Criticism

[Aroura]

The problem for me is that I work in a male dominated field. Generally only about 10% of us are women and I find that men generally blank the only woman in a social situation. It was particularly bad in Germany when I would walk into the building and not even get to say hi to anyone until lunchtime. Add to that the language barrier. And moving around a lot means that I long ago largely lost all my real life friends. I have one life long friend that has started meeting up for a holiday or a weekend like twice a year. But last time I actually was able to properly socialise regularly was back at the beginning of the noughties.

This is why I took up roleplaying. I remembered that I used to really enjoy playing it. There's no stress of having to socialise because you are all playing a game rather than concentrating on whether you are making the right impression, accidentally offending people or whatever. I worked in a lab once where some of the researchers were using lego robots to connect with children on the autistic spectrum. It was quite successful because the child appreciated the company but it wasn't stressful for them because they could focus on the robot instead.

I started playing RPGs again last year and it's really helped my social confidence a lot. It has created a cycle whereby I also socialise more and people respond more positively towards me. I am starting my first campaign tonight. It made me realise that shared activities that you really enjoy can really help in this regard.

If you ever run any games where I can join in on Skype or something, I'd love to play!  I find RPG's of various kinds a great outlet, too, when I can find people to play with.