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"Lazy phase" of stripping?
Did anyone go through a lazy phase when they started dancing (or camming, or any self-employment) full-time?
After doing it part-time occasionally for several years, I decided to go full-time last May. I went through the honeymoon work-5-days-a-week-money-flying-out-the-hands phase until about September, then began keeping serious track of my earnings and trying to work a schedule and save, but generally failing.
While I was able to really stack $$ the days I worked, I always ended up not keeping whatever schedule I had written out at the start of the month... which lead to working like, 7-8 shifts a month and not being able to save much, largely because I had time to spend the $$. I'm honestly very disappointed with myself, since there was so much potential.
I was reading this: http://www.sophiagubb.com/motivation...ployed-people/ She says that people who leave 'the system' rebel by not working much at first, for up to 2 years.
I'm thinking maybe that's been the thing; some kind of subconscious "fuck you, I don't HAVE to work"... Now I'm a bit bored of only working 1-2 days a week, not happy with the number in my bank account, and I'm wondering if that isn't what my vanilla job hunt is about.
So yeah, anyone else experience this phase after the honeymoon? How did you get out of it?
Edit to add: Not looking for advice on how to 'fix' my motivation to go in... Just wondering if anyone else had this phase happen, since this seems to be such a common thing for dancers/camgirls.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
Great thread idea and cant wait to read article and respond... because, damn, if your post didn't sound familiar. But then, there is an existentialist crisis/phase that most of us go through and I believe that it plays out in the 'search for meaning dynamic' too. Tired and prob not clear, bedtime x
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
Honestly, I very rarely had another job during my adult business years. It often wouldn't work out & I made enough to get by. I lived modestly so that helped.
This all depends on the dancers. There are girls who knock it out of the park part timing it at the club, and others who struggle to make a living wage doing full time shifts.
A lot of variables here. I recall feeling mentally bored sometimes but overall happy that I made good money just focusing primarily on adult industry activities.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
There is so much truth to this. This is brilliant. It helps partially explain why I lived as a subsistence stripper for almost 2 years. When I go back, I don't want to barely scrape by anymore. I want to completely change my mindset and attitude about everything. This is good stuff! Thanks Selina!
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
I was totally lazy at first lmao, but now that I moved to a new place, I am doing a lot better. However I am still kind of lazy, putting off days mostly because of foot pain, and when I do go to the club, sometimes I get bored (it's always day shifts with no customers) and by the time the customers DO start coming in, I am already burnt out. I am thinking of coming later at night, and probably even bringing my sketchbook with me (idk if it's a good idea, what if it gets stolen, etc) so I can recover and start working later into the night.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
The other thing I need to point out is- with the economy definitely being STILL stagnant in many regions of the U.S.....sometimes juggling a day job and stripping is not the financially smart thing to do for everyone. If you have a really really lame day job that pays minimum wages, in some cases it costs more to get back and forth to work, pay for food to eat at work, and deduct car expenses OR public transit (if you live far away.)
The Internet is a total blessing in that you can do a home based business OR claim you "work from home" and put that on resumes. In short, for a lot of girls smart saving of stripper dollars needs to be the focus of your prime stripper years...NOT trying to be an overachiever with no guarantee of a favorable outcome (i.e. if your day job doesn't count towards a degree or features some sort of future advantage, why bother with it?)
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
I wasn't really trying to make this a dancing vs. vanilla job thing... I mentioned the vanilla job only because it was part of my mentality that perhaps I was searching for one simply because I was boring myself by not going to work very often... a regular job makes you be somewhere 4-5 days.
I would agree that I would never take a shitty vanilla job and then try to dance on top of it. I didn't use my degree for a year because it meant $13/hour, 10 hour days with a lot of overnight travel, and being too tired to dance. That would have been financial and mental suicide.
Aaaaaanyway, I think this is a lot of why we see so many subsistence strippers, the "fuck you I don't have to do anything" mentality, coupled with making several hundred $$ when they do work which further gives them the ability to not HAVE to go to work.
Part of my issue is also that I get bored very easily. Most of the customers are nowhere near the same mental playing field, like not even in the same baseball stadium, and the asinine conversations night after night really grind on me. It frustrates me to the point of nearly exploding when someone OTC tries to make small talk. Switching clubs won't cure it; still the same boring ass customers save the one or two gems every couple nights. This translates into another mentality akin to the Bitch Hustle where I'm like "Uh hello, you should be paying me just to bask in my presence, common folk!" There's often not enough $$ in the club, except for the 4 months of season, to make it worth being around these people to me.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
Oh god this is exactly how I've been feeling lately and part of why I want to move so bad lol. I feel like everything has gotten so monotonous and I turn into a huge bitch at work especially late at night when it's really crowded. I always worked nights and decided to stick to days to switch things up because where I work seems like a completely different club during the day. Plus I won't have to deal with annoyingness that happens at night. I know you said switching clubs won't help but I'm also going to try a club thats a little farther away so if I feel like switching things up even more I can work one night a week there. It can be fun being the new girl.
But yeah I feel myself getting in a major funk and needing something new. I decided I might get a 'vanilla job' being a personal trainer or something to get myself out of the club. I keep making these goals of working super hard and then I try to work X many days in a row and by the end of the week I'm about ready to kill someone. It's frustrating because I have all these tangible goals I need to reach but mentally I just can't get it done. I'm hoping a new start in a new city will help, but until then I guess I'm sticking to dayshifts and other clubs/jobs.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
SnuffleUffleGrass
(i.e. if your day job doesn't count towards a degree or features some sort of future advantage, why bother with it?)
Yeah I totally do not bother with a job if it doesn't count towards my career in the future. Too much stress and time for low pay, when I can make more without being screamed at by a boss.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Selina M
I mentioned the vanilla job only because it was part of my mentality that perhaps I was searching for one simply because I was boring myself by not going to work very often... a regular job makes you be somewhere 4-5 days.
Remember why you got into stripping in the first place. If you had all the money in the world, what would you do? What are your interests? I think there is always something better to do with your time than do a vanilla job that you don't necessarily like, and the more time you have the better. With the time you have, you can hit the gym more, travel to places more while you're young, even go on date with several cute guys lol! It's better to be a stripper with enough money and too much time on hand that she finally finds what she likes, than someone who works 40+ hours a week and worries too much about bills at night to really think of anything else as she hits midlife. What did you plan to do with all that time when you got into stripping? Do you remember?
My reasons: to fund my hobbies and education, spend more time on my hobbies and education, and have the funds to back me up if SHTF. At least I don't worry (too much) about going hungry or homeless at night. There is always something to occupy my time with.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
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Originally Posted by
22lligm
I know you said switching clubs won't help but I'm also going to try a club thats a little farther away so if I feel like switching things up even more I can work one night a week there. It can be fun being the new girl.
I said it wouldn't help me, it may help you though :)
I have to say, my club is very conducive to burnout/monotony because it's such a regulars club. Most of the days I'm in a bad mood, are when I've walked in to a semi-crowded club and upon inspection it was the same non-spending asshats that are always there.
I know some people view making money as a challenge, but I guess I plateaued at that and got bored (like everything else I do). Once I was able to consistently make $4-$500 on a day/swing shift, something clicked and it was like "Okay, goal to be good at being a stripper, check, next subject please". It doesn't seem to motivate me terribly much that I could make even more working nights :/
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
If making a particular amount of money each shift doesn't motivate you anymore, what about specific saving/spending goals? I have a list of big-money purchases as well as savings and investment goals in a document that I regularly look over. I pick the 1-3 things that interest me most at the moment and go through the process of evaluating my current income/budget, and how much more would I have to make each week/month in order to set aside X number each month and have this goal/thing in X months?
Vague amounts of saving with no end goal (though I guess "emergency funds" are important!) don't motivate me very much. But if I imagine getting to put my money toward something big and expensive and think about how quickly I could do it - and also how much more quickly I could accomplish that doing adult work vs. a vanilla job - it makes me excited to make more money.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
Also, getting into a lot of volunteer work got me back on track with work. Having a few shifts a week where I have to be somewhere or be available for a particular reason is just enough stability that I don't crave it and give in to going after a vanilla job that I know I don't want. It also means I don't get as much of the attitude of "Oh, I have all the time in the world - I'll just do work another day." if a good work opportunity is missed because of a volunteer shift, I get angry and then motivated to make that money back. It provides the flexibility to get a lot of work in but restricts my schedule just enough that I take the opportunities that I can instead of blowing them off thinking I'll make it back up, if that makes sense.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
Okay, I have to clarify and I apologize that apparently I was too vague... I'm not really looking for advice about how to fix my own non-motivation :)
I'm not looking to dance full-time anymore, honestly. Even if I could be motivated by large amounts of $$, or buying things, I want something else a little more meaningful and mentally challenging as a job right now.
I was mostly wondering if anyone thought this theory about self-employed rebellion against authority held any water. If anyone has figured out that that's what they've gone through, and what kicked them out of it. It was an interesting idea, and made sense to me as to why I, and many other ladies apparently, were/are so lazy about going in.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
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I was mostly wondering if anyone thought this theory about self-employed rebellion against authority held any water. If anyone has figured out that that's what they've gone through, and what kicked them out of it. It was an interesting idea, and made sense to me as to why I, and many other ladies apparently, were/are so lazy about going in.
Personally speaking, this theory doesn't seem to hold water across the board. Self-employed Uber drivers, or any number of other relatively low paying 'gig economy' self-employed workers, can't afford to be 'lazy' if they want their rent and student loan payments to be made on time. Instead, I would offer an alternate proposition that the very high relative earnings level ( on a per hour basis ) which is usually available to dancers and camgirls ... which makes it possible for dancers and camgirls to meet their short term financial needs via working relatively few total hours ... is the primary factor.
Once a person is able to meet their short term financial requirements, arguably a 'whole 'nuther level' of motivation needs to kick in ... motivation based on a 1-2 decade long plan of earning, saving, investing, etc. to take advantage of a high earnings potential but relatively short-lived career opportunity. In past threads I have used the term 'serious, professional' dancer to describe this long term 'disciplined' approach. I have also pointed out the analogy of dancers to professional athletes ... some of whom take a 'serious, professional' long term approach, while others tend to 'live for the moment'.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
This is a pattern I have been in for the couple of years I have been camming (going on three now). It's like I need a break every few months to get in touch with my big-picture plans and to replenish my inner reserves to have something to give in my work. One of my friends was asking what I was up to work-wise earlier today, and I felt like I had to make up "busy work" to account for my time! But really, being able to focus on my various pet projects and hobbies, knowing the work is there when I return, is a kind of wealth, too, and being able to enjoy life on my own terms is why I left the corporate world behind. There is probably a big grain of truth to the rebel theory, IMO!
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Every time I've stopped dancing and gone to a vanilla job, it would hit me how thankful I am that I can go to a club and shake my bum for $ anytime I want. Stupid people at the club don't even compare at the stupid people in every vanilla job I have ever had. Not by a long shot. I can't even relate to civilians ugh
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Selina M
So yeah, anyone else experience this phase after the honeymoon? How did you get out of it?
I had to work at clubs that had mandatory scheduling so I was "forced" to go. Otherwise now I've only been working in clubs that do not have scheduling and I'm never there lol. I have to drag myself the club next week though lord help me.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
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Every time I've stopped dancing and gone to a vanilla job, it would hit me how thankful I am that I can go to a club and shake my bum for $ anytime I want
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I had to work at clubs that had mandatory scheduling so I was "forced" to go. Otherwise now I've only been working in clubs that do not have scheduling and I'm never there lol. I have to drag myself the club next week though lord help me.
... this fits in with the theory of short term financial needs being the prime 'motivator' for the majority of dancers.
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I am trying to see money as just energy exchange, instead of an evil piece of paper that controls the masses.
In order to combat these negative feelings about money, I have to realize that money will not last forever. This monetary system will one day collapse. So I have to enjoy this while it lasts. This is like a phase that humanity is going through. We will one day evolve beyond money I believe. But these are just my "authority rebellion" thoughts that I think are relevant to what the blog was talking about.
Historically speaking, there have been a few periods where humanity 'evolved' beyond money. The 'death' of the Roman denarius arguably led to the 'dark ages'. The 'death' of German Marks arguably led to Nazism. Just sayin !
Some 'talking heads' point out that the underlying issue is that when money is considered to be a genuine store of 'value', people have some sort of motivation to accumulate more money than is needed to meet short term needs, to invest their extra money to earn even more money, etc. Those 'talking heads' also point out that when money is no longer considered to be a safe store of 'value', that motivation is instantly lost ( since years of hard work could translate into a pile of worthless paper ), with the remaining store of 'value' ( reverting to ) being productive / physical assets - which a few people already own, but most people do not ... and with no way to store 'value', never will.
Also, if money is no longer considered to be a safe store of 'value', lending and credit come to a screeching halt. This is based on fears that 'valuable' money loaned out today will be repaid with 'worthless' money in the future. From individuals to countries, this also means that people can only 'consume' as much as they are immediately capable of 'producing'.
'Worthless' money arguably 'locks in' those who own / control physical assets at the 'top' of society, while 'locking out' those who have no physical assets at the 'bottom' of society. The latter situation also strongly incentivizes the seizing of other people's physical assets by force ... on a scale from one on one robberies to major wars.
So much for the monetary history lesson ... I now return you to the regularly scheduled discussion ...
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
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Originally Posted by
Melonie
... this fits in with the theory of short term financial needs being the prime 'motivator' for the majority of dancers.
^For me it is. I've got a good job that pays well so no longer interested in club money since I probably make more now than dancing full time. These days I only go in for fast cash.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
I was never in a lazy phase with dancing ( the prep and travel is just too much effort to be lazy for me ), but now that I do massage on a very part time sporadic basis, I have phases where I'm SUPER lazy. My main thing is that I only want to meet people who book really Smoothly so I'm just very very choosy about who I see v.s. tolerating non-sense like I did 2011-2013 mostly full time to meet my goals.
They can't book a few hours ahead? They DARE ask for more photos than what the ads provide? NEXT !!
( I block their number once I've identified them as slow moving )
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
I was never really lazy during my dancing years but I always thought about working smarter rather than harder. I'd work 5-6 days a week (8+ hrs) during the busy seasons because I know I could make the most money this way. I'd drop down to 3-4 days when it was slow and take weeks off for notoriously bad holidays. I genuinely enjoy being productive so I'd get extreme anxiety if I sat around the house for more than two days. Sometimes I'd take a few days off for sanity sake but I think its good to focus on yourself to avoid burn out in the future.
My job now is also self employment but requires a ridiculous amount of self motivation far more than stripper ever had. I've never had a vanilla job so I have no idea what ti's like to work for a boss for be motivated for a job where I don't see a direct reward. I make a lot of future monetary goals for myself so it helps me stay focused. I'm TERRIFIED of being poor so I guess that motivates me enough to get out there and work.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
I find for me at least, full time stripping is only a good idea for short periods of time. Dancing was my only stream of income my last two years of school, I paid to live in an expensive city, for supplies, and classes. I am used to spending all of the money that I make because I lived with such high costs for so long. Subsequently when I finished school and was dancing full time while looking for work, I was spending all of my newfound free time spending all of my money...I still always paid bills on time, but I wasn't saving. I was also missing a lot of work eventually because I was so bored and also burnt out a bit and exhausted from being fresh out of uni. When I got a vanilla job and slowly decreased my dancing shifts over the next year I found that my earnings per SHIFT increased. So whereas when I was dancing full time and averaging say 300 a shift and ended up working 14 shifts a month (~4k a month), when I had various vanilla jobs I was averaging say 400 a shift working 8 shifts a month (~3k a month, BUT I was guarunteed another 1-2k a month from vanilla income depending on the gig). For me it works out to be the same or better to have a variety of income sources. It also makes you more shock-proof: if you injure yourself and can't dance for 2 weeks or longer, you're not going to have to worry about being evicted, you just can't go out or shop for the rest of the month for example. I also find that having a vanilla job on top of dancing makes limits how lazy you can be. I will still occaisonally bail on shifts, but mostly I show up because I know I will make money being fresh, and it also gives you time to miss it a bit, there's not a whole lot of fun in waking up before 8am on mondays after all...it also adds some mental stimulation to life. I personally have never really only had one job, I like to always be doing a few different things so as not to get bored. And I didn't think it would be but dancing full time turned out to be just as boring as doing retail full time. Anything gets repetitive and dull. Except you make money in dancing from being entertaining and interesting and full of life. So it's a really bad combo imo.
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
^ That really helped to read Odette. More and more I'm finding myself in a vicious burn out/boredom/subsitence/injury/depression (and more adjectives!) cycle with dancing. For years now I can barely manage 2 shifts per week when in 2008 and previous I did approx 4per week; bearing in mind that an aussie shift is around 12hours its still not maximizing my time in the industry.
I am so scared of not making the "right" choices in creating a future income stream asides from dancing whilst I'm still capable of earning well in the club to set myself up for the transition (before i get pregnant/relocate to an area I wouldn't dance in/stop getting hired because I'm older-its stricter for older dancers in Aus). Fear of commitment and change I believe.
God i could use some reassurance- I don't own a house and I'm scared I will miss out on my chance in life to get pregnant, will my husband stay sober? how can aI move interstate to look after ageing parents where there are no strip clubs! so much pressure!!!!
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Re: "Lazy phase" of stripping?
I think a lot of us have sketchy family backgrounds. If you look at the general population there's a 20% mental illness rate. Look specifically at the moms : "About 11.9% of mothers (2.1 million) living with youths aged 12 to 17 had serious mental illness during the past year. About 3.2% of the mothers had both a serious mental illness and also reported illicit drug use, binge alcohol use, or heavy alcohol use during the past month. Youths living with a mother who had serious mental illness (SMI) were more likely to have used alcohol or an illicit drug during the past month (26.7%) than youths living with a mother who did not have SMI (18.8%)."
Another common problem is drug abuse among parents: "Based on SAMHSA's National Survey on Drug Use and Health, in 2002 almost 5 million adults were alcohol dependent or alcohol abusing and had at least one child younger than age 18 living in their home. Parents with past year alcohol dependence or abuse were more likely to report household turbulence than parents who were not alcohol dependent or alcohol abusing. Household turbulence included people in their household having serious arguments and often insulting or yelling at each other." http://www.oas.samhsa.gov/ACOA.htm
Now if you look at a club's roster of girls they will have easily 30% who have dealt with this. It's common to suffer C-PTSD Once you get past the first windfall of cash, the symptoms catch up to you. CPTSD is: "Complex post-traumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD) also known as developmental trauma disorder (DTD)[1] or complex trauma[2] is a psychological injury that results from protracted exposure to prolonged social and/or interpersonal trauma in the context of dependence, captivity or entrapment (a situation lacking a viable escape route for the victim), which results in the lack or loss of control, helplessness, and deformations of identity and sense of self. Examples include people who have experienced chronic maltreatment, neglect or abuse in a care-giving relationship, hostages, prisoners of war, concentration camp survivors, and survivors of some religious cults.[3] C-PTSD is distinct from, but similar to, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)"
Here's what it feels like: "Adults with C-PTSD have sometimes experienced prolonged interpersonal traumatization as children as well as prolonged trauma as adults. This early injury interrupts the development of a robust sense of self and of others. Because physical and emotional pain or neglect was often inflicted by attachment figures such as caregivers or older siblings, these individuals may develop a sense that they are fundamentally flawed and that others cannot be relied upon.[7][15]
This can become a pervasive way of relating to others in adult life described as insecure attachment. The diagnosis of dissociative disorder and PTSD in the current DSM-IV TR (2000) do not include insecure attachment as a symptom. Individuals with Complex PTSD also demonstrate lasting personality disturbances with a significant risk of revictimization.[16]
Six clusters of symptoms have been suggested for diagnosis of C-PTSD.[6][17] These are (1) alterations in regulation of affect and impulses; (2) alterations in attention or consciousness; (3) alterations in self-perception; (4) alterations in relations with others; (5) somatization, and (6) alterations in systems of meaning.[17]
Experiences in these areas may include:[4][18][19]
Difficulties regulating emotions, including symptoms such as persistent dysphoria, chronic suicidal preoccupation, self injury, explosive or extremely inhibited anger (may alternate), or compulsive or extremely inhibited sexuality (may alternate).
Variations in consciousness, including forgetting traumatic events (i.e., psychogenic amnesia), reliving experiences (either in the form of intrusive PTSD symptoms or in ruminative preoccupation), or having episodes of dissociation.
Changes in self-perception, such as a chronic and pervasive sense of helplessness, paralysis of initiative, shame, guilt, self-blame, a sense of defilement or stigma, and a sense of being completely different from other human beings
Varied changes in the perception of the perpetrator, such as attributing total power to the perpetrator (caution: victim's assessment of power realities may be more realistic than clinician's), becoming preoccupied with the relationship to the perpetrator, including a preoccupation with revenge, idealization or paradoxical gratitude, a sense of a special relationship with the perpetrator or acceptance of the perpetrator's belief system or rationalizations.
Alterations in relations with others, including isolation and withdrawal, persistent distrust, a repeated search for a rescuer, disruption in intimate relationships and repeated failures of self-protection.
Loss of, or changes in, one's system of meanings, which may include a loss of sustaining faith or a sense of hopelessness and despair."
So pay particular attention to the interpersonal problems. Girls take off time because they need to recover from childhood trauma. They take time off to avoid being triggered by the crazy no win situations in the club with the self absorbed, the predatory, and the substance abusing crowd all around them.