I say this kindheartedly , and i mean no disrespect to anybody. And i wasn't even going to say anything till now , but i almost felt obligated to say something because the new me isn't going to back down from much anymore i feel this needed to be said.
All those years ago i joined this site , i was helped i was supported everyone wanted to speak to me and everyone enjoyed talking to me. I gave advice when i could and i was most of the time a nice person to talk to , with the acceptation of a few , chat seems to have become some huge popularity contest now where no one wants to speak to you unless your either in crisis or a popular person on the website , I've tried to talk to numerous people on here and i just end up getting ignored , so i tend to stay in the general room and just play arcade games all day.
The site i new all these years ago it didn't matter who you where , where you from or what you wanted to talk about you could just jump into a conversation and it wouldn't matter , but now it feels almost as if your intruding in someone else's private conversation in open chat.
I'm not hurt at all , i'm just a bit upset its this hard to make new friends on here without feeling like the way i do now. I'm trying my up-most to face my anxieties by being in a busy crowded chat room and talk , but i cant get a word in. I think ive walked in and said Hi over 15 times this week , and its completely ignored sometimes. (There are the exceptions who always say hi).
I think what i wanted to gain from the website again was someone to confide in and talk to someone who's going threw a similar walk of life. But it just doesn't feel the same anymore.
I do feel much better writing this thread , again i hope this hasn't offended anyone , its not my end goal here. I doubt i will enter chat for a while now because i'm a dat bit embarrassed for some reason.
Way to put your feelings out there and express yourself :) I agree and hope chat will become better like it used to be so you, and any others feeling in the same situation, can feel more comfortable in chat.
*When life shows you a hundred reasons to CRY, show life you have a thousand reasons to SMILE!!" :) <3
I've moved this thread as it seems more appropriate here.
I don't go into chat as I'm a forum dudess so can't comment directly but on another website I go into chat as the forums don't really exist. At first it was really daunting as everyone knew each other but the more I hung around the more I got and the more well known I became!
I'm still not that well known but do feel I can contribute to it but it did take perseverance!
When we lose twenty pounds... we may be losing the twenty best pounds we have! We may be losing the pounds that contain our genius, our humanity, our love and honesty. ~Woody Allen
Is a chocolate muffin loving glitter ball
I spent yrs being scared of chat. Sometimes going in but not saying anything. Feeling excluded and such. I do go into chat lot more now (though am on the forums more) and have found that if I join into convos at times people join me in. Sometimes what I say seems to be ignored though and at other times, the chat is v much focussed around so,etching I've said.
If you want support then say it, just say something along the lines of 'I'm feeling rubbish right now, can we talk about it?' Or similar and yeh, just try and join in with a convo that's already going on and see what happens and if an appropriate moment comes along then maybe start your own convo.
Chat can be quite intimidating though. Even though I've been on RYL for 7yrs on forums, am a well known member on forums and have probably been using chat since June, sometimes I decide to log out as soon as I join. Tbh, I prefer to have private chars with people I know from forums rather than announce something and I have never had the strength to ask publicly for support on it but then I even struggle with that on forums and I do still find chat pretty intimidated by it partly as often they know each other really well and I don't want to butt in to a convo that they're in the middle of.
If you go in around the same time each day and jump into the conversations going on, it helps people get used to having you around. Sometimes people are distrustful of new chatters because of past bad experiences. There is always a chance you will be ignored. If you want to talk, keep talking anyway as long as you aren't being rude to people. I get ignored in chat all the time, especially if the room is mostly full of people from the UK and I either talk anyway or I get bored with it and leave. I don't often use chat for support, but I have found that when I do, just asking for it directly and politely is what gets responses from people.
People need time to get used to you, basically. I think years of being burned by trolls or just crappy members has made some people slow to trust new RYL'ers. Or maybe that's just me.
Edited to add: I realize you aren't new to RYL, but you are new to chat in its current form.
Last edited by Crysainta : 03-08-2014 at 06:53 AM.
Reason: Adding something.
I am in chat A LOT... and I am rude and a bitch, but I don't say hello to people I don't know (in general). I have issues with strangers is all... However when people join in whatever conversation is going on I will talk back to them and such. I know a lot of the regulars in chat are also the same as me, we don't much like change, but we will accept it.
So basically, I apologise, but just jump into the conversation (we're not that scary) and get to know people. Then you too can be one of the popular people! (I joke.. I don't even know what popular means...)
I don't know if I have any expectations going into chat anymore. My basic question would be "Is anyone available to chat?" Once I think I've gotten all stroppy about which room it was: it was intended for support mainly and I felt the conversation was banal and everyone using real names- but at the end of the day, you cannot make people talk to you. While I understand people not being trusting of new persons- there are so many unofficial rules in chat it can blow your mind. I know that going on when you are extremely vulnerable is a risk, because in reality you cannot put that responsibility for safe guarding yourself on anyone else but you. However, people are not all in that place. Attention seeking behaviour is very scary to some, annoying to others.
I find that I have to place boundaries on myself and give myself realistic expectations of chat. Like I am going on for 5 minutes- 30 minutes. I do not have to talk to this person threatening self harm. I go on chat because some things are not at the level of calling my family or psychiatrist after midnight- or I just want to chat until I fall asleep- or want to see if someone I had a good chat with previously is on. I would not call anyone "friends" though, simply because unlike other members on chat- I haven't maybe been to meet ups or have real world interactions. Making friends I think is a blurry and unrealistic goal- for me anyway. Finding support isn't.
I do think chat is currently under utilised. Maybe there are more options for people in some places, so membership and usage is down but it is overwhelming. Therefore, I do not allow it to be my only tool to cope with SI urges and MH challenges. I also have to remember that sometimes I take things personally when they aren't. Like being told bluntly "I don't know you- so don't talk to me" last week. That was just that user- nothing to do with me. But if you are vulnerable, it hurts. For the most part I am myself, and try to be cognisant of the rules, while learning the culture of chat.
Last edited by bitomato : 05-08-2014 at 12:44 AM.
~Happy tomatoes together we will be~
You say toe- may- toe, I say toe- mah- toe:
Let's call the whole thing- red
“It’s time to lead the third revolution, which is not to say we want to be at the top of the world, but to say we want to change the world. Because the way the world has been designed by men is not working. It’s not working for women, it’s not working for men,
it’s not working for polar bears.” Arianna Huffington 2014
Yeah I mean, the supporters generally run on the forums, so although they're open to anyone emailing in a lot of people who use chat don't utilise the structured support because its not in the chat room.
The problem is that there aren't enough members who go into chat for a large portion of the day, so imagine if you're a regular to chat, you can only spend so much time offering advice to other people before you feel like it isn't really your job to do so. If we had more members in chat then perhaps we could set up some sort of supporter style support if that is what the community needed.
In the past we have done support evenings and so on but people lost interest and it really isn't the moderators job to force people into giving others support. Chat has both the quickest burn out rate of members but also has some of the longest serving members and they don't stick around for no reason.
Chat isn't the forums, if you make a thread people reply and you make another thread and more people reply or you post a lot and people recognise you. That isn't how chat goes, you really really have to put in the time and join in with conversations. Chat is daunting of course, it's like entering a room full of people who know each other and you don't know anyone. But there's a quote that says something like 'strangers are just friends we haven't met yet' and I think that is true of chat.
There are times to stay put, and what you want will come to you.
But there are times to go out into the world and find such a thing for yourself.
I aint no abacus but you can count on me.
Well done for speaking up. See, when you do it in a kind and patient way you're almost always going to make progress!
I'm not sure what to suggest about chat because as far as I know, if I'm watching the room I greet you/people as they enter, but my concentration does rather suck so I wander off a lot. Nothing personal x Hope you start to feel more at home in chat soon :)
"I know that every good and excellent thing in the world stands moment by moment on the razor-edge of danger and must be fought for."
-Thornton Wilder
"You don't throw a whole life away just 'cause its banged up a little."
Mum to Caleb: Has autism and epilepsy. Makes me laugh every single day!
Mum to Natty: Cheeky little punkhead-ASD but it doesn't slow her down!
Slave to Pippin the dog.
