What I Wish I Could Tell Work

I really don't want to have to look for a job right now. What I want is to be looking for an apartment, to be applying for housing assistance on the off chance that I qualify, and/or to be looking for a roommate situation for awhile. What I want is to find a cheap but airy studio or one bedroom apartment that is just mine, where my cats and my stuff can live, where I can settle in, where I don't have to be anything to or for anyone.

But to keep my job, you want me to be able to tell you a designated person who I will be able to tell when I'm starting to not do very well, so that they can call you and tell you "Hey, she needs a bit of a break, even if she isn't in a place to ask for it herself." I get it. You want to make sure that the clients are taken care of, that I don't no-call no-show and leave everyone wondering what happened to me. And I even understand that you do care for me and you want me to take active steps in dealing with my mental illness, in making sure that I go through an easier time next time that I go through a difficult time.

Just two things.

One: You don't know what I already do for my mental illness and I don't really feel like it is any of your business. While the manager who has dealt with mental illness in her family is sympathetic, the boss ended up throwing out a bunch of the stigmas about mental illness in our conversation and I don't really feel like talking about it with her. Shit, sometimes I have a hard time talking about it with people I am close to, people I love, people I am living with. I sure as hell am not going to tell you. I'm not going to tell you that I've been on medications for 13 years. I'm not going to tell you that I picked out my health insurance plan, which you contribute nothing to by the way, specificially so that I could go to the mental health in-patient hospital that I liked the best of the three I've been to. I'm not going to tell you that I go see a psychiatrist every couple of months to tweak my meds, except that until recently I couldn't afford to think about adding another one because I didn't have health insurance to help me afford anything other than barebones generic medications. I'm not going to tell you that I've been in a therapy program for over two years where I see my therapist once a week and go to an educational therapy group once a week. I'm not going to tell you that my girlfriend, who I live with, works in mental health, understands my illness, and I still couldn't tell her. I'm not going to tell you that I didn't tell my therapist how bad it was because I didn't realize it was that bad until everything blew up because I was trying so hard to keep everything under control that I almost thought I would be able to keep it all under control long enough for things to settle down again. I'm not going to tell you these things because I'm not sure that I think it's any of your fucking business. I'm also not going to tell you these things because I worry that you'll think "Well, damn, if she's this bad with all this help, how bad is she really?"

Two: It never works like what you are wanting. It is not like I don't know that this is a chronic illness I have. It's not like I don't say the same things to other people about mental illness, that it is like any other chronic illness, like say diabetes, that must be managed and evaluated in a realistic light. But when I am bad, I am lucky when I can express to someone else that I want to hurt myself, that I have hurt myself, when I'm starting to feel suicidal, when I'm feeling full on suicidal, when I've already attempted. Hell, I had one attempt that no one knew about at the time, that no one knew about until months or maybe a year later when I was joking about it. It doesn't work like that for me. You are right that maybe it should. But guess what? That's something I don't have the head space to change right now. Right now, all I can manage to do is to keep moving, to keep getting up each day, to keep doing chores around the house, to keep going to appointments, to keep taking my meds, to keep eating, to not just decide to fall into a bottle until the money runs out, to keep applying for jobs since it doesn't look like I'm going to be going back to this one. Right now, there are moments when it is all I can do not to harm myself or start drawing up plans, so I can't really promise that I'll  make this thing that I've never been able to do in the 13 years that I've been dealing with this mental illness happen.

I have until Friday to figure out if I'm gonna lie and say that I can do it and name a person or be unemployed.

god Radio

Smoking my second cigarette, because I'm watching what I eat and thus can't go have a mocha frappe or other ice cream treat, window rolled a quarter of the way down in the rain. I get his voicemail.

Hey. It's me. I just wanted to talk. Work sucked. I got called in at 2:30 to work at 5, when no one would even work for me when I was sick. Then the meal I cooked was tough as hell. Well, his wife started it before I got there so I guess it's really her fault but it was still tough and they didn't eat it. Then I almost dropped my client on the floor. And he was using something that I'd never seen before and no one had told me how to use. ugh. So work fucking sucked. I just wanted to vent. Hope you're having a better night than me. 

I lit another cigarette. And heard the tell-tale piano playing

You might put your love and trust on the line
It's risky, people love to tear that down
Let 'em try
Do it anyway
Risk it anyway

And if you're paralyzed by a voice in your head 
It's the standing still that should be scaring you instead 
Go on and 
Do it anyway 
Do it anyway 

There will be times you might leap before you look 
There'll be times you'll like the cover and that's precisely why you'll love the book 
Do it anyway 
Do it anyway 

Tell me what I said I'd never do 
Tell me what I said I'd never say 
Read me off a list of the things I used to not like but now I think are ok 

Sometimes it's not subjective: wrong and right
Deep down you know it's downright wrong but you're invincible tonight
So you
Do it anyway
It's done
You did it

Despite your grand attempts the chips are set to fall 
And all the stories you might weave cannot negotiate them all 
Do it anyway 
Be honest, anyway 

So tell me what I said I'd never do
Tell me what I said I'd never say
Read me off a list of the things I used to not like but now I think are OK
Yeah yeah yeah yeah
Woah woah woah woah

It's gonna be so very hard to say
And watch the trust and joy all drain from her innocent face
But you must
Do it anyway
It sucks but
Do it anyway

Call it surrender but you know that that's a joke 
And the punchline is you were never actually in control 
But still, surrender anyway 

Tell me what you said you'd never do 
Tell me what you said you'd never say 
Read me off that list of things 'cause I used to not like you 
But now I think you're OK 
Yeah yeah yeah yeah
Woah woah woah woah

Everybody knows that you just gotta do it anyway

Do it anyway
Do it anyway
Do it anyway
Do it anyway
Do it anyway
Do it anyway
Do it anyway
Do it anyway

Cause you don't do nothing to avoid self punishment
You won't do nothing
You won't feel nothing
Gotta
Do it, do it, do it anyway
Ah
Do it anyway



And now I feel better.

*god Radio: What my uncle called it when the radio played something that really spoke to you, in whatever way. It's become a whole thing with those of us who were really close to him, especially as many of us have had times when we thought my uncle was speaking directly to us through the song on the radio, though I still use it for general mood-changing, epiphany-giving events.

**BFF's performance of the song on the Colbert Report is also great, though not as fun as the video above and no longer available online.

Adventures in Employment, Vol. 1: Am I the only one who thinks this?

"Were you sleeping? So what, were you planning on laying in bed all day?" the assistant manager asked, after calling me to talk me into working more.

"Yes. Yes, I was. I was planning on sleeping until I am actually scheduled to work," I replied. I wanted to add, "And that's none of your fucking business!" And with that, I wanted to just throw my hands up. 

One of my favorite bloggers, who shares her research into BPD as well as her own experiences, recently did a series of posts about BPD and Jobs/Careers (Posts 1, 2, 3, and 4.) Now she has several engineering degrees and works a steady, high-intellect job, but has some of the same crazy thinking that I do when on the job. These are things that don't seem all that strange to me, because that's how I've always felt, but that most people in my life can't relate to. From post 2:

It can be tough. I see over and over how family and friends of people with BPD get down on those of us that have a harder time maintaining adequate employment.  Inevitably what I see is, “She’s just lazy and refuses to get to work on time,” or,  ”If he would just do [INSERT normal brain function that is impaired for us] it would be fine,”. There are plenty of other iterations but they all fall into the general category of: I don’t see why you can’t just grow up, be normal, and act like an “adult”.

1. Because we’re not “normal” (whatever that is).

1. Because there are a lot of things going on in our brains that make this whole “being an adult thing” kind of impaired. Like having the emotional development of a 3 year old. < ---- That’s actually what psychologists say. People with BPD tend to have a stunted emotional growth (often due to childhood trauma) which contributes to poor interpersonal development.

1. This isn’t a helpful attitude. I get that it’s shitty for the Nons in our life too, but this is not helpful. We’re not dysfunctional on purpose. We didn’t choose to have the chemical responses that cause our brains to freak the hell out. What we need is to learn the kind of coping mechanisms that will allow us to be more functional. Blaming and shaming pretty much just makes us feel even more worthless and even more angry. When you feel worthless and you’re super pissed about it, that’s not going to end well for anyone. Just sayin’.

Not helpful face. Full of snark. (not me)

So why is it so difficult for some people with BPD to have steady employment? (Some People – this isn’t true of everyone, but it’s common enough).
Yanno all those things that hinder us in our day to day lives? Yeah those don’t magically go away when we punch in from 9a-5p (or 7a to 4p in my case). So now it’s even more important to hide it all.
So why’s it so hard?
·         Identity Issues·         Paranoia·         Criticism/Rejection·         Splitting·         Impulsive Behavior·         Co-morbid symptoms·         Poor Stress Response

I'm gonna guess that the above is how my step-dad, TyRoy, and probably even Moneypenny have looked at my work history. People just go to work. That's what you do. Unless you're some lazy, freeloading asshole. It's not all that hard. In my head, I can hear Moneypenny telling me that half of life is just showing up, as is much of graduating from college. But sometimes just showing up is hard. Then staying there can be even harder.

The getting a job and getting to the job like I'm supposed to get hampered by the "co-morbid symptoms" and the "poor stress responses." I get depressed about not having a job and it's harder to get motivated to apply for jobs. I have never been able to sleep when I was supposed to and being anxious about getting up on time for an early shift or about the job itself leads to rumination which leads to very little sleep. Then, I don't get up on time or sometimes I don't get up at all.

If only that was where my issues ended. There's also black and white thinking (what the blogger refers to as "splitting") and impulsive behavior.

Black and white.


“People with BPD may be more likely to view potential work situations in terms of extremes, idealizing each potential job or career choice as an opportunity like no other. A person with BPD may be blind to anything potentially negative or questionable about the job. This perspective can also hide potential difficulties in achieving the idealized goals. For instance, if Bruce were looking into certain sales positions, he would need to be able to clearly assess his ability to make cold calls and deal with the rejection from these calls (something that he is extremely sensitive to) in order to reap the rewards of the generous sales commission plan.”

 I’m not sure how I feel about that particular example but I definitely know what it’s like to idealize and then demonize a particular job. Hell, I do it all the time. Ever have one of those days where everything goes wrong, nothing goes right, and all you can think about is the bad, atrocious things you have to do and put up with every single day? Sure. Everyone has. Now imagine those scenes from the day projected onto an I-MAX screen in 3-D magnified with surround sound replaying endlessly on repeated ruminations inside your own head. Everyone deals with it, but it feels extreme. And it’s impossible to remember the reasons to stay when you’re shrouded in the darkness from the day. I have plenty of days where I hate what I do. I have days where I love what I do and feel like I’m the king of the world wearing a clockwork crown of awesomeness. I rarely have days where I just feel content. I actually hate feeling like I’m not progressing. I hate the feeling of stagnation. I hate that sometimes you just have to keep plugging on, for what seems like an endless indefinite amount of time with no site of change.

For me, on a day like today, it feels impossible to remember the good things about the job. When you're settled with a client and things are going well, you don't talk to the main office very often. My client, his wife, and I are in a nice little groove and things are going well. But I'd also worked with another client, his family likes me, and the office e-mailed me to see if I could sub in for his current caregiver. But I'm fine with the number of hours I have right now, which I haven't been able to convey to the office. I was planning on emailing them back this afternoon, until the assistant manager called me before I even woke up this morning. Every time they call me about working with another client, I feel so much pressure. I feel like I'm letting them and the other client down if I say no. I feel like I'm going to be judged if I just tell the truth, which is that I don't really need to work 40 hours, that I'm happy getting 60 hours over a two week pay period. And, as they usually call me when I'm half asleep or stressing about something else, I am not really "with it" enough to firmly explain myself and turn them down. Then, all I can think about is how much this sucks, how I hate this pressure, how I've ended up working more hours than I want or need because I couldn't turn them down, how I won't have enough time to myself to decompress and destress in between shifts.

This leads to the rumination. All I've been thinking for the past twelve hours is "I can't fucking do this. I'm so fucking done. Done, done, done, done, done." Which quickly leads to "How can I not do this? This work thing that people find so easy, that most people can do every day, forty hours a week, more than forty hours, that so many people all over this country are busting their as looking for, how can I not do this? What the fuck is wrong with me that I want to just give up on a job that I actually really like, that is rewarding for me, and most people would love to have?" Then, I get even more freaked out thinking about the near future. This job has made me contemplate getting schooling in this field, but I know that many jobs, most jobs, in this field require 12 hour work days in much stressful situations than the one I'm currently in. How am I going to be able to do that if I can barely do this? Which leads to being freaked out about the future, even longer term. I can't make a living doing this, especially with no certification. So what am I going to do? Though I know this might make most people more resolved to work harder, I just don't have much fight left in me. It just makes me want to give up.

Which usually leads me to impulsive behavior. I attempt to take back my power, either through acting out in my private life, which usually bleeds through to negatively effect my work life, or by lashing out, even just quitting, at work.

 One of the problems with having impulsivity as a part of the way your brain reacts is that by definition, there’s no time given to consider consequences. When you’re faced with a scenario that makes you feel threatened (paranoia, stress) that fight or flight response kicks in. Adrenaline pumps, fear chokes you, and all there is to do is react. When you have a disorder that is marked by emotional dysregulation (a.k.a. impulsive emotional responses) controlling those emotional responses is extremely difficult, if not impossible, if we haven’t learned how.

For example, receiving criticism in the work place can trigger a fear or anger response leading to vocal attacks or quitting on the spot. Hearing something, being in a situation, where you feel like your job is threatened, you become paranoid that you’re going to get fired, so instead of letting someone do something to you, take that control away from  you, humiliate you, it’s better to take action, make the decision yourself, quit on the spot… except less thought out and more emotionally charged.

I had a very unrewarding job as the cashier at a valet stand. One particularly busy Saturday night, the bosses decided to hover over my stand. Not just my immediate manager, but the bosses of my boss's boss. The company didn't have a very good way of keeping track of the keys in relation to the tickets and I was getting really frustrated by the end of the night as more people came back for the cars. My bosses were pushing me to go faster, while not actually helping at all. Finally, in frustration, in front of a group of customers, I told one of them to just give me goddamn minute. Yeah. That didn't go over well. Instead of just apologizing and hoping that it might blow over, I took my employer-issued shirt, tossed it at my manager, and walked off the job. That job doesn't go on the resumes.

Not all my decisions to quit are that impulsive, but they aren't usually that well thought out either. I've never had a job for over a year, I've rarely given a two week notice, and I've only ever once had a job before I quit the previous one. If it wasn't for the fact that I'd be leaving my client(s) high and dry, I probably would have already quit this job in one of my freak-out sessions. And if I hadn't been working on the DBT skills for a year. Hell, if I hadn't been half asleep, I'd probably have said everything I wanted to say to the assistant manager, then I'd have added paranoia to my ruminations.

I know that other people have much more difficult lives than I do, much more difficult jobs than I do, much more difficult bosses than I do. I know that they do it everyday and don't bitch half as much as this. I don't want to discount them and I don't want to say that "normal" people don't have these same thoughts. I really have no idea. But what I now know that I didn't know until those posts was that any other people felt like I do. While group has shown me that I'm not alone in some of my fucked up thinking, most of those people are actually firmly employed and, as it's an education group not a process group, I don't hear as much about what goes on in their heads in relation to their jobs. Reading her blog posts gave me a window into the thoughts of another person who felt those same things, but the fact that she is steadily employed gave me hope.

(Yes, I did just get into gifs. Why do you ask?)

Temporarily Abled

I'd like to start out by saying that I do feel kinda silly writing this. I worry that I always sound like I'm complaining or whining, that my life and what I am able to do does not look the same from the outside, which means I shouldn't vent this stuff, that I don't have permission from... society? to express this. But lately I've been reading more and more about people living with disability, especially hidden disabilities, from the people themselves, most notably on Feministe and Three Rivers Fog. Not only has it raised my consciousness in dealing with and looking at those who do and do not fit our stereotypes of atypical ability and atypical neurological states, but it has also allowed me to contemplate the ways that I might not currently be as abled as I might be expected to be. I hope that makes sense. I'd don't know all the right terms, but I think it makes sense.

For a while now, I've recognized that I spend large chunks of my life planning for when my life will really begin. While I've been thinking lately about one small segment of my life in particular, that of working a paying job, I seem to be bumping into some of the same issues. First, I had to get my meds straightened out. Then, it was just hard to find a job. Next, Gram passed and I stayed in Slightly Larger Midwest City to help my uncle who was undergoing a treatment there. Now, as my uncle gets chemo in his hometown, I'm commuting the four-hour roundtrip to help him when he gets chemo and playing homemaker when I'm home. Though I might have heard it before and just tuned out, I was told last week that my uncle will likely be on chemo either for the rest of his life or until his body can't handle it anymore, so I'm not thinking that this commute will end anytime soon.

But when I honestly reflect on my last ten years of employment history, ok so all of my employment history, I haven't really been able to commit to anything for a long period of time. The best I've been able to eek out were two one-year stints at part-time jobs. There are various reasons behind this, though a great many of the times I quit jobs had to do with symptoms of my issues with depression and/or bipolar disorder. The biggest of those symptoms was disordered sleep. That hasn't gotten any better and is the biggest issue that I see in any job-seeking future.

For awhile, I thought the root of the problem was getting to sleep. And it is a part of the problem. But when I take an honest look at it, I have times when I sleep 24, or even 48, hours, straight through. At the very least, when I don't force myself to get up, I sleep about twelve hours. Now, for as much as I know a great many people who'd love to be able to sleep that long, ever, it really isn't normal and it definately isn't condusive to working an outside the home paying job. I have, to a certain extent, been able to get when I go to sleep under control, when I want to, when I take the time and thought to really plan taking certain meds at certain times and then making a point of relaxing after that. Oh, yeah, unless my legs start acting up and then I'm screwed. But getting up on time is.... well, I'm barely able to do it. With the exception of my uncle's chemo days and then I'm on it.

Which leads people to tell me to just FORCE myself to get up on time, to pull myself up by my bootstraps and be like a normal person. I mean, if I can do it for my uncle's chemo day, why can't I do it for other days? For a regular job? Or an irregular job? Well, mostly because that takes alot out of me. Friday I slept all day, until about 9pm. I was only up until about 3am until I went back to sleep and didn't get up again until I was dragged out of bed at 8:40pm. I also slept for over 12 hours on Sunday. I was up all day Monday, only to sleep 25 hours on Tuesday. So being up to make sure my uncle is on time and has company meant that I slept through the next five days. I don't mean for that to sound like I'm complaining. I'm not and it's totally worth it to be there for my uncle. BUT that's the reality of my situation.

So I'm starting to wonder if, after all this is done, all I have to look forward to is a string of mind-numbing part-time jobs, which barely pay for my meds anyway, that I keep for a maximum of a year. This really isn't alot to look forward to. When the doctor at the pulmonologist suggested I go on disability, honestly, I was kinda appalled. I guess my main thought was that I wasn't really that bad, I wasn't dis-abled enough by my condition that I was unable to work. There's also another part of me that suspects that, if I got disability, it would take it away from another person who had less resources than I. But now I'm worried that, even when the economy gets better and all this is done, I won't be able to find and maintain a paying job, even a part-time one.

Not sure what I'm looking for here guys. Guess partly just to vent and share my own experience. Maybe to find some advice or experience that I haven't heard before, though I'm not sure that exists. Fuck. Whatever.

Being a House(not)wife

In a society where "What do you do?" (which means what job do you perform to earn money) is usually within the first five questions asked when people first meet, I'm having a bit of trouble getting used to being long-term unemployed. I suppose I never realiezed how much 'what we do' can equal 'who we are' to people who don't know us well. Hell, even to people who do know us. Maybe I'm being overly sensative, imagining that people see me in a much more negative light than they really do, because I'm have self-esteem issues with not working right now.

Though to say I'm 'not working' would be a lie. I am not currently a wage-earning worker. When I asked TyRoy what I should say when people ask what I do, his quick response was to tell them that I am a housewife. As that isn't exactly true, in that I am not anybody's wife nor am looking to become someone's wife anytime soon, I do all the typical things a housewife would do - shopping, housecleaning, laundry (just not much cooking because my folks don't like to eat what I can cook) - for my parents. Now I've tried telling people this (that I'm a housewife) but it tends to go over like a lead balloon.

Until two weeks ago, I was looking for wage-earning employment, permanent or temporary, full-time or part-time, while still doing the housewife-ly things until then. Since December, I've had interviews but no job offers. Before that, I'd had some job offers and temp jobs that might have led to offers but I frakked them up. I think my own poor management of my mental health had a good deal to do with it. Since then, I have gotten to a different (hopefully better) place with my medications, though I will always still be me, underneath it all. I honestly don't know that I wouldn't have frakked up any job offer I got between December and now. But with the job market the way it is, I was competing against more people than usual, more people who have better work histories and more skills than me, so I don't begrudge them getting those positions.

Until I found a job, must to continue to play housewife to my parents, more to ease their burden and to give me something to do than anything else, and also try to visit and help out my grandma more. But my plan was always to get a job, work steadily, pay down my debt, fix my car or get a new-to-me car, and move out. I was also hoping to get my Bachelors slowly but surely once things were on track.

I guess nothing has really changed that plan except to put it off, with no real idea of when I'll pick it up. When we realized that my uncle might/would probably need help, even if only with the driving, to get back and forth to his new treatments, my mom told me to just stop looking for a job right now. It's cheaper for our family if my parents contintue to subsidize my bills while I help my uncle than it would be for us to temporarily lose my mother's income, even if I was working and paying my own bills. It makes sense and I'm happy to do it. And, after helping my grandmother when my grandpa had his first stroke, I think I'll be ok doing it, as long as I take time and space for myself, stay abreast of my own needs.

But I still feel this huge hole in my 'plan' and I feel 'less than' because I'm not earning money, don't have a job others would recognize, am a housewife without a husband or my own house.

*Sigh*

On second thought though, I can't imagine how my previously always employed, super-hard-working, very independent uncle must feel right now. I guess I'll count my blessings.

Friday's Random Bitching

• Is it horrible of me to pass up a possible job opportunity where I'd have to stop my work with the LGBT group that I've been volunteering with and any weekend trips to Slightly Larger Midwestern City to see my Grandma? I didn't even really get into the interview before I was told that it was every weekend, both days, and also a couple shifts during the week, and told to come back to talk to the manager if I was ok with that schedule. So I don't really know if I would have been offered a job or not. Also, it's definately just a job, not a career, probably doesn't pay much more than minumum wage, part-time retail work in a hardware store when I don't know much about tools and such. Maybe I'm just rationalizing because I really don't want to take this job, but I also feel bad in not taking any job that is offered me right now, as it's so hard to find jobs anyway and I am living off other people. Mom won't really answer me about what she thinks I should do. TyRoy said that it is pretty bratty to "turn down a good job." I think our definitions of "good" are vastly different. Honestly, I think I would take a job I didn't think I'd like if the hours weren't every single weekend. And, while I know this is in part my privilege talking, I don't think it's fair to a job to take a job just to take it while I'm actively looking for another job just to dump the first job. Please please please let me know what you think, dear readers.
• If 50% of the population is overweight and we can safely assume that is relatively evenly divided among men and women, why are there only 4 plus size clothes racks at Target? There are at least 5 times that many clothes racks for "regular size" clothes. And all of those plus size clothes were casual wear, not what one would wear to even a business casual workplace. Do us fatties not need clothes? Do we not work in professional environments like the non-plus sized women? Should we just stay home, locked up so no one else can see our ugly fat bodies? Do they just not want our money? Grrr. Not that I have any money to buy anything, but I would still like to be able to find clothes that fit my body, especially when there is a large percentage of women who also need the same category of clothes that aren't stocked.
• I hate feeling like this medication has made me cognitively slower. Other than the schedule of the position, I also found out in the interview that the job is very fast paced, with either a store full of people or a back-room full of stock to put out. I hate admitting that I thought about stopping the interview there. I have a hard time dealing with a crowd of people, even on my best day. I tend to need a bigger bubble of personal space these days. And I'm just not as fast. I can't get things out of my mouth. I back my car up, only to find that a car has appearred behind me out of nowhere, when I could swear I checked my mirrors before I took my foot off the brake. I remember when I worked at a gas station/convenience store when I was in my late teens. They prided themselves on their friendliness, well-stocked shelves, and cleanliness. By the end of training, we had to be able to do the full cleaning and stocking routine in 2 hours flat. We would get crazy busy at times and I remember being able to handle the rushes. I haven't applied to work for that same company again, though I know I have a great record with them from when I worked, because I know I can't do that stuff as fast, if at all. It's not that I don't think I can do anything. It's just that there are certain things I'm pretty sure I can't do right now.

Well, that's my day. Feel free to share your thoughts.

To Work or Not To Work

This weekend we went to Slightly Bigger Midwestern City to see my grandmother and celebrate my uncle's birthday together. My grandmother asked me if I was applying for jobs yet. I confirmed that I was. I also told her, as I've told many people recently, that I'm trying to work extra hard to pitch in around the house and do things for my family. Right now, while my meds can impede things, I'm attempting to push through the difficulties, get used to a normal schedule, and to be more than the lump of flesh sitting on the futon. I know that if I went from just sitting around all day to working even part-time, I'd have a very difficult transition and even more tired than I usually am when starting a new job. I'm also acutely aware that all my bills are paid for by my parents, with no financial help from me. I figure that if I push myself to do what not ungrateful and not lazy people would do then I'll be seen as not ungrateful and not lazy.

But my mom threw me for a loop with some comments that she made on our way home. She mentioned that she had heard my comments to my grandmother about finding work, and that she had heard me say the same things the previous weekend at my uncle's house. My mom expressed to me that she was displeased that I seemed to put so much emphasis on finding a job. She pointed out that I wasn't in dire straits financially, as my parents are paying what bills I have and providing a place to live and food to eat. (Yes, somehow I now feel ungrateful for wanting a job.) But her bigger worry was that I would push myself too hard and either take a job that I liked but that I would end up losing because the meds that just settled down got messed up again or that I would take a job I didn't like that would cause me to spiral and lose that job. She would like me to just take it easy and allow myself more time on the current meds before I put myself out there too much.

It is not like I don't understand what she said or why she felt the need to say it. I'm well aware that I had what might have been a great job offer last month, which, unfortunately, coincided with when the Lexapro dropped off and the Prozac didn't pick up the slack, like it was supposed to. I couldn't even get out of bed in the morning to go to the job, much less see how bad I'd mess it up by being there. And, honestly, it isn't like I don't have a difficult time with the more mundane aspects of life. I get tired much more easily than I ever used to. Just one trip to one store, be it grocery or wal-mart, wipes me out. I also have weird... spatial disturbances.... I'm not sure how to easily describe it. It happens when I move my head to fast, either up or down or from side to side. It feels like what happens when you are just a bit drunk and you move your head too fast, only it doesn't last as long. I guess when a person is drunk, they expect it and they're already out of it enough not to care. When you are sober, it's disconcerting. In addition to the above, I still have the tremor, some times worse than other times, though the beta blocker helps. I also don't like too many people. Tend to get a little paranoid around strangers and need a larger bubble of personal space. All of these things combined, as well as all the others that I'm not remembering right now, and, now that I think about it, bad memory should be on that list too... where was I? Oh, yeah- all of these things combine to make me worry that I could keep a job, even if it was one that I really liked and tried my hardest at. Those things also tend to limit what I would even consider applying for. I probably couldn't do a job where I had to stand eight hours. I couldn't do a job where I had to have steady, precise hands. You get the picture.

I should also say that it isn't like I'm hurting financially or lifestyle-wise. I will grant that I would be someone's slave for a week if they would either fix my car or have it fixed. My poor car :( Like I said before, I have a place to live, food to eat, everyday needs met, and what few bills I have paid. I don't go out as much as I would like and tend to look longingly at books I want, but a little less consumerism could probably do us all good. And I have plenty of books and movies here to catch up on anyway.

But it brings up some questions surrounding my future employment that I've been trying not to think about lately. I worry about my ability to get and stay employed over my lifetime. I've never really been able to keep a job for a very long time, though most of my jobs have also been in high turnover, low pay, service industry jobs and some I quit when I moved to a different area. But I know that I have a problem consistently keeping a job. I also have a hard time starting a new job when I find one. I've also had long-ish periods of unemployment, especially during and after a hard time in dealing with my depression or during and just after a crisis in my life. (Wow. I sound so pathetic.) It isn't as if I am physically disabled. It isn't like my mental illness is debilitating either. It would seem that the only thing stopping me from working is my own laziness and self-defeating attitude. But, on the other hand, this has been the pattern of my whole life.

I don't want to give up on myself though. To quit before I've even started, especially now that I"m on not just a new medicine, a new anti-depressant, but a new set of drugs, who's combination, for better and for worse, have new effects. A new set of drugs that I'm sure my doctor is hoping will make me better able to live a more "normal" life. I also feel like my life can't move on really until I am more free and independent, or at least in a position where I can choose to be dependent or not, where it would be a choice for me to live with my parents, whether to save money or just to be close to family, or to live on my own here in this city or to start over again somewhere else or to shack up with a hot lover or ten.

So I'm left wondering what road is best to take. I've been trying to take life much closer to one day at a time, not have expectations but enjoy things, feel things, love while I can as much as I can, try to be good. But now.... well, I just don't know. Please feel free to give advice...

UPDATE 1: I Have a JOB...for now

I was supposed to go to my second day of work Friday night at 11pm. I had written the previous post at 9am, thinking that, if I just got some rest, took some happy pills, I'd be better and I'd just go to work, no biggie. I slept all day, until I had to get up at 9pm to get ready to go to work. I spent half of my time in the shower laying at the bottom of the tub, crying. Obviously, I wasn't feeling any better. But I even got dressed. I sat with my bag next to me, coat across my lap, in the dark in the comfy chair in the computer room. Then, right before 10, just before the one hour prior call in time and just before going back to bed in a depression induced stupor, I called in to the job. I just told them I was calling in for the night. My arm hurt. (Which it kinda did after using the arm I hurt falling off the truck to throw packages the night before.) Then I called in to the temp place, which was of course closed, and left them a message too, just like I was supposed to. Only I think this one was slightly more rambling. When BT asked me tonight what exactly I said, I told him that I think it was something about how the job was killing my soul and I wasn't going back. (At which point he smacked his own head and hung his head there in his hands.) BT suggests I call back tomorrow (or actually today- Sunday), leave another message on their voice mail, saying I was out of my mind, I want to work the job and I will be there as scheduled on Monday if they will still have me, please, please, please. I think 1) I'm going to ask my mom about it, 2) I'm going to ask TyRoy about it, 3) I'm going to ask MP about it (though his answer Friday morning was that it gets much easier once your soul dies), and 4) if I continue with this job, I think I'll have to take 2 of my 3 daily happy pills at my last break, to get me through the rest of the day.

Another big problem I have is with the "one hour mandatory overtime." I was told by my temp agency that I was to work 11pm-730am (which means 8 hours and no paid lunch time though you still have to take it). Fine, no biggie. But at 6am, my leader asks me if my agency had told me about the one hour mandatory overtime. No, my agency had not. My agency had warned m that I might have to stay later if there was more work and that I might get sent home before 8 hours was up if they just didn't have enough work for us. As far as I could see, all our work was getting done, so I wasn't really sure what I'd be doing extra for that hour. As everyone had different hours, it was hard for me to see if we were really getting all our work done or if we were behind. But no one told me. That day, I went home at 7:30am, mostly because I think I'd have started crying right there at my desk for no real reason if I'd stayed later. And they'd sent another girl home instead of giving her anymore overtime. Maybe she had been there longer and made more per hour. Either way, it sucked and I made sure I told my temp place that, during business hours, but I had told her that I thought I could hang with it for a while. Then I didn't go in.

But, as I was relating this to BT, who had more sympathy for me than most people in in shoes would, considering he just got back from a 24/7 job that he had for....a year pretty much, 8 months of it in country and that he has always worked shit jobs with long hours and low pay and seems to rarely have had a car so he was always walking too, I started thinking more about how most people live like this. On Friday morning, driving home, I was thinking about my mom and my grandma and my grandpa and my uncle, who have always worked kinda crappy jobs, in one way or another, but never seemed to come home angry. As I was talking to BT, I realized that I can sympathize with guys and girls who come home and are rude and cranky to their kids and spouses because their job sucks and it just took everything they had out of them, but the come home and their kids and spouses want more, which they just don't have to give.

When I got to the thought that maybe that is why my step-dad is so crabby all the time, I realized that I'm just like that. When I work a regular 9-5 kinda job (I include 3rd shift jobs where I work 8 hours in that), I'm just like that. I'm a total raving bitch! I know I"ve told the story in this blog about working the data entry job in the cave, which I hated. I'm not sure if I related how my family wanted me to contribute more, especially by coooking dinner (=what they were used to eating and wanted to eat for dinner) since I was the first one home. That was not an unreasonable demand whatsoever. But the times that my step-dad tried to teach me how to cook specific dishes were disasters, the second one ending in me telling him to cook his own damn dinner and then I went crying into the bathroom, where I stayed for several hours. I now realize that those incidents were just as much about him being a horrible teacher and "why can't I cook what I want to cook" as they were about me coming home from work a raving bitch. I am not a good, sweet, nice person when I come home. I'm not saying that my mom has sunshine coming out of her ass when she comes home from work everday, but she really is a generally cheery person when she comes home. My step-dad is not, ever. And I am really not a cheery person when I come home from a 9-5 job.

What the fuck am I going to do???? Please leave suggestions.

I Have a JOB...for now

[Back dated to when I wrote it in my journal, by hand, old-school, because our internets were down. Now I can only hope that I can read my own damn handwriting.]

I have a job.

Don't get too excited now. The longest I've ever kept a job was a year and I loved it. But I even screwed it up in the end, so there was no way I could go back. I've worked good jobs that I've liked more for less time, or barely past the first real day because of my own self-defeating, self-destructive nature.

But things being what they are (or aren't or are, who knows from day to day) with BT, and with me realizing the extent of some of the bills I'm dealing with and finding that a Sugar Daddy, especially when you aren't in the best shape of your life, is harder than one might think, I had decided that I'd better start the job search hardcore next week, after visiting my uncle early in the week and spending a weekend at Gram's.

But a job found me! Last Friday, a temp agency I had signed up with over the summer called, asked if I'd be interested in a 3rd shift data entry position. I'd just have to come in Monday to file out the same paperwork I'd filed out at the other, original, office that I'd signed up with (you'd think that they'd have a database for this kinda shit but I guess now), take a drug test, and fill out the paperwork for the background check. I was excited just by the prospect. What luck! A job found me! And it's 3rd shift so it's not like I'd have to worry about getting up in time or about the worst, most depressing hours of the day/night, when I'm all alone, there's nothing on TV, and so I'm reading, wishing I could sleep like the rest of the world.

I actually hadn't gotten much farther than that in my thinking. I'd had seemingly good job prospects from temp places dangled in frong of me, only to have them find a better candidate or some such. But the background check came back in precisely three days, which was yesterday (I was told it could take between 3-7 days because I'd lived in another state recently), and the temp place wanted me to start THAT NIGHT. Something about how quickly this all went down really should have set off some red flags, but it didn't.

In the shower, all I could hear in my head was the Bright Eyes lyric from "First Day of My Life"-"But I’d rather be working for a paycheck/Than waiting to win the lottery." (I know the song isn't about work necessarily but it fit in my head.) I was really happy to be doing something positive after all the negative I've been doing, or at least things that people around me perceive as negative.

Most of work was ok, but, and maybe this is just PMS or being tired and cranky, but I got to a point several times where I just wanted to cry, for no particular reason.

Ok, that's not entirely true. See, my job is entering in addresses on packages and printing the extra shipping labels. Some places just sound like regular places but other places sound... wonderful- Sugar Maple Lane or Humble Road. And I think of this job, of this paycheck to paycheck life and I know I'll never see these places. Or places like what I imagine those places to be. My greatest adventure happened just a little over a year ago- Reckless and foolish and unplanned and followed by lots of unforseen not-positive consequences- the kinda thing I should never do again, probably never will do again, both because of better decision-making skills (yeah right) and a lack of that kind of disposable cash and not caring about the money.

I know I must sound like a broken record here, with the number of posts I have about jobs and how much working sucks and how I always feel like it is killing my soul, but how do people do it? It's mind-numbing and soul-crushing. Some people still manage great insight and widsom and kindness and love despite living this and/or worse everyday. But I've never felt like I could. Still don't feel like I can.

"I want something/That's purer than the water/Like we were/It's not there now/Ineloquence and anger/Are all we have"- "It's Beginning to Get to Me" Snow Patrol

From June 11 To July 6

I guess I don't even know where to start right now. It's been quite a while since I've blogged and my life has been a weird series of ups and downs, some that I expected and many that I didn't.



One of the hardest things but also the thing that I'm most ambivalent about is the reoccurance of my uncle's cancer. He was diagnosed with a rare type of sarcoma (tumor) May 2007 and had radical surgery June 2007. My mom and my uncle's boyfriend went with him while he got his surgery and recovered. (He went up to the Mayo Clinic in MN, which is about 10 hours away from where we live because they have the best program for that type of cancer.) At the time, I stayed with my grandparents because my grandfather had just had a stroke and I was the only one able to really stay with them, so I was useless to my uncle but I was useful to my grandparents. They thought they got all the tumor but apparently not because he had to get another surgery THIS June and then radiation (which is tiring but not too bad). But he was having a great deal of pain in his back. (The original sarcoma was in his chest so they expected it to say in that area. Apparently they were wrong.) The pain in his chest was from another sarcoma. Now they want to do chemo. Nothing has been decided yet but....I just feel useless. All I want to do when I think about it is cry, so I'm probably not much use in talking to him. Everyone in my family went to see him last weekend but I couldn't go because I had bronchitis and I didn't want to spread it to all the other cancer patients there. I'm hoping to get to visit him sometime this week when I'm not working but.... He's so young!!!!!!!!!!!!!! How can he be so sick!



My health isn't going so great either. Just after my birthday, I got a really REALLY bad stomach bug. I had to go to the ER because I couldn't stop puking and everytime I puked, I shit too, so I was pretty sure I was getting dehydrated. After the stomach flu stopped, I got the head cold that TyRoy and my mom both had because my immune system was weak. That turned into bronchitis. Which was a lot of fun. At least I have to give props to TyRoy because he didn't turn away from he gross stuff and he took care of me as best as he could. While I know that BT doesn't like him (and BT would have done an even more subservient job), TyRoy really did take care of me.



The other health problem is even more gross and I'm not even sure I want to talk about it here, but maybe it will help others feel not so bad about it when it happens to them. Well, as most of you know, I got my gallbladder taken out in September 2007. I was really happy with that for a while. I didn't have the pain or the thowing up or the diarehea. But what your gallbladder does is store extra bile, which helps to break down extra fat that your liver can't handle all by itself. I was warned by the doctors and by other people that had their gallbladders taken out that for 3-6 months I would experience pretty quick diarehea when I ate really greasy or really really rich food. Well, I didn't have too much trouble those first 6 months. But in the last 3 months, well, I can't eat anything without getting rid off it right away. Even when I don't eat ANYTHING, I sometimes get rid of something. Last Tuesday was the final straw. I was running errands and I almost didn't make it to the bathroom at my first stop (a bookstore). But I did make it and I thought it was over. All done. NOPE!!!!!!!!!!! Twenty minutes later, I'm in the middle of the local Walmart and it hits me that I realize I have to go to the bathroom. RIGHT NOW. Needless to say, I didn't make it and I shit myself in the middle of the Walmart store. I went to the bathroom and cleaned up as best as I could before I left the store. It was the most embarrassing moment I can remember ever. Luckily, I had my yearly physical Thursday and my doctor said that it was a lack of fiber and that I'm going to have to take fiber supplements for the rest of my life and eat lots of fruits and veggies for the rest of my life. Now, I don't know about you but I always thought that fiber supplements were for people who were constipated and that too many fruits and veggies would lead to diarrehea. But I guess not. I guess I'll just listen to my doctor for now. If it doesn't work, I'll go back to their morning walk-in clinic and crap myself there.



Then, there is the divorce. I filed the papers the day before my birthday and mailed them ON my birthday. Yes, another lovely birthday for Ava. I got the papers in the mail earlier this month saying that our court date is set for August 20th. It's pretty amicable and everything was agreed on before I filled out the papers so it should be pretty easy. The saddest part of it all is that I still love him very much and I know that he still loves me very much, even though we are trying to move on with our lives. I'm living with TyRoy and he's seriously talking to a woman he met on the internet. They are even talking about getting married when he gets back. I hope that everything works out well for them and that they don't have the same money problems that we did. Actually, in a weird bit of irony, the first paycheck he DIDN'T overdraw since we've been together was the first one AFTER I filed for divorce. Oh well.



Things with TyRoy are going pretty well. Most of the time, we are just kinda an old married couple. Especially since my latest birth control has robbed me of my sex drive and my wetness. (I just got a new one. I hope it works better.) The biggest thing about me living here was that I had to have a job or be working on finding a job. I have done that. I worked a temp job for a couple weeks. After that, I was sick but I got a job RIGHT after I got better. It will even work with school, which I have signed up for. I haven't asked him for any money, even though he pays the bills at the house. (Bills that he would pay whether I was here or not. I try to pitch in on the groceries but he doesn't really accept it. But at least I try.) BUT I still haven't figured out how to fight with him though. He didn't just shuts down and I can't get anything out of him and he says that nothing is wrong, though there obviously is, at least in my opinion. I felt so useless between the job (managers suck and make you feel bad) and not being able to help with the family and not being able to do anything with TyRoy that I just gave up. I called in with a family emergency (everyone knows that my uncle is sick) and I took a bunch of pills. Let me tell you though--- 120 .5 Clonazepam doesn't do anything! I could still fucking drive!. Next time I'm jumping off an overpass!



Well, I guess I'll end on a happy note. My job right now is as the cashier for the valet parking. I work Wednesday through Saturday nights. Today, I got up early, dressed, ran errands so that I would have a cooler, cold drinks, some protein, a personal cash tray, etc, etc, and get to work early so that I could park where they wanted me to (they keep changing where I"m supposed to park-assholes). I got there 30 minutes early. None of my valets were there or my managers. Finally I called my boss. Me: "Hey, where is everyone?" Boss:"We don't work on Sundays." Me: "Yeah, but it's Saturday." Boss: "No, it's Sunday." Only Valet there: "No, it's Sunday." Me: "Fuck. Sorry." Working these crazy hours has me all fucked up. BUT at least I have a job.



Thanks for listening. Comment if you want.

Not 9 to 5...or just lazy?

I can do office work. I can have, have had in the past, 9 to 5 jobs. Well, not really 9 to 5 jobs, but jobs with Regular People's Hours (RPH)= 40 hours a week, Monday through Friday, going into work between 7am and 9 am and leaving after 8.5 hours with a 30 minute lunch break. Even now I could probably get a RPH job in a cushy office somewhere, and take a night class or two a semester until I finish up. I could pay back my parents fully and start paying down my student loans. I could even get my own place. By the time I graduated, I could even be debt free. There was a time when this was even my plan. But working RPH Oct 2005-Jan 2006 demonstrated to me that this probably wasn't an option for me. Basically, I hated it.

As a side note, when I quite the last RPH job I had, there were lots of crazy depression and personal issues going on and I shut down my whole life for a few months. Because of this, I can't really say if I could have stuck with the last job, if it world have gotten better, if the money would have balanced it out, if I could have balanced that job and a class or two.

What I do know is that I was miserable those months that I worked RPH. While working at the video store I had crazy hours, often closing the store and getting home at 1am, and I had frustrating customer issues, it was more than bearable, mostly enjoyable, until the end and that was only because of the shitty management. When I left and started working temp offic jobs, I was introduced to new levels of boredom and unbearableness. I had worked over six months doing third shift data entry, which was boring and tiring but I could do homework and read novels. I also did temp office work one summer but it was only for the summer, not long-term. But this longterm temp work, the third placement being quite permanent, was hell. Though my jobs were neither physically or mentally taxing, I got home completely wiped out. My mom and I were trying to exercise together at night, in order to be in better health and sleep better at night, etc, but we rarely did it more than once or twice a week. Any real life stuff had to be done after work or on the weekend. I never had energy either of those times. I slept most of the weekend away. I finally understodd why my parents came home to "veg" in front of the TV, not really engaging in what they were watching like I did when I watched and followed a TV show passionately, why they didn't engage in politics or read magazines or want to watch movies that they "had to think about". Sir has been complaining for years about how his parents' blankly sit in front of the TV at the end of the day, because, in his opinion, it is such a waste of time and brain power, but I finally understood after working this job. And though I'd get home before anyone else, I loathed the idea of having to come home at the end of the day to learn how to cook food I didn't particularly like because it was what my parents (read my step-dad) like. He and I had two cooking lessons together. The second and last ended in me telling him to cook it himself because I obviously couldn't do it right, after which I locked myself, crying, into the bathroom for two hours. I think I'd have gladly paid for fast-food or delivery or even a real restaurant meal on nights when I was supposed to cook rather than having to learn how to cook for my parents after working all day.

The job itself was mindless, monotonous and boring. My co-workers weren't great. Where I was working only added to the crappiness. In most office environments, there are windows, even if you don't get to work near them. Also, you can go outside during breaks. The last assignment I had was in a cave used to store documents. Yes, A CAVE. It took five minutes by car to get to our area of the cave. It was almost impossible to get out on breaks and quite tedious to go out for lunch. But, as this was winter, I never saw daylight unless I went out during the day.

After my mind adjusted to the work, the imaginative part of it went off on its own while the other part did the data entry. We weren't really allowed paper or notebooks at our workstations, lest we steal someone's confidential information. I squarreled away a pen and a small notebook in my pant's pocket to jot down notes for poems and story ideas. We also couldn't keep our purses or the book that we kept to read on breaks at our workstations, which was fine except when a computer system breakdown or error left us all sitting there with nothing to do for hours on end. This usually happened at least once a week.

Ok, so that job especially sucked. And I've known a few people who've worked at cell phone company call centers which really really sucked. And I have a good friend who works sales and customer service for a credit card company. She doesn't LOVE it and it sucks when her sales are down and she's under pressure, but it's just ok. But what's really been plaguing me lately, after this latest job, which I did really like, went south, is whether or not I'm severely flawed because of my dissatisfation with these jobs, the way I mess them up, the way I don't seem to be able to just stick it out like others do? I know Sir isn't happy with the RPH he works. I know my mom can't wait to just retire. But they do it everyday. Just like most people do. I'm starting to worder if I'm not just lazy.

Last Tuesday I went to a poetry reading. My poetry teacher from last semester was there. I know she doesn't teach full-time, but I'd never gotten to ask her what else she did until last Tuesday. She said she writes grant proposals freelance from her home and teaches a class or two a semester. This allows her time to write and submit her own work, to have a meditiation practice, and to raise her kids. She said she just wasn't a 9 to 5-er, though she could do it if she needed to, had done it before whne she had to. I wonder if I'm going to be able to find an equalibrium between just being lazy and not being a 9 to 5-er.

I Cheated Myself Just Like I Knew I Would

I just can't seem to get it right for too long at a time.

Amy Winehouse-You Know I’m No Good
Meet you downstairs in the bar and heard
Your rolled up sleeves and your skull t-shirt
You say why did you do it with him today?
And sniff me out like I was tanqueray

Cause you're my fella, my guy
Hand me your stella and fly
By the time I'm out the door
You tear me down like roger moore

I cheated myself
Like I knew I would
I told ya, I was troubled
You know that I'm no good

Upstairs in bed, with my ex boy
He's in the place, but I cant get joy
Thinking of you in the final throws,
this is when my buzzer goes

Run out to meet your chicks and bitter
You say when we're married cause youre not bitter
There'll be none of him no more
I cried for you on the kitchen floor

I cheated myself
Like I knew I would
I told ya, I was trouble
You know that I'm no good

Sweet reunion, jamaica and spain
We're like how we were again
I'm in the tub you're on the seat
Lick your lips as I soak my feet
Then you notice lickle carpet burn
My stomach drops and my guts churn
You shrug and it's the worst
To truly stuck the knife in first

I cheated myself like I knew I would
I told ya I was trouble,
you know that I'm no good

I cheated myself, like I knew I would
I told ya I was trouble,
yeah ya know that I'm no good

The Crazy One

Right now I'm very confused about work. While I never want to say that I am without blame, because I never am, I'm pretty on the fence as to whether it is my problem or their problem. Mostly, whether I should stay in this situation, because it is a good job and the problem is mine and one of perception, or leave because I truly don't think that anything will change. There is always the possibility that things will change, but I'm not really putting much faith in that anymore, especially where job situations are concerned. But after my conversation about the incidence yesterday with The Powers That Be, I'm reminded of a Ben Folds song, in which he sings, "She liked to push me and talk me back down/ Til I believed I was the crazy one/ And, in a way, I guess I was." I just wish I could feel more certain that is the case and not that I'm just an ill-tempered, foul-mouthed bitch.

Things that are NOT ok

It is not ok to not have my paycheck on time.

It is not ok to call me during my shift when I should be helping customers to talk to me about that. My first job is to help our customers, not make sure you feel ok.

It is not ok to try to bully me into saying it is ok that you are not going to have my paycheck to me on time.

It is not ok to point out to my past behavior to justify your current bad behavior. If this was the only time something like this (not this specifically) had happened, I'm sure I would be more understanding. Also, if you had wanted to fire me because of those instances, you would have had every reason to and you would not be out of line to have pointed out that those things were not ok. But I will not say that something is ok when it is never ok in any professional working environment anywhere, just because you bring up my past bad behavior.

It is not ok to call the work phone line and then my cell phone from two different numbers just to ask a small question. I would pick up the store phone if I did not have customers. Do you want me to tell our customers, "I'm sorry. I can't help you and/or run your credit card/loyalty card because my boss thinks it is more important for me to answer her question than it is to serve you."? If you leave a message on the answering machine with your question or need, I will call you back as soon as I am finished with our customers.

These are things that are not ok.