I was where you are, years ago. It was upsetting and disruptive; the SCA had been the center of my social life and discretionary time, and people were ruining it and didn't even understand the abuse they were dealing. I didn't think of it then as an abusive relationship (the abusee rarely sees that at the time), but I do now.
For what it's worth, here's what I did. (This will be an unstructured brain dump.)
I do still go to occasional events -- ones that I choose, and not out of perceived obligation. Yeah, I'm a Laurel and I don't go to most A&S events; deal with it. When at events I do the things that are fun for me, whether that's socializing with the people I came to see, playing board games, making music, or whatever. If I'm not having fun, I leave at the earliest opportunity.
I sing in the local choir (except during Christmas-music season, when I don't). I like singing, and this gives me weekly social contact with SCA friends. We sing at a few events a year (two free evens, Pennsic, and sometimes something else).
As a matter of personal policy I do not work at any event that charges the corporate tax. They don't get to declare me a freeloader and then profit from my work. (We have free events sometimes. That's different.)
I go to Pennsic because, well, Pennsic.
I have cultivated other activities with a mix of SCA and non-SCA people, like our occasional board-game days. I also have a social group that is (for all practical purposes) wholly distinct from the SCA. It's ok to have multiple sets of friends.
I spend more "me time" on solitary and introspective activities than I used to. You might think this is counter-productive when re-assessing one's relationship with a major social context, but that helped me identify and focus on the subset of the SCA stuff that was really important to me.
I spend more time online. While I don't do Facebook and don't really use "social media" for the social purposes for which it was designed, LiveJournal/Dreamwidth and Stack Exchange give me meaningful and different consistent interactions with real people. I have real online friends who've never been part of the SCA, as distinct from the days of the Rialto when almost all my online friends came from the SCA. There's a whole world out there of people interested in the things I'm interested in, and connecting with them has been huge for me.
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Date: 2015-11-27 03:32 am (UTC)For what it's worth, here's what I did. (This will be an unstructured brain dump.)
I do still go to occasional events -- ones that I choose, and not out of perceived obligation. Yeah, I'm a Laurel and I don't go to most A&S events; deal with it. When at events I do the things that are fun for me, whether that's socializing with the people I came to see, playing board games, making music, or whatever. If I'm not having fun, I leave at the earliest opportunity.
I sing in the local choir (except during Christmas-music season, when I don't). I like singing, and this gives me weekly social contact with SCA friends. We sing at a few events a year (two free evens, Pennsic, and sometimes something else).
As a matter of personal policy I do not work at any event that charges the corporate tax. They don't get to declare me a freeloader and then profit from my work. (We have free events sometimes. That's different.)
I go to Pennsic because, well, Pennsic.
I have cultivated other activities with a mix of SCA and non-SCA people, like our occasional board-game days. I also have a social group that is (for all practical purposes) wholly distinct from the SCA. It's ok to have multiple sets of friends.
I spend more "me time" on solitary and introspective activities than I used to. You might think this is counter-productive when re-assessing one's relationship with a major social context, but that helped me identify and focus on the subset of the SCA stuff that was really important to me.
I spend more time online. While I don't do Facebook and don't really use "social media" for the social purposes for which it was designed, LiveJournal/Dreamwidth and Stack Exchange give me meaningful and different consistent interactions with real people. I have real online friends who've never been part of the SCA, as distinct from the days of the Rialto when almost all my online friends came from the SCA. There's a whole world out there of people interested in the things I'm interested in, and connecting with them has been huge for me.