-
have any of you felt this way
I am so stressed out. I used to be a happy, friendly, optemistic person. I used to love going to work. I still appear to love work, put on a great, energetic, fun stage show, make killer money while being one of the cleanest dancers in my club full of extras, but I am really starting to feel out of place. I have always been a very confident person, in all aspects of my self and life. However, lately the rude ignorant comments are getting to me. I am sick of men thinking I am "just a stripper". I feel out of touch with alot of the girls I work with whom I used to like, at least on a casual working way. I don't want to sound conceided, but I feel that with the exception of a few, I am surrounded by silly little girls with silly petty problems and with no real goals in life. The reason I am so addicted to this site is that the women on here seem smart, driven, confident and well adjusted. WhERE ARE ALL THE DANCERS LIKE THAT UP HERE??? I used to love showing off my body and shape outside the bar with classy but sexy clothes...now I HATE it if I turn a head or get a look outside the bar. I tone down my looks unless I am with my hubby or at work.
Why am I feeling this way? What does this mean? I have never experienced anything like this before. I was on my way to work tonight in the car with my hubby and I just broke down and cried and couldn't bear to go in there. Came home, and played with my cats and ate chocolate! What the hell is going on? And all this even though I have been making considerably good money lately and have not changed my dances or anything! I think I need a shrink. I am finding I want to be around people who I feel very close with...no patience lately for fairweather friends and accquaintances. (sp?) I get so mad at any litle negative arrogant comment I hear from some drunk dude at work that I can't sleep! I think "who the FUCK does that drunk peice of crap paying ME to twirl around in front of HIM think he is to say anything less than positive to me?! ( you know...the "why are you doing this? " crap that is meant somehow to be a comliment but is actually SOOOO insulting?)
AAAAARRRRGGGGGGGGGHHHHHH!! :censored: :censored: :censored: :censored: :banghead: :banghead:
OKay...I feel abit better. Thank you to those who endured my mindless venting and actually got to the end of these psychotic ramblings.
Have any of you felt this way? What did you do about it? What helped you get out of it? I am tired of being this stressed out, bitter, unhappy person that I have never been before. The only things that make me happy are staying home with my kitties and hubby, cooking and cuddling. I could care less if I left the house if I didn't need to work. Please help!
And sorry about spelling...I am freaking. :crazy:
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
I am no expert, this is all my opion (sp?). It kinda sounds like you need a vacation. or even just a change of scene. have you thought about changeing clubs? I get pissed off when i get a lot of grabby, dirty talking, guys who are looking for a date and not a dance. That actually was a small problem monday, but then wendsday there was a mix of the grabbers and the calm guys who sit on thier hands. that was much better. when i go out into public i generally wear baggy clothes that hide my figure so that i dont get the stares and comments. I dont like that attention outside of work and husband. You might need (again opinion) more mental stimulation and appreciation. That might be why you want to only talk with your good friends. it might be a good idea to take a class where there are group discusions, or to go to meeting that talk about something you are intrested in. I like poetry clubs and the like. a shrink might not be a bad idea either. but you know and understand your situation more then any of us do. I hope you start to feel better soon.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
Burnout. You need a vacation to recharge. Take a week or two off and chill out, you'll feel better.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
I don't personally think you need a shrink- but I guarantee you would have (or worse) if you didn't have your outburst you mentioned in the car.
Becoming a bit troubled or otherwise aware of the human condition surrounding you is a normal, and natural process. And although not the case with everyone, the frustration and anxiety is usually, deep down, rooted from a simple nature of compassion... which is never a bad thing. The more compassionate people are generally the most troubled by experiences of blatant prejudice, ignorance or insensitivity... and strippers work everyday in an environment that is often times overflowing with all three. You see co-workers/other people without goals or realizing the important things in life, it can become very frustrating... and keeping this to yourself over time leads to intolerance and finally outbursts.
It's impossible to guess the true source of your anxiety from such a limited description, but I kind of sense from what you have included this may be the case. I think the vacation advice is a good suggestion as you can use this time to search yourself and see what the real source is. Taking a sabbatical from life and people from time to time can be very therapeutic, and reduce the burn-out and intolerance.
I'd say definately take some time off. Spend it AWAY from your club and club friends, and do some soul searching. I'm sure you'll feel 100x better afterwards.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
I came on this site to pose the exact same question to you ladies but it looks like kennedy beat me too it! ;)
I am feeling the same at the moment sweetie and have done so on and off since I have been dancing. Some nights I just can't bare the thought of getting naked in front of a guy so I will stay at home.... some nights I force myself to go into work and nearly break down in tears on some guys lap. Some nights just the thought of it makes me feel sick.... sometimes i wonder why I do it to myself.... I wonder if its just me being too sensitive? Why do things get to me that don't seem to effect the other girls? I wish I could get my head around it.
Not all nights are this bad but I do get affected by it alot... and right now is one of the bad times.
I agree with what the other girls have said... a holiday or even just a new club can be refreshing and enough to get you out of the rough patch. Good luck and I hope it passes soon xo
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
I think we all feel like that at least once. Thats why you have to be strong .
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
I agree with giggles.
I don't think I ever got to the stage I couldn't sleep coz of work, but I did get majorly pissed off about the comments some men would make and the repetitiveness of their questions. Even the sheer shallowness of some girls got to me, it was like the money they made and designer clothing (aka keeping up witht the Jones' IMHO) were the most important things to them. I sometimes felt like I was the only one who had a life outside the strip circuit AND an education. But hey, stripping ain't like any other job that's why a lot of people can't really relate.
Bridgette has the right idea - you sound like you need a good long break. You can only do well at this job and view it more positively by taking some time out to recharge your batteries.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
Kennedy, it sounds to me like you are suffering from a mild form of clinical depression. If I were you I'd do some reading on the subject, decide in advance on what form of treatment you'd prefer (meds and cognitive-behavioral therapy are the usual choices), and see a professional who specializes in providing that sort of treatment. I take prozac myself, and it works very well for me, but YMMV. If you want some links, let me know and I'll post them.
Krys, it sounds to me like dancing is not a good career choice for you. I know the money is good, but have you explored other, possibly equally lucrative, careers that don't involve activities that make you feel sick? Some of the ladies here report terrific income from web sites, I think Melonie knows quite a bit about this.
BTW, I'm an IT consultant, not a mental health professional, so anything I say on this subject should be taken with a whole shaker of salt.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
Kennedy, all I can tell you is that you are not alone in feeling the way that you do. I think that this reaction really has its roots in the changes which have taken place in the exotic dancing business over the past few years. I am greatly affected myself by the gradual transition from dancing being considered "show business" and customers treating dancers as respected "performers", to dancing being considered "sex business" and customers treating dancers as "sex workers".
Unfortunately, as you point out about your own club, this change is now so ingrained in many areas that the clubs, the newer dancers, and the customers now seem to integrate 'extras' into every aspect of the club's operation. Subconsciously at least, this places clubowners as some rough equivalent of pimps, places dancers who provide 'extras' as some rough equivalent of whores, and places customers as some rough equivalent of 'johns'. Even though this line of thinking may be subconscious, it eventually takes its toll. Your reservations about appearing in public as an attractive sexy female are a dead giveaway that your subconscious is having problems in this area!
As you said yourself, you ARE out of place working in a club where the majority of dancers provide 'extras', where the majority of customers expect 'extras', and where club management knows that 'extras' are at the root of the club's continued profitability. You didn't change, but the club, the other dancers, and the club's customers changed all around you! My best advice to you is to either try and find a much lower mileage club to work in where you will again be treated as a respected 'performer', or to simply quit dancing for a couple of months to give your subconscious enough time to dissassociate these negative linkages.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
Get out of my head Kennedy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm starting to burn out myself for some of the same reasons. I dispise some of the new young dumb girls who have started lately. They don't know shit about the business but think they do and talk shit about us "old shool" girls. I'm at that club entirely to much. I know I'm burnt out.
I'm taking an extra day off a week and it's a me day ;D. No club, no drama, no husband around, I can lie around and eat bon bons all day if I want!
Take a much needed break and recharge yourself.
Remember, if you can't love yourself, you can't love anybody else!
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
My ATF quit for this exact reason. I think most dancers eventually get to that point. That's why you should be actively preparing for the next stage of your life while you have the money to do so.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
i just took three weeks off and i could not wait to get back to work! for me time i go to the stables and ride my horse. no phone no husband no son. it really helps to take time off and have my personal time. so when i do go to work im ready to make that money.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
damn kennedy i couldnt have said it better myself. it sounds like you are definitely either burnt out, depressed, or both. i became really depressed too and now im taking an anti-depressant. i think that is why dancers quit after awhile- you can only take so much of this buisness!! it takes a really, really strong person to deal with all the downs in this industry. there is noooo such thing as easy money.
out of work i just want to hang out at home with my cat and relax by myself. i too have no patience or intrest in hanging out with "acquaintences" who would probably just stab me in the back once i turn around!!
i hope you feel better. i know EXACTLY how you feel!!!
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
It's very normal for strippers to feel this way sometimes. If we had regular jobs it would be different, but we don't get that sense of being valued for our skills and a job well done like in other professions. All we get is some cash and we go in again and again to bounce our boobs in someones face. Cash alone is not going to fulfull the sense of purpose that say, a nurse, has.
This can easily lead to bouts of depression and stripper burnout. A vacation sounds like a great idea. Use that time to think about all the goals dancing will help you accomplish. A clear cut set of goals, with time frames, will help you get back to feeling like you are accomplishing something.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
The reason I think this may be clinical depression rather than the work-related malaise other folks are pointing to is the fact that you mention not wanting to leave the house at all.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
I think it's the season. A lot of girls at my club are feeling this same way. Just a few days ago one of my friends had a breakdown at the end of her shift. A vaction sounds like a good remedy but we had a girl go to Germany for 3 weeks & she ended up quitting a week after she got back b/c she realized the job was no longer for her.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
I felt the same way for a long time. You just need to be strong and push through. I feel the same way at work with the girls. Like I can't connect with them or their on a different page than me. I just got used to being a loner and made friends outside of the club. Be strong K? :-*
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
You know,
I broke away from dancing for a long spell. I'm talking dancing ,not stripping for about ten years. Suddenly I got back to it with avengance. I don't know why you suddenly came down with a bout of depression but I know it doesn't make sense to continue if you are unhappy with it. I think I'm in agreement with Bridgette. Take a break, think it over but don't force anything.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
"...you can only take so much of this business!! it takes a really, really strong person to deal with all the downs in this industry. there is noooo such thing as easy money."
Carmen NYC
This hits the nail on the head. I have worked with many, many newbie dancers. In contrast to most DJs, I enjoy it, but I have noticed that in spite of all my attempts to make it easier and to brace them for the stresses and pitfalls of the business, most of them don't make it past the six month mark. Those that do are almost always changed in some respect, generally are not as inclined to be cheerful about working, and are in general less compassionate people. Considering the shit they have to put up with, it no longer surprises me.
This has been in Daytona Beach, where virtually no one has any sort of education or intellectual/artistic life outside of dancing, and so it is probably worse there. Few people (in or out of the business) there could be considered compassionate. But it is a very tough business everywhere, due primarily to the fact that dancers are judged on surface appearance and a willingness to behave in a fashion which gratifies the customers' fantasies, which sadly don't often include having a brain or personality.
It is a business that tells you you are only as good as your tits and ass, and maybe your face, or possibly even your smile. Customers who enjoy good conversation with an intelligent and enlightened woman are the exception. Managers who appreciate this are also very rare.
I was quite distressed to discover that in the metropolitan area where my girlfriend works, patrons ignore the stage and tipping is unusual. She has worked with me only two nights, in a terrible club, when I was out of practice, and was still surprised at how many tips she got, and the power she had over the audience. It is a shame that she could not have performed in one of the better clubs I have worked in, when I was in true form--then she might appreciate what a really good DJ can do, instead of preferring relative morons who just play her music--any asshole with three brain cells and half a heart can do that (though apparently they can't even manage to do so most of the time).
This was always the one way I could fight the trend, by creating an atmosphere where inspired dancers and erotic art were valued, and a woman could be appreciated for the way she moved her body onstage, not just how it conformed to the viewers' ideals at rest, or how well she ground in VIP. Focusing attention onstage is also going to be much harder in a club where women and customers alike are convinced it doesn't matter, isn't worth any money, and is a mere front for the "quasi-prostitutional" activities entailed in private dances.
Melonie, as usual, has cogently summed up the problem, "dancing being considered 'sex business' and customers treating dancers as 'sex workers'." And it's getting worse all the time.
I have also experienced this burned-out feeling, after dealing with too many cretins who somehow wound up managing a SC, and all the stresses of a very tough business. Management tends to dislike it when a DJ has a brain, in spite of higher liquor and VIP sales as a result. I had the most trouble when working more than 3 or at most 4 nights a week, and when I didn't have any real life outside of working as a DJ. It's a damned shame I wasn't a SW member then, that would have helped a lot!
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
Oh absolutely, I know what you mean. I understand what everyone is saying about taking vacation time due to burnout, but the more time I take off the HARDER it is to go back. I try not to take too much time off as I need to be dancing right now.
I look at the positives about the business to stay upbeat. And the good thing is I don't think it's changed me. As long as you see the business for what it really is, I don't think it can change you.
If you're in a lot of debt maybe you have to be strong and go in, but even then, why do you have to "be strong" and do something that makes you depressed? I say listen to yourself on those depressed days and don't go in if you don't have to. And don't feel bad about it! Take care of yourself and don't make yourself do something you really don't want to do. Maybe you can start to transition out of dancing or maybe, once you get the idea you aren't forcing yourself into going in, it'll start to become fun again.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
WOw,,, thank you all for your insights and sympathies. I haven't been to work in a couple days and am preparing to go in tonight.
I'm not sure that the job has changed ME as much as it has changed my view of people. (Hmm...i suppose that's similar) I was always this little miss happy sunshine and rainbows girl and now I am quite a bit more cautious...which I see as a good thing. Still very friendly, too compassionate for my own good (since that word's been throw around alot) but just more interested in the quieter things in life now as opposed to the big, social, adventurous things I used to like.
Anyway,,,since I have at least a year and a half left of my dancing plan, I will have to find some way to process these feelings. I really find this site helpful for that, sort of a mentoring type of thing from alot of you that have been in the business for longer than myself and have a good method of dealing with it. Needless to say, I will be here alot.
ANyway, again, thank you so much for all your help and suggestions. If any of you are EVER up in the T.O. area for work (lol...sheesh,,why would you?!) I would love to meet you. There seems to be very few even slightly interesting dancers around here...at least where I work! Lol....
THANK YOU!!!
Kennedy
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
I've only been doing this for a little over a month, and I feel really tired of the job sometimes. Customers talking about us, the cattiness of the girls, greedy managers, etc. However, I deal with it because since I am only 21 and have only reached junior status in college, I could be doing worse. Like working as a waitress getting stiffed every night, having to kiss people's asses in retail. The shitty college jobs. I can't deal with them! Sometimes I make in a day what I would be making in a month. I say suck it up and drive on after a few weeks vacation. It's hard on all of us, but we can be each others support.
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
Well, Kennedy. I've worked the Corporate world before the dancer world. And, believe me when I tell you that it's not that much better...and the pay can be infinitely worse! In the corporate world, you have the kiss-ass brown nosers who will do anything to get the next promotion or raise. You have the bosses who ride your ass all day to finish your work so that they can give you theirs before they leave for a 3-week vacation. You have to bitch constantly to get the IT people to get your computer to do what you need it to. And, then, you have the phone to answer, the calls to return, and the meetings to schedule on top of filing, doing future projections and just trying to keep your hands away from your hair for fear of pulling it too much and going bald.
The nice thing about being a dancer, though, is that you can take off the days that you need to. At my corporate job, I brought home about $3000 PER MONTH. Now, I have the ability to do that in one week (or weekend if I'm lucky). I'm taking a 2 week vacation in March...I know I'll need it both to get away from the dancing scene to recharge and also to get away from this damn cold and snow.
My suggestion is that you have some more ME days. Also, make sure that you stay in touch with those close to you. Arrange to meet someone close to you for lunch every Wednesday morning for a light breakfast (or whatever). It gives you the contact that you are craving from "close people" and also gives you something to look forward to. A nice spa day wouldn't hurt, either.
Take care of yourself, Kennedy!!!
And, remember...we're all in this together!!
Love and hugs,
Venus
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
Hey Kennedy - a little late for me to add my coupla cents but...
The job short of the cash incentive really has no enduring value. Its a meaningless means to an end for most of us.
It wears on a gal.
Especially if you know your personal value far and above exceeds monetary reward for physical attributes and or hostessing skills.
Yes you can take the 'be strong' route but that too has its price...damping down feelings lead to related - and can easily grow into - deeper issues.
It is especially difficult to add up the hours of our lives and see how much we have put into the industry and to what end. No gold watch at OUR retirement party - know what Im sayin?
It compounds and can be very stressing to say the least.
What I can suggest is a due date to reach the goals you have set for yourself - break up that due date by mini due dates to obtain smaller yet worthwhile projects along the way ie. car, house, travel, education - whatever your route is - dont just keep on keepin on because time waits for no one and what you are feeling now is similar to a kind of wake up call to the reality of this profession.
Get done what you need to - and feel your reward in the knowing you are taking this for every red cents worth - MAKE IT MEANINGFUL by the very reaching of each and every subsiduary goal.
By giving your own life back its true value - the sweating of the small stuff becomes considerably easier.
Try just setting one small goal and get after it *hard core* - you will see some of your angst slip away by the very action of having meaning or direction OTHER than another night at work paying just regular bills etc. stop going thru the motions and get a plan going.
Try another club sure but I think the problem isnt the club its inside you and how you are thinking and feeling.
Take a break - sure but the problems will wait for you. Guaranteed.
Try a little restructuring and get a game plan, keep a journal of goals - budgeting - forecasting - dreams -
Work on some personal fulfilment - this job wont give it to you and cash wont buy it either.
Kennedy I wish you love, health and strength, and I am actually glad you are feeling this - it will give you the drive and incentive to be more than your average burnout peeler that leaves this job with nothing to show.
Harness this anxiety and or anger and chain it to a star!!! Let it rocket you to a bigger better place in life!
Peace...
Leigh
-
Re:have any of you felt this way
YES YES YES! I had the same problem , i was just sooo tired of working everynight and it was just getting to me. I was mad at the hubby and i was just mad at myself and eventually it made me make less money. I went on satturday and said to myself this is the last day and i made good money!After that i went home and vacationed at HOME for 3 weeks. When i was back that depression was gone. You are probably got tired but like i said just relaxx or maybe just find a hideaway, trust me its good.everybodys advice is right