My Owner asked me to write about an emotional meltdown that I had the other night. In part, this is because I had a pretty intense reaction to something and She wants to make sure that I have really thought it through and processed what happened and why. And, in part, I think She's looking for further insight into what might have caused such an episode.
Having had some space and time from it, as it happened on Thursday night, I am definitely in a better place to be able to really evaluate it and so I spent a great deal of time thinking about it last night and this morning, so here goes.
Thursday night, Syr and I were working on transferring some files over from a borrowed hard drive onto ours. The download was going to be rather lengthy and therefore my computer was out of commission, for the most part, during the file transfer. I had come home from work and spent the majority of my evening cooking a lovely dinner for my Owner and family as well as preparing a couple of desserts to bring to a dinner party we would be attending the following evening. Tired and distracted after cooking, I plopped onto the couch and habitually/instinctively pulled the table my computer was sitting on closer to me like I usually would if I was about to do something on it. But, unlike any other time I have done this, there were cords and borrowed equipment attached to it and along with the computer came the borrowed hardware that had been set up on a second table and it fell to the floor with a very large and shocking thunk.
You know that sick feeling you get when you just KNOW that it's not going to be okay? It was like that. I instinctively and immediately knew I'd busted the thing. It was confirmed when the file transfer suddenly shot up all kinds of errors. We tried to see if it was just a file transfer interruptus problem or if it was a hardware problem but either way, the data was messed up. Thankfully, we knew we had the means to replace the hard drive AND we knew the data on it was completely backed up in another location so we THOUGHT it would all somehow work out. But I, steely calm while we tried to fix it, was freaking the heck out inside.
Syr had me call the friends we'd borrowed it from to break the news. Our friends were wonderfully understanding. So much so that I suddenly burst into tears, was unable to talk, and handed the phone to my Owner who wrapped up the call and then tried very hard to be patient while I completely melted down. I was a sobbing, pathetic wreck for quite a while and Syr and I had a few tense moments while She tried to figure out what was going on. I couldn't articulate just why or how I felt SO badly but I really did.
Later that evening, once I'd calmed down, even I was surprised at how upset I had gotten over something that was so clearly fixable but I just really had felt terrible.
In retrospect, a few things became clear.
1. My hormones were *raging* which was totally confirmed when I started my period today. LOL. In all seriousness, I get crazy mood swings in the few days leading up to my period. Sorry if that's too much info, dear readers, but its the truth!
2. I had been, for whatever reason, in MAJOR service mode at the time this happened. I'd been in that sort of mood where I want to cook something delicious and fabulous and pretty and fancy for my Owner (which I had just done) and also make something for our friends that would make Her proud of me. I love doing things like that and these things often make me feel very little, submissive, and very very invested in the opinions and pride of my Owner - which can and often does sometimes leave me particularly sensitive to doing ANYTHING wrong or making even the slightest (correctable) mistake.
3. My Owner had suggested earlier that evening that I avoid going on my computer during the file transfer. It hadn't been an order, and if nothing had gotten broken would have not been a big deal at all that I went on the computer, but that really stuck in my head and I kept feeling as if I had disobeyed Her and ALSO broke our friends stuff.
4. Totally unrelated to the hard drive incident at all, some stuff is going on with one of my other friendships that, while not at the forefront of my mind that day, was certainly lingering on my mind and the bits of stress floating around about that might have really left me feeling more raw and sensitive than usual. I am doing something new with the stress going on there in really taking more time than I am used to, to figure out what the next steps are and that's not something I have any experience with and sitting in a place of ambiguity can be really quite challenging for me and would certainly be playing a part in some underlying stress.
Really, all three things combined left me RIPE for a melt down and I think partially I just was really tender and ready for something to trigger a really good cry anyway. I really think, in hindsight, that if only one of those factors had been at play, I would have not gotten SO upset, but the combination of all four was just killer.
Having gone out today and gotten the replacement drive for our friends and with the file transfer in place from the backup source to replace the data that was lost - it all seems so silly that I got so very upset, but it was what it was. I actually feel a lot more sane, now, realizing how many different factors were at play at the time. It seems to make more sense that I got so devastatingly upset about something that - in the grand scheme of the world - was really not that big of a problem.
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