My friend today was like you know fern I think your genshin favs are really funny because to me they’re all very tame green flags that have good vibes and then there’s zhongxiao which everyone hates. And I was like. WELL…..YES….SNUCHFJFJCNC

my manager is really sweet actually

so i used to rarely put cams on in our small group calls, it took me a good couple of months to do it consistently even when i have nothing to add to the meeting

but we've now switched out our small morning stand-ups for an official wider department stand-up of maybe 20 ppl & there's this one woman there who has taken charge of the meetings for some reason (idek what her role is or what she does, she just loves to talk & is pushy abt everything tbh) & lately she's been insisting that everyone turn on their cams. like literally will not let the meeting start until every. single. person. has their cams on & makes passive aggressive comments abt being fickle abt appearance or whatever & just straight up names & shames ppl it's kinda ridiculous

anyway this morning the dysphoria was so bad i just couldn't do it & i was stressing bc literally nobody cares like it's just a camera it's just a face but then she makes a pointed statement & now well damn everyone's waiting it's getting awkward i'm stressed if i turn my camera on now does it just make me look like i've just been stubborn or does it mean i'm just not pushing myself enough like it's just a 15 minute meeting should i have to push myself do i need to ask for an official exemption will it draw more attention to myself how do i get out of this

& after this weird uncomfortable silence my manager goes 'if anyone is having tech issues just send me a message it's all good' so i send her a quick brief msg like 'hey can i not have my cam on today. dysphoric' & she's all 'no worries <3' & covers for me which is. huge relief. then later in our scheduled 1:1 she brings it up briefly like 'btw i'm going to have a word with [the other lady] to stop pressuring my team. it's my job to manage them & it's getting kind of silly. also if you ever feel not great you can keep your cam off or skip the meeting entirely. you don't have to ask, just send me a message'

i don't think i'd skip the meetings but it's really nice to know the option is there. it's a big relief to know i don't need to keep pushing myself especially when there's going to be a lot of changes coming up soon and i can work on preemptively giving myself room to breathe instead of just powering through whatever y'know?