Game session abruptly canceled

[boerngrim]

I'm going to ignore the in-between, 90% of which I have read, and go back to the OP.



Hoarfrost. In other words, this has been building for some time.



I think this is perhaps the basis of the issue. You perhaps feel that you have been entirely giving on your end by always going over to their place to play. Quite a sacrifice, that they do not share with you.



So now you need, for once, a change of venue. You would like to host and have THEM be the ones who drive for an hour. Not entirely unreasonable, but it runs smack into their comfort with the established pattern where YOU do the work and they sit back and wait for you to come to them.



Question: Have you ever had issues with M being less than straight forward in carrying out his agreements with you? Because from this point, he seems to be passive-aggressive.



How much in advance did you call him? If you were already waiting for him, then you could have a valid issue with him just blowing you off and not being courteous enough to call and let you know. If it was several hours in advance, he might just have not gotten to it yet in his otherwise busy schedule.



This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but...



M, like Steel_Wind, says (and I totally DISagree); "Negative Emotions are Evil. You are a bad person for displaying them!".



No, you were deemed 'out of line' because you displayed negative emotions and made M feel uncomfortable.



Again, I think this is the root of the problem. M is entirely comfortable with the current arrangement where you do all the work. You are not and you are chaffing under both the load and M's unwillingness to contribute or compromise.



M does not appreciate the amount of time and effort required to drive this distance in order to play, and he isn't interested in caring about or appreciating your effort in doing so. It is all about his comfort, his life, his schedule.

Now that isn't Evil, that isn't entirely wrong of him. But it isn't good for you.

You really need to sit down with him and let him know, CALMLY, how much effort you are putting in on this and how much it bothers you that you're not being met half-way and do not feel like you are being respected. Maybe he just hasn't considered it. Maybe he doesn't care. But you won't know until you try to work it out.

What you said really made sense to me. You read between the lines. Are you a psycologist? If only I could have put it that way. I was just too upset at the time.

 

[boerngrim]

I think the distinction here is between speaking about feeling pooped on and yelling at someone because you felt pooped on. The "feeling" part is fine, it seems like the problem was likely in how you chose to communicate your feelings at the time.

Yeah you're right I reacted out of anger and frustration. I couldn't put it into rational words at the time. The first words out of my mouth when I called him back were "I'm PO'ed". I know that automatically triggers defensiveness, but I was incapable of reason at the time. I'm still tore up about the heated words. that's why I'm here posting instead of sleeping.

 

[Warbringer]

With a masters on clinical psych, and 5 years experience...and another lifetime ago, here are my pearls of wisdom.

Interactions with family memebers often cross the line. There is an uncommuticated line that behavior between family can cross that it is unacceptable for friends and collegues.

The fact you were upset is completley accepatable, the fact you communicated your disappointment is completely acceptable, hell even the way you communicated it may be acceptable for your system dynamic (read, the way your family interacts).

However, your nephew called you on it for being a jerk, you crossed a line with him. OK, don't do it again, set a boundary with him that lets him no that gaming with him under those conditions is unacceptable, but he's family and that's all your talking about.

As to getting angry; it happens. Venting is fine. It's off your chest.

Don't do this with friends though. They tend to have a lot less invetsed in you.

 

[Cabled]

While it's always nice to know things are changing in advance, I'll just say this as a current father of a one year old, and having been through that twice before, four and seven years ago. Sometimes your plans REALLY DO immediately change based on what kind of day that one year old is having, and no force short of the almighty himself can predict what that is going to be in advance. We love them to death, but a one year old is not a person, he (or she) is a primal force. They turn into people a little later.

Yeah, short notice changes stink. But given the short background you did, I'm going to say that both your friend and his wife truly enjoy gaming, and were likely also bummed about not being able to make it, and possibly stressed already by the antics of children, and you unsuspectingly stepped in a bee hive. But then you stomped

With luck neither you or them is too big to call and apologise for your parts in it.

 

[WayneLigon]

M and wife have 2 kids age 5 and a bit over 1.

Any time this is the case, you can count on some last minute cancellations. Kids that age can get sick astonishingly quickly; since they can't really articulate 'Dad, I've been feeling icky', the first time you'll know they're sick is fifteen minutes before you're leaving for the game and your son calmly turns his head and projectile-vomits all over the kitchen floor.

No parent with kids that young - especially with one whose age you're still referring to in months - really likes being an hour away from home (and, thus, established doctors and other caregivers) if they are not on vacation or know they can have the parents there to take them; if the parents were not available, then that's that, usually. Kids also make you damn tired, even if you are young. They probably were exhausted and just didn't frickin' feel like it.

You'll need to get used to that for the next 10-12 years until the older kid can be trusted to be left alone by himself and also care for his sibling, if he ever can.

As far as you going there and getting cancelled out from under, if you already don't do it, then get into the habit of calling just as you're walking out the door to see how things are going.

 

[boerngrim]

With a masters on clinical psych, and 5 years experience...and another lifetime ago, here are my pearls of wisdom.

Interactions with family memebers often cross the line. There is an uncommuticated line that behavior between family can cross that it is unacceptable for friends and collegues.

The fact you were upset is completley accepatable, the fact you communicated your disappointment is completely acceptable, hell even the way you communicated it may be acceptable for your system dynamic (read, the way your family interacts).

However, your nephew called you on it for being a jerk, you crossed a line with him. OK, don't do it again, set a boundary with him that lets him no that gaming with him under those conditions is unacceptable, but he's family and that's all your talking about.

As to getting angry; it happens. Venting is fine. It's off your chest.

Don't do this with friends though. They tend to have a lot less invetsed in you.

You know I don't think I would have been as upset if had been any one else but my nephew. If it was a friend or even just a casual game group member I would have been annoyed, but not hurt.

 

[Warbringer]

You know I don't think I would have been as upset if had been any one else but my nephew. If it was a friend or even just a casual game group member I would have been annoyed, but not hurt.

Isn't that the truth!

The more we care, the more we care

 

[Chimera]

You know I don't think I would have been as upset if had been any one else but my nephew. If it was a friend or even just a casual game group member I would have been annoyed, but not hurt.

I am not a Psychologist, just an arm-chair student of Humanity. I've been forced to study psychology in order to understand what the hell goes on around me.

Here, it's like Warbringer says. It's about Investment Level. You probably wouldn't have been hurt by a casual gaming friend because you probably wouldn't have let it go this far and put this much effort into it. But because it's a family member with whom you are particularly close, you let quite a lot slide before the big one hit.

 

[Jeysie]

My group has to cancel at the last minute all the time. No biggee, we find something else to do. We're pretty good at finding ways to entertain ourselves.

But sometimes "finding something else to do" requires having advance warning.

Case in point from my own experience:

I once turned down going to a concert with a friend who had an extra ticket, because the concert was on RP night, and he asked me the night before... which means most of the group wouldn't get my missive about the matter until after work the next day, a few hours before RP time. I decided that since my desire for both possible things to do was more or less equal, I would pick the least disruptive option and show up for RP.

However, another person in our group had made plans to go to a musical on RP night... and ended up never telling us. So we waited around for him... and waited around for him... and finally cancelled the session. It wasn't until he showed up much too late for RP that he remembered the session and told us what was going on.

So, you know. If he had told us he was going to that musical ahead of time, we could have said, "OK, have fun, we'll pick up again next week," and I could have gone to that concert with my friend instead. Instead, I got to have *nothing* to do that night. I wasn't very happy, as you might guess.

Peace & Luv, Liz

 

[boerngrim]

Question: Have you ever had issues with M being less than straight forward in carrying out his agreements with you? Because from this point, he seems to be passive-aggressive.



How much in advance did you call him? If you were already waiting for him, then you could have a valid issue with him just blowing you off and not being courteous enough to call and let you know. If it was several hours in advance, he might just have not gotten to it yet in his otherwise busy schedule.



OTE]

M never told me that not having a baby sitter was the deal breaker untill I called and asked him about his status Saturday. He tends not to be upfront about things like that in my opinion. That has been a source of my frustration.
I called him around noon. We didn't have a hard start time but we usually try to begin in the early evening. Before 5