u/minatozakiparty

I am looking to primarily hear from other women in the APS and to get some advice, strategies, commiseration etc.

I don’t believe the APS has a broader sexism issue, or at least no more so than most workplaces.

However, the particular division I’ve landed in is insidious and the sexism is very apparent. An example is that it’s an unspoken (key, because this makes it hard to report) rule that women cannot attend the coffee runs/brunches the male staff go to at the head office. None of the women in the division go, if they’ve tried (which they have in the past) they are told to stay back and coffee will be brought to them.

Several of the male employees in this division go to the golf club together on the weekends. The women aren’t invited (and to be fair, probably aren’t sycophantic enough to go lol). One of these employees was promoted to EL2 over a female employee with 10 years more experience and 3+ years acting in the role in question.

Male employees are given training opportunities while female employees are told that there isn’t a budget. We, the women, have only figured out this is a pattern by asking each other behind closed doors. Acting opportunities are only given to male employees unless the team in question only has women at the appropriate level (which is rare). In an area with 15 directors, 3 of them are women. No SES are women. A team was explicitly reshuffled just because it had all women on it and it “wasn’t fair”.

I’ve personally as a woman in the division dealt with being asked if I’m single, asked the gender of my partner, told to grow my hair out etc

It’s also a weird division in other ways. R U Ok day, Wear it Purple, anything in that realm is ignored where as the rest of the department at least pretends at inclusion.

Obviously the solution to this problem is for everyone in this division who doesn’t want to deal with the culture to leave. But that’s proving difficult in this current climate. And the problem with the practices are that they are an embedded culture (coming from a band 1, who has been there forever and is the source of the problem) that is hard to evidence.

This isn’t even a broader department issue. People I work with in the office from other areas have a very different experience.

Myself and some of the other women (at this point, we have weekly meetings just to help each other psychosocially) are all close to breakdowns over this culture.

Hey all,

My partner and I are fans (myself the bigger fan) and we have SC tickets to Sydney.

However, we are going to struggle to get to the 4 pm check in for soundcheck. We both work and we would both have to leave at 3 pm from our jobs, latest, to get there which we are not sure we can swing.

At the same time, we went to the Twice sound checks and we didn't enjoy not being allowed to leave the arena between the SC and the actual concert. It meant hours sitting around without being able to go out and get dinner and relax. We also felt the Twice SC (I've been to many of their SC's and their energy is really dependant on the day) was not entirely worth the hassle, given it was about 7 minutes.

The Mamamoo check in is at 4, but the concert isn't until 8.

In Melbourne, how late could you get to the arena for SC without being locked out?

Were you able to leave the venue in between to get something to eat?

Would you say the SC experience was 'worth it' - for us, that would mean fan interaction deeper into the crowd and something 10+ minutes (nothing to do with the members or the group, it's just very hard for us to get out of work early and its a drama).

I am looking for a bit of solidarity and advice from those of you who are also a dumping ground for the 'too hard' tasks.

In every APS job I've had thus far, I have eventually ended up being the staff member the senior executive flick a very big task to that, objectively, should be done by a team of people and that I often have very little expertise in. Usually I am given extremely tight deadlines, no support, no direct reports to use, and very little recognition (because ultimately the work I am doing is owned by another team).

As an example, at my current place of work a certain policy to address a certain rather big deal of a thing needed to be drafted by week's end. The problem? The team doing the work re the problem for the previous three months hadn't documented anything, didn't know what they were doing, and couldn't write policy well.

I was parachuted in and told to write an enterprise wide policy in three days, tops, piecing together random bits of SME information and content that this team had done and trying to turn it into something that could be operationalised and made any sense.

It was extremely stressful for me, especially because I had no knowledge of the type of work the policy touched on and so I was flying by the seat of my pants and using google. The 'problem' is that I am considered good at what I *can* do which is write.

This happens again and again and again and even if I raise capacity, WHS etc issues with my direct manager, no one really cares. I've tried to express that I am happy to assist BUT I need to be given adequate time and resources AND I don't want enterprise wide deliverables solely on my desk when I'm not even very senior, but that is never considered. Even recently when my current manager genuinely tried to limit my role in a project I was parachuted in to, as soon as she went on leave my role expanded completely and I wasn't consulted, just told. In contrast, a lot of my similar level colleagues do at least get a conversation about this kind of role expansion with the relevant exec.

To put the icing on the cake, I applied for financing and leave re a training certificate I wanted to do that is relevant to my role about 3 months ago. They still haven't approved it. Meanwhile, a male colleague of mine (I am female) was approached and told to do that training certificate and that it would be financed despite that skill not being a part of his role, but they wanted to give him the opportunity. I am feeling really exhausted and burnt out.

This is a bit of a discussion and a bit of a vent.

A few years ago, I finished a novel. It was not my first, but it was the first written with serious intention.

I had some beta readers read it, who really enjoyed it. I had some people I know who know the genre/genres well read it, and they really enjoyed it. It was a genre novel that was deliberately subversive, and trying to be all at once entertaining AND critical/raise some questions.

I decided to try the trad pub thing and put it out there and see what came back.

That was when I gradually realised my mistakes.

1. Good luck traditionally publishing a book where all of the major characters are not American or from the UK or Ireland. It's not impossible, but given 90 percent of agents are from one of those two places, your work is immediately seen as not commercially viable if you don't write about these places. I had responses coming back asking me to re-set my novel in the US or UK, which I was extremely reluctant to do because...other places exist and I love writing about where I'm from.

2. Agents will say they are seeking a sub genre but reject pretty much anything from that sub genre for some reason.

3. If the sub genre hasn't sold well or isn't in vogue in the last five years, no one sees the value of publishing your work. Even if that sub genre has been successful before.

4. It is really hard to sell a genre novel where the prose is anything encroaching on literary. They want your writing to match the market, and don't trust that there are genre readers out there who really appreciate the mix.

5. Debut novel word counts are getting so restrictive that it is hard to have any meaningful introspection, especially in genres that require more exposition, and you have to really push through beats.

I felt pretty dejected about the experience, especially because of the sheer amount of rejections with no actionable feedback at all. I understand agents are very busy, but as someone also working an intense corporate job WHILST writing and having to put together 52 versions of the same query package because for some reason, agents all need different word counts and can't just make it easier, one sentence of constructive feedback takes about 1 minute to draft!

Anyway, I decided to very deliberately craft the next novel as trad pub bait. The idea is, in my opinion, quite stupid and gimmicky and very tiktoky and will be dated quite quickly. The writing is serviceable, but quite bad. I deliberately made the prose feel very pacey, unchallenging, easy to digest if you're listening to an audiobook and on a run. I made sure the novel is set in the US and wrote the text in American english. I focused the novel on some 'huge twist' which is completely ridiculous and hard to believe. I made sure it is short. I made sure you can summarise the plot in a line and include very hashtaggy words.

Its a book I actively dislike and would personally not really read. Not because these types of books don't have their place, its just not really for me.

I started querying it two weeks ago and already have very strong traction and numerous fulls.

Is this the state of where we are headed? I struggle to imagine how some really successful novelists from decades ago would have gotten published in this climate. Think of an unpublished Robin Hobb trying to pitch Liveship Traders or Nora Roberts trying to pitch her genre blendy early 2000s romances that were over 100,000 words.

In a world where books like Yesteryear are immediately basically sold on premise alone, rather than prose or the final product, is this just...how it is?

Hi all,

I've just finished the first draft of my novel. It's a romantic suspense crossed with chic-lit elements. It definitely needs some editing, as one would expect, although I tend to revise quite a lot as I write so my first drafts don't read as first drafts.

I am at 106,000 words. Ideally, I would like to try and query this novel for a trad pub, although I will self publish if that doesn't work out. I am sure the word count will move down as I edit, but I wanted some insight as to whether you really need to hit under 100k for debut.

I ask because both of my comps (one of which was a debut) sit closer to 130k. They are both romantic suspense, and I think the genre/subgenre tends to lend itself to slightly longer novels because you have both romantic AND thriller/crime/mystery elements to resolve. That being said one of my comps is from an author who was more established before publishing, so had wiggle room.

Hey all,

It'll be my third trip to Japan. I've done Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka twice, and I've done Takayama, Uji, Fuji area, Hiroshima and Miyajima.

I'm going to be going back in December, and I'm looking for some new spots to explore. I will probably be flying in to Osaka, and will be spending some time in Tokyo, but that's all I know. I will be in Japan for around three weeks.

I love good food, nature, quirky places/nightlife, and nerdy things.

I have been in 'remission' for about three years. I got to a point where my OCD was negligible and it rarely impacted my day to day life.

And then...my 'thing' happened. The thing I am fixated on, my theme, came true. My theme is, unfortunately, not something that uncommon. I have contamination OCD, and I have a thing about warts.

I got a wart on my foot. Ever since, it has taken every bit of my energy to not spiral back into intrusive thought and action patterns. I tried to do what 'normal' people do, and go to the podiatrist and get treatment, but it hasn't worked. Meanwhile, I feel utterly zapped energy wise, I don't feel myself, and I feel like I'm falling into depression.

I know many people have warts and live life like nothing at all is going on. The problem for me is that having a trigger constantly on me is really testing me and requiring me to be really in the zone 100% of the day. It's also a struggle because there are normal hygiene things people do when treating warts, which exist on a spectrum, and I am constantly tempted back into reassurance seeking thoughts trying to figure out what I should and shouldn't be doing with a manifested 'threat'.

Has anyone dealt with similar, and how did you cope? I am looking for advice about techniques I can use and how I can work towards staying recovered.

Hi guys,

My first experience with plantar warts, I went the cryo route. I had one wart originally, and not long after cryo it spread immensely. They all eventually disappeared, almost spontaneously, at a much later date.

Ten years later, and I've had a wart come back on the ball of my foot. Ostensibly, it looked really small/new from the surface. But I've gone to a podiatrist who has used acid and advised me to use OTC acid for about 2 months now.

My foot has abscessed twice and I've experienced second degree burns from the treatment. I've been unable to walk for about 3 weeks and I've had to do wound management with a GP.

What other treatment options are there that aren't extremely invasive or likely to require more recovery/time off of feet? I am at my wits end

I’ve been dating my girlfriend for close to 12 months.

I genuinely love her and have fallen for her.

However, it’s become apparent that she hid her depression and its extent quite well for the first three or so months of our relationship. I had no idea she had it or that it was this bad.

She cries almost every day/night and has spirals where she ruminates on how much she hates herself. She won’t get out of bed before 2 on the weekends unless she has plans. She struggles to shower every day despite working in healthcare (where…it’s not great not to shower). She has no hobbies and has lost interest in everything she enjoys, which has actually made it hard to talk to her because she’s not reading anything or doing anything so there’s nothing new for us to discuss. She talks about feeling hopeless and like she can’t see her future or what it would be like.

The thing is, I have suffered from extreme depression in my past. We are talking not showering for long stretches of time, unemployed, very close to not wanting to be around, no friends, no hobbies, sleeping at 3 am until 3 pm. I recovered. It took a few years of really consistent work but I recovered. I do sometimes struggle with depression but I’m much more functional now, much more grateful, and I have coping mechanisms.

I have tried everything I can think of bar a pure ultimatum to get my girlfriend to see that she has a disease that has treatment options. I’ve offered to do some of her hobbies alongside her, like co reading a book together or planning walks. I’ve asked her multiple times to consider therapy and I’ve offered to book her into sessions and find her someone she might gel with. I’ve talked to her about how her constant negative self talk is perpetuating her mood. I’ve tried to encourage her towards exercise for the endorphins and told her she can tag along with me. I know she hates her current job and it doesn’t earn anything much, so I’ve found options for her to re-skill in areas she has shown interest in but there’s always an excuse as to why she can’t do it (when in reality, she’s become the kind of person who would find any workplace intolerable after a year because she’s just mentally burnt out).

She isn’t receptive to anything and has said she will “think about” therapy but I know she won’t go, even though it’s very accessible where we live. She has convinced herself her whole family hates her but from what I’ve seen, they are concerned and she’s often objectively rude to them and antagonistic and self isolates. Her mother, for instance, clearly feels worried that she doesn’t have an actual career despite being smart and is worried her daughter is in bed all day, but my girlfriend takes that as evidence that her mother hates her and further parental trauma.

The thing is, I really do love her. When she’s in a decent mood and when we are out on a date or talking at one of our homes, I am so happy with her. But her moods are becoming increasingly present and I also find her constant self victimisation really unattractive, but also detrimental to my own recovery. She currently seems to believe that how she feels is simply a product of who she is, and that there’s no room for improvement. When I, someone who has been where she is, know that’s not true.

I feel scared that if I leave her, she’ll a) get worse or hurt herself and b) I’ll have left someone I really love. But I am also worried this will never improve because she hasn’t even reached the point of realising this is a mental illness and not an inherent personality she needs to stop identifying so heavily with.

There will be some mild spoilers in this post.

Yesteryear promises to be a novel about a trad wife influencer who travels back in time and has to contend with the realities of the life/epoch she heralds, in the modern world, as being superior. This is a great concept.

So many things could be explored with this concept. Why are white women, in particular, drawn to conservatism that doesn’t serve them? How does conservatism mythologise and misrepresent times and attitudes of the past, or the realities of people who lived in them? How do we reckon with the rise of white women on instagram who glorify servitude and wish they could return to eras where slavery was widespread? Etc etc etc.

The author herself was, at one point, a conservative Christian white woman. I think this ends up being incredibly obvious in the tone of this novel, which feels more interested in being condescending and vindictive than it is in examining an actual social problem, its ramifications, and taking a nuanced lens as to how these women even get here, what forces are at play, and their complicity vs victimhood.

Natalie is completely irredeemable. Which I suppose is fine, and I’m not saying unlikeable women aren’t great protagonists (they are often the best ones). The issue is that if it’s established pretty early on that Natalie is really tremendously awful and has no humanity, interiority, ability to change or any genuine complexity…everything in this novel then is really just poking fun at a trope or concept, enacting violence on a woman who is yucky, without any meaningful critique or examination.

As it turns out, the whole conceit of the novel and its premise actually isn’t even really happening. The author pulls the “it was all a dream” in an actual contemporary fiction novel which I personally felt was a cop out and extremely disappointing. All at once it allows the author to never actually establish the premise or deal with the hard stuff (ie world building in a premise that has a sci fi/fantasy element), the author doesn’t have to stick that landing or meaningfully deal with the element of the past, and at the same time…it means that the potential of that premise is ultimately lost. Also, to be frank, the modern day influencer part of the premise isn’t that interesting to most modern readers - we all know what trad wives are and what they seem to get up to. The interesting aspect was the time travel…which barely features and does nothing meaningful at all.

Personally, I didn’t get anything from this novel. If you’re its target audience, you already ostensibly agree that trad wives are cringe and bad. What was interesting about the premise is the idea of throwing this person into the past and exploring themes of white complicity, white womanhood, American Christianity and anti feminism…none of which actually happens. Natalie is a trope wrapped within another trope - she isn’t a real person with fleshed out beliefs or fears or justifications or perspective. The question of “what makes a trad wife” appears to be answered with “being an asshole, some patriarchy and apparently significant mental illness”.

What’s more is that I feel like the almost forgone inherent success of this book says a lot about what or rather whom tends to sell and who tends to be ignored or to attract a smaller readership. This premise has been done before - a great example (and a much better executed one) is Kindred by Octavia E Butler. Kindred is by no means super obscure, but a black author writing about a black modern woman sent back in time, meeting her enslaved ancestors, and reckoning with race and complicity etc is seen as genre fiction and not sold as a big ticket item. White women are immediately more intrigued by books that are from their own or depict their own. Kindred does this premise, in my opinion, about a thousand times better but a lot of the critiques of Yesteryear will be defended with “you just don’t like unlikeable women characters”, when maybe…the book is mediocre.

Ultimately, this book really had nothing new or insightful to say about the issue it wants to contend with. It felt to me like a white feminist writing a blog post about how much she hates this specific kind of woman, without examining why she herself was one, why these women are the way they are, or offering her humanity whilst examining her behaviour. It delivered none of the genre elements it promised, and the implications of its twist basically turn any meaningful critique into mush (and evoke the often used trope of “woman just be crazy”).