "are you mad at me?" it is because they are afraid.

When someone becomes hypervigilant about other people's behavior, whether that's due to present stress or past trauma, it's understandable that they would want to remove uncertainty from the conversation. This "are you mad at me" is a way of asking "are we both going to be calm about this?"

Perhaps the asker does want comfort and reassurance and is afraid to ask for that directly (although, yes, stating that need openly is usually more helpful). If you find yourself responding, "no, I'm not mad at you" often, you might consider asking if there are other ways this person in your life could ask for reassurance more directly, or if there's something you could say or do that would remind them that you care.

Or perhaps they aren't usually good at reading body language, or tone over text. "Are you mad at me" is not usually intended as an accusation--the asker may be trying to prevent a miscommunication.

Or perhaps you, the askee, are unintentionally giving off signals that you are irritated or stressed, and the asker is trying to figure out if their behavior is what's causing that so they can change it.

There is no one universal "are you mad at me." But it would be cool if there were and it always resolved tension and improved everyone's mood. That would be nice.

[draconym]

They should make a "are you mad at me" that is taken neutrally and informationally every time and doesn't make everything worse when you ask it

[draconym]

I have disturbed the universe (my immune system)

Do I dare to eat a peach?

I am allergic to stonefruit

[draconym]

Do I dare to eat a peach?

I am allergic to stonefruit

[draconym]

spider poll but its just head, eyes, body, leg leg leg leg leg leg leg leg, mouth thing /j

No, no /j, let's go. Serious poll.

[draconym]

You might THINK that this is a whimsical picture book about a block of tofu having cowboy adventures. But you would be wrong. The world is full of injustices.

[draconym]

I was just looking at your Elvira tag (what a beautiful belegged lady) and I thought you might like this story. I used to volunteer at a museum and every day I did a tarantula feeding demonstration to mostly crowds of kids. We had a curly-haired tarantula named Curly Sue, and my favorite memory is that one day after the demonstration I was wheeling Curly Sue back to the back room when a mom and her kids who had been at the program walked by, and the mom went, “oh, there goes Curly Sue! Say ‘bye, Curly Sue!’” and the two kids went “Bye Curly Sue!” and I was DELIGHTED. It wasn’t a case of “we have to go now, say bye bye to the spider,” there had been enough time since the program that they had walked away to look at other bugs, and anyway I think the kids were too young for that. This was genuinely a situation where the mom was like oh that’s the spider from the program a while ago! and encouraged her kids to say bye to good ol Curly Sue. Curly Sue did not care but I treasure that memory.

Spiders have no idea how much bug people really love them and I think that's beautiful.