OK, this is from a  looooong time ago, but brought out special for the opening of the new crying forum, haha.  So anyway, I was caught in a rare moment where I had to cry and really didn't want to, yet could not escape.  The story: 

I had been working on a project (passionately, I might add) with a very small group of people and we had something very important to discuss with someone of influence who we hoped would help further our project.  We had arranged to have this person meet us for lunch.  I was naively optimistic -- I just assumed she would like our project and want to get on board with it.  I didn't picture it going much differently.  Anyway, so after we all bought our food, treating her to lunch (it was a serve yourself type of environment), we sat down, and the discussion began.  She had already looked at our project ahead of time, and one of my teammates asked her what she thought of it. 

It turned out she didn't like it.  She REALLY didn't like it.  I was shocked.  I was disappointed.  Everything - my hopes and dreams for the future - had been riding on this.  I actually couldn't believe this was happening.  If this project was going to go anywhere, we really needed her -- she was my one big hope!  Anyway, I was soooo glad that the other teammates (well, mostly just one person) continued the conversation with her after that, because I knew that I had NO voice to speak with.  I knew it would be wavering all over the place if I tried.  My throat hurt so much because there was such a huge lump in it.  I couldn't remember feeling a lump that big before!  I'm sure she could tell what I was feeling by looking at me... I was actually shaking a bit and my face was probably was starting to contort a bit, which is what will happen if I don't let the tears out.  I was blinking back the tears, but I know that nothing fell.  I just remember that I was trying very, very hard not to cry because I really wanted to sit there long enough to hear WHY she didn't like the project and knew if I had excused myself right then and there, not only would everyone have known or kind of figured that I was going off to cry, but I also would have missed what hearing what she said, and if I'm going to be rejected, I want the sick satisfaction of hearing all the details.  I don't want the emptiness and dissatisfaction of not understanding WHY.  And I wanted to hear it straight from the horse's mouth, not after the fact. 

Well anyway, after the initial shock and some further conversation went on, I finally found an inconspicuous enough moment (well, who knows) to excuse myself to go into the bathroom.  I honestly don't remember what I did in there, but I think I probably tried a release of tears to get it out of my system.  I battled between not wanting to spend too long in there and miss out too much on what was going on and not wanting to go back until I was at least semi pulled together.  Which was really hard, as the emotions themselves never really left me.  Anyway, I went back out.  And I managed to talk.  And who knows, maybe my emotions hadn't been as noticeable as I felt they were.  The meeting ended at some point (she departed first), and the rest of us just sat there and discussed what had happened and where to go from there.  Needless to say, I had no appetite to finish my lunch. 

Anyway, that's my obs.  It was soooo painful.  I'll never forget that painful feeling of not being able to cry -- to be forced to hold it in like that.  There was just nowhere for me to go -- I was literally sandwiched into the corner at a table and the meeting had JUST begun and had started off so blatantly badly.  I couldn't turn anywhere to hide my face.  Maybe I tried hiding my face behind my coffee mug -- like, trying to sip long sips so it would cover part of my face.  I think I might have tried that, but I also think my hand was shaking too much to be convincing!  I felt so trapped.  Even though the others in my group were disappointed, I think I took it much worse than everybody else because I had placed more hope on things going better and had invested much more of myself in the project.  I am much less naive now about whether someone will like your project or not.  Still, in its various forms, rejection is a hard thing for a lot of people.  I think it has something to do with expectations and how you view yourself and what validates you.  Rejections don't hurt so much if they're about something that doesn't really matter to you.

Last edited by woundedpuppy (July 30, 2011 3:48 pm)