As always, I love being around Audrey Middleton and her team when I play Sequester. I liked the experience last night, but the social construct was challenging. I was the first victim of Sequester: Heroes vs. Villains tonight and I had a feeling that it would end up that way after I saw who I was up against. I know Joe Murgida absolutely does not like me and I knew right away that he'd be going after me when he saw I was on the cast.
Unfortunately for me, Joe is also very charismatic and when he tells people things about me, he will be believed whether or not what he says is true because people feed into his charm and they did last night. Being on the autism spectrum, I struggle with verbal communication and I tried and tried to defend myself against the onslaught that came towards me right away. I know people who were in Sequester last said that I stirred up drama first, but I didn't. Every time I went into a room, even at the very beginning, other people worked to get away from me as quickly as they possibly could and Joe actively followed me everywhere on point to keep me from talking too much. Some people in the cast were even upfront about the fact that Joe was after me and basically told me, quite rudely, that I had absolutely no shot in going any further. I did try very hard to defend myself, but Joe is so good with words that I felt like it wouldn't do any good because people had already made up their minds. People weren't willing to be open-minded to conversation with me and when people aren't willing to have conversations with me, it can get pretty hard emotionally.
There was a bright side to being eliminated first, though, and I played it strategically. In being eliminated from Sequester: Heroes vs. Villains first, I was able to leave six players with immunity for the next round. I gifted immunity to two I knew, Joe and Hunter Ince, and made it known that I knew them, thereby submarining their chances of getting others to trust them. Although they weren't eliminated right away, neither one of them ultimately made the finals and only one of them made the Jury. As soon as I saw the cast, I knew my odds of doing well were poor because rumors of my 'oddness' were already out there. I decided to fight for myself from the very beginning because I knew there was absolutely nobody else in my corner, as is often the case in games or even in real life social situations.
People think that I have lots of friends just because I put myself and my talents out on social media so much, but I really don't. I have to find joy in my uniqueness because it's a path I walk alone. I wish more were truly willing to walk it with me in deed, not just word. I hear so many people say that they are fans of mine and love me and my work, but how do they show it? I felt rather shunned and dismissed by a lot of last night's cast because words by others caused a lot of damage. I'm a little odd, yes, but I am a hard worker and a quick learner. People don't need to be scared of getting to know me, but they allow the words of others to influence their judgment and automatically assume I'm damaged or bad because others say it. I'm different because of living on the spectrum, yes, but I wish people would try to get to know me as a person instead of running away, shunning me, or gossiping about me because they fear 'different' and want to extract it from their lives as quickly as possible. I will definitely play more Sequester games, but I hope that the rumormongering stops and that I'm given a fair shot next time I play. Rumors by others have damaged my personal life over the years and it just felt like more of the same last night. I wish people would give me a chance to prove myself as a good person and deem me worthy of their time and compassion.
Comments
Sorry you had to experience this Heather. You're a wonderful person
