[Yearning0723]

Talking to T about this hasn't been helpful...she always tells me I'm being hard on myself (which I know) and that I need to find compassion for myself (which I struggle with because I don't see why I should, especially when I feel guilty after doing something wrong). Even when I can see logically that the "wrong" thing I did was a 2 instead of a 10, I still feel incredibly guilty and just can't make those feelings go away.

Like yesterday I was judging at the debate tournament my school was hosting and I ended up getting paired to judge with this girl who is one of the senior debaters who I have a bit of a crush on (and also really admire her and respect her and just like her in general), and after the debate when the debaters were coming to ask us for feedback, she said something related to the debate topic that was factually incorrect (it was on separate high schools for LGBTQ students, and she said there weren't any such schools that existed so the topic was just hypothetical), and I interrupted her and told her there actually is a school for just LGBTQ students (Harvey Milk in NYC).

I wasn't trying to make her look bad; it's just a knee jerk response for me when I hear something incorrect to correct it (and there might have also been a small part of me that wanted her to pay a bit of attention to me and notice that I knew something relevant and sort of acknowledge my existence). I know I shouldn't have said anything, and it's something I've been working on literally all my life not to interrupt/correct people because it's a really natural response for me, and I know other people don't like it...and in the future I will try harder to just not say anything.

So I know logically it's not a huge deal; she's probably already forgotten about it; it was just a mistake that I'll try not to make in the future. And yet I feel incredibly guilty about it. I couldn't get it out of my head all day yesterday and today, and I just feel really bad about being rude(ish) to someone that I really like. I was thinking yesterday about going to up to her and apologizing, but by that time I figured she'd already forgotten about it and I thought she would find it strange if I brought it up again...but I just feel super uneasy about it, like I want to crawl out of my own skin. "Finding compassion for myself" is not actually something I can do.

[kaliope]

well, know you are not alone...I obsess about these types of things all the time too......

[unaluna]

I would ask myself, really why are you feeling guilty? She got it VERY wrong that the debate topic was hypothetical to begin with. That is bad on a judge's level, but it's even worse on a "she cant even conceive of such a thing happening" level. Are you feeling guilty because its easier to put the blame on yourself, than to consider and face that she might not be gay-friendly or open?

[secretgalaxy]

Same thing here! I am still trying to find a way to get over it, but it is hard, especially with T telling me I am just too hard on myself, which I know but I need help learning how not to be. Maybe one day...

[Yearning0723]

Originally Posted by hankster

I would ask myself, really why are you feeling guilty? She got it VERY wrong that the debate topic was hypothetical to begin with. That is bad on a judge's level, but it's even worse on a "she cant even conceive of such a thing happening" level. Are you feeling guilty because its easier to put the blame on yourself, than to consider and face that she might not be gay-friendly or open?

Well, it was after the debate had ended and the scores had already been given out, so at that point it wasn't super relevant. And I know she is gay-friendly - she uses the word cisgender, which isn't a word that most straight people know, and she works in the equity office, so I don't think there's much more to it than just not knowing this school existed. It's a pretty esoteric thing I wouldn't necessarily expect people to know, and either way, after the debate had already happened it wasn't really necessary to point it out, and especially not when she was in conversation with another person about it and I wasn't even part of that conversation.

[unaluna]

Originally Posted by Yearning0723

Well, it was after the debate had ended and the scores had already been given out, so at that point it wasn't super relevant. And I know she is gay-friendly - she uses the word cisgender, which isn't a word that most straight people know, and she works in the equity office, so I don't think there's much more to it than just not knowing this school existed. It's a pretty esoteric thing I wouldn't necessarily expect people to know, and either way, after the debate had already happened it wasn't really necessary to point it out, and especially not when she was in conversation with another person about it and I wasn't even part of that conversation.

Then i would think she is glad to have the information. But maybe you could have emailed her about it. Sounds like you extended yourself and youre not sure if that was okay or not. Usually its okay? People will let you know if its not.

[Yearning0723]

Originally Posted by hankster

Then i would think she is glad to have the information. But maybe you could have emailed her about it. Sounds like you extended yourself and youre not sure if that was okay or not. Usually its okay? People will let you know if its not.

I think it's not so much that I feel bad about giving her the information, but that I interrupted her and corrected her in front of other people, which she might feel like I was trying to make her look bad. (That's how I might feel if someone did it to me...but maybe I'm overly sensitive about such things?) But just in general, people don't usually like being made to look ignorant in front of others.

[Depletion]

Hey I think that school was on an MTV true life ???

But thanks for confirming its existence. What an interesting and vexing debate topic (I used to be a debater). I would have loved to lean something like that, so unless you were rubbing it in her face or something I don't think you did anything wrong. The whole thing just sounds very cute.

BTW I'm in relationship with another super nerd, we correct each other all the time, and have intellectual arguments on the regular, its part of the fun, and the flirting. Next time just ask her out for a coffee, and then you can talk even more about all the cool stuff you know.