I’m not sure where to post this but I just want more opinions and stuff. Since this is related to raid groups in WoW… here I am x_x.
I’m pretty upset, this happened a while ago but it’s still got me rattled.
No names or anything will be shared in this post. For super obvious reasons x_x I just need advice and people to help me generally figure out how to feel better and come back from this situation.
So I know what happened to me is wrong. I know I did the best that I could. I know I handled it like an adult to the best of my ability.
But this still very much hurts and idk I just needed to let it out here at least.
So I was a part of a raid group (well, a part of like 4 different ones before this all happened), I’ve already been in a few different friend groups and raid groups in that game for much longer (literally YEARS now) and I just liked the difference between this group and my other ones. This one was neat because it wasn’t necessarily directly LGBTQ+ supportive/positive but it did have some elements of that and I did feel quite welcomed for a long time. I was attending raids, I was helping members of things out with various activities like farming and overall developing pretty good relationships I’d say.
In came this most recent Friday was an event that I considered a planned event (because it was? I was being gaslit told it wasn’t and I am still left going… what?) and then I only learned that I was replaced by someone else [who was, in fact, more attractive than me].
I didn’t flip out. I didn’t rage. I didn’t message anyone saying “you’re gonna regret this!!!” or anything. I just left the communication channel in game cause I was only in it for a few days and the combination of no one interacting with me in that particular channel + this event made me feel really uncomfortable and out of place and so I just left. COULD I HAVE TALKED TO SOMEONE? Yes. But I made the, in my opinion, rational adult decision of “Okay, I’m not wanted here. I’m just going to let people do their own thing and move on with mine.” No one needed to be bothered or disturbed by it or “handle it”.
We’re all working adults and have responsibilities. They don’t need to deal with it, nor do I. I’m in fact far more busy than them due to my RL responsibilities but not going to dive into that further in this post.
Point is, there was no malice, no anger-- there was sadness for sure and shock but it wasn’t intended as some wicked act.
Hoooooooo boy. That was a mistake.
Some backstory is the raid leader and me have shared a lot of our personal lives with one another and I had figured we got pretty close. They even took on the moniker of “(name)dad” to me so basically was playing up this like father-son kinda deal. He is like 15 or 20 years older than me too and in his 40s or so and played it up. Essentially I figured this was just going to be a pretty casual raid group. We weren’t even doing relevant content. I already have my hardcore mythic busting raid group.
This resulted in my raid leader for this one group basically coming at me in a “caring and concerning manner and being ‘very direct’ with me”.
Boiled down discussions turned into me being called, for leaving that channel:
1: Having cognitive distortions (and I’ve seen many therapists for years-- not once have I EVER been tagged with this.)
1: Delusional (and I’ve seen many therapists for years-- not once have I EVER been tagged with this.)
2: Unreliable
3: Lashing out freakout spazoid or whatever
4: A liar
5: A threat to the raid group
6: A revenge seeking loser
So back and forth he was essentially trying to convince me of these things. Ignored my sides of the arguments, he said my sides and my concerns were all “bulls__t” and yes he even linked a beautiful image of “the amount of effort it takes to dispell bulls__t is a magnitude higher”. Which not going to lie, if anyone else called my pretty big concerns (not going to get into them here) bulls__t I’d laugh in their face and walk away. But here that hurt.
But it was over and over trying to convince me those qualities were qualities in me. I said to stop the insults, was ignored. Essentially this turned into a "teachable moment" where I was being taught that apparently I lash out, my feelings are cognitive distortions and the rest. Again I silently left where I felt unwelcome without disturbing a single person.
I had my fill and flat out said “Nonsense. That is abusive gaslighting.”
Then they immediately flipped out and blocked me everywhere, removed me from everywhere including all in game channels, discord servers, I was removed from my maps groups, raid groups and everything to do with anyone I had in contact in there.
And yes, I am well aware of the irony of telling me I lashed out when they did that after I tried to have a rational adult conversation with someone like 15 years older than me. Which is freaking insanely infuriating.
But no we’re not done yet.
I had OTHER people come to me trying to again convince me that I was all those things. And tell me that it was wrong for me to say he was abusive and gaslighting me.
I was told I was acting like a first year university student who just took a psych class and had no idea what gaslighting meant (I’ve been genuinely gaslit before by someone who -really- hurt me (I can’t type the word out in this post) and a big part of my ACTUAL therapy in the past was actually teaching me gaslighting in detail over probably 20-30 hours worth of sessions.)
Basically, in and of itself, gaslighting me and trying to shake my world view and reshape my perceptions.
See, I don’t think I’m that smart. I really don’t. But that makes it so that I know that I need to sometimes sit down shut up and revisit the actual experts and hell I even reviewed videos from Kati Morton, Med Circle and a few others on youtube. It all was exactly what I heard before (well, watered down honestly on youtube).
Basically through this conversation it turned into me asking what was even wanted from me.
Ends up, nothing was wanted from me. That I was apparently digging in my heels, that I wasn’t teachable, that I was stubborn that I was delusional and that I “needed a therapist”. Again, picking at my mental health to try and make me accept labels that do not fit.
Goal? Probably to make me slink back begging for forgiveness for saying that was abusive gaslighting so their friend felt better.
And me? I sat through and listened and was engaged fully with the conversations and wanted to handle it like rational adults. Afterall, I am the youngest BY FAR of the raid leaders. I wanted a proper adult ongoing dialogue.
Instead all I got was this and ultimately I’m left sitting here right now going “What?”
Idk. It’s just really bothering me still. I can identify what was happening, I can identify the key metrics and terms used because I’ve unfortunately been hit by them. But I can’t shake off this negative feeling.
