Six Months

 And so things have moved, a meeting has been had and a new start........

I crashed after the last post I was in despair my job seemed beyond redemption and resignation was my only option.  However, since that time wheels have moved and so have I.  I continued to rewrite my resignation letter up till last week.  Since then I've not looked at it, I had two weeks off and some time to think or not think about work as was the case for lots of the time.  I knew I had to leave it alone for a while to clear my head, to give me some room to think about other things and to calm myself down.  It wasn't easy and I don't think I did it well enough to be honest, but I did it enough to have a quiet break and ultra quiet birthday.  The usual suspects sent me cards and birthday wishes, which was nice of them but other than that nothing from my sister I should add, not that I expected anything to be honest.  I spoke with the counselor that I'm seeing about everything, which was good.  Though doing that over what's app is very odd and I don't know if it's the best method to be truthful.  I have to admit that I say things that I, but my facial expressions will tell you the truth and what's app isn't the best tool to see how I'm feeling or if I'm doing what I do best and tell bits of where I'm at, which is enough of a concern but that bit is probably only 5 to 10% of where I'm at.  

Since returning to work I've tried not to think about the situation, but knew I had to as obviously things couldn't go on as they were.  A meeting had to be had and to be honest it wasn't comfortable, I didn't feel totally at ease, what made it worse was the connection at my end of the meeting was a bad, that's the first time that's happened and so that frustrated me somewhat.  Did I convey where I was at in the meeting?  I thought I did, but I don't think it got through, and the responses were almost what I expected.  I was prepared to do as asked, but then things got questioned and ideas flung at me.  A new solution to the problem and so here I am with this new solution.  I'm unsure on how I feel about this if I'm honest with myself.  I feel I'm running away, which goes against my nature, but I've got little fight left in me and so I'm going to have to accept it.  

With that in mind though, I'm going to try and find where I am at with myself in work.  I need to see where my level is right now.  I then need to set myself a target of where I want to be or more so where I expect to be in six months time.  I need to see an improvement in my performance and satisfaction or else the resignation will go in.  I don't care if that is the ultimate running away, I acknowledge I'm on the last chance saloon for myself.  I've got to be realistic and give myself a chance.  I have to set the level I want to reach at a reasonable level, not go over the top, but also set it higher than one or two steps above.  

One other thing that I'm going to have to do is explore why I'm so resistant to positivity to me.  I'm not sure why I can't take praise from anyone?  Why I put myself down so much and so harshly.  I want to think it's always been that way, but it hasn't.  I need to know why I don't believe any praise I get?  Have I got to high standards?  I would hope I have, but that shouldn't prevent me from taking praise even if I haven't reached the standards that I would like.  Where has this acceptance of negativity come from?  Has it come from so many others constantly being negative towards me, seriously or even just jokingly that that has become the norm?  I just don't accept that I do anything well anymore, I used to think I was good at my job, I used to think I was a good person, I never thought I was pretty or nice, but now I probably put myself down even harder on that level more than ever.  Even in the past two days I've slapped myself in conversation when someone has been fractionally nice to me on one occasion and in a totally off the cuff manor.  

Possibly the more I have struggled the more I have allowed myself to be negative with myself, why should I be positive about me if I am not doing well?  Praise of any nature seems fake when it's aimed at me, I'm almost OK with being the dirt on the bottom of the shoe, or should I rephrase that and say that by being in that position means the expectations on me are less then and perhaps then I am trying to establish a false norm for myself one of a poor worker, one who you can't rely on.  Is that part of me trying to sabotage myself?  I know I have been trying to sabotage myself in work, that's almost my instinctive reaction to the situation I was in as I couldn't care less about my position.  I knew that was wrong, but I couldn't stop myself.  

Moving on I've got to some how jump start myself, I've got reignite my passion, my hopes for the future, perhaps those are the targets that I have to reach, the point where they have a heart beat once more as right now they are lying motionless on the floor without a heart beat.  They are close to death, but I'm giving myself six months to bring them back to life, or else I had in my notice, and then have to look in the mirror and ask myself what am I good at?  I don't think anyone that I know has ever given me a suggestion of another career that I may be good at or that I'd like, I don't know what I'm actually good for other than what I do, so let's wait and see where things go....

Finite

 So it seems the decision is finite I am now just doing admin for the one of the youth work sessions I'm involved in.  I no longer am expected to work as a youth worker for this area which I guess is a huge statement from the manager.  I'm so pissed off by this that I'm plotting my own downfall now, I'm not holding back, I'm openly looking for a new job and whilst I don't like this I'm already prepared to completely leave the youth service right now as now I don't see anyone who can help me in this situation and the amount of anger, frustration and hurt is to imense to carry on even volunteering with the LBGTQ+ groups which I absolutely love working with.  

 

I am writing this in tears, and realising that I've got about 15 minutes to write this and to sort myself out before I've got an online session to work.  I'll compose myself just about, but I'm not sure we'll get anyone as no one has responded to my messages to attend this session and so it might just be myself and a colleague.  I would then be able to switch off quite early and really wallow in my own misery.  I feel sorry for the cousellor that I'm seeing in the morning as I'm way off the scale from where I was last week.  The last two weeks has seen me go from bad to OK, down to fucking miserable and at the point where I'm writing this.  I've also got my GP calling tomorrow over my anti depressants, I asked for a repeat prescription and the surgery called and said I needed a review, so I've ran out of them yesterday.  I was hoping to pick them up today.  

Admin work is something I can do, it's not something I enjoy, it's not something I want to do on a long term basis it drives me crackers.  I hate the tedium of it all, but hey if that's what they want me to do then that's all I'll do.  I won't do anything else what so ever if I'm still in a the job when we return to working in a youth centre.  I'd set a plan for this Friday, which as with all my plans has been blown up in the very first moment, it's unbelievable how many times I plan things and they never work out.  I keep saying I won't plan anything and do and it then fails.  My life is a failure...

Further Away than Ever

 I thought things couldn't get any worse with work, how wrong could I be???  I'm now further away than ever from doing what I want to do, and being able to further myself professionally.  All I want to do is the job I was employed to do, but that now seems like it's a pipe dream I guess my title should change as should my title.  I doubt it ever will, but you there's more chance of that happening than me getting back to where I was.  

Something though has taken place, I have recognised a correlation between how unhappy I am in work to how unhappy I am in life.  The further away from doing what I enjoy the most the more unhappy I become.  The fact that work is something that I enjoy doing means that the further that goes beyond the horizon the darker the hole that I'm in becomes.  To be told last week that I'm essentially becoming a glorified admin worker once more is sending me over the edge once again.  I just don't feel that the team manager supports me, they don't like me and thus I'm the piece of shit that they step on, the thing they can play with like a lion with it's prey and essentially not move forward in my career.  I've become once again the person who'll willing help everyone but themselves, the person that holds the ladders to allow others to climb up the career path further than me.  

This is a position I've been in before, at other points in my life I've happily allowed this to happen as I've been comfortable with this and been happy with what I've been doing.  However, now that I see things repeating and being unhappy with work it's not something I'm happy about.  I know I'm not the best, I know I'm not going to progress, but to not even feel the support to aid you to get to that point is desperate.  I've got leave coming up, and that two weeks should have been about resting and trying to relax and enjoy myself, to enjoy the fact that I've a birthday in that break, however it's going to be spent miserable, depressed and contemplating my future.  I'm not looking forward to the break any more.  

What can I do to change things?  I'm not sure to be honest.  I've tried so many different things of late to change my mood to change what's going on in work, but nothing has altered this.  

 

At this point I should point out that some aspects of work is fine and I have no issues with it, but and it's a huge but, that part of work doesn't involve the work "team" or that's "team's" manager.  Everything connected to the team is causing so much aghast right now that it's painful.  I am struggling with this both mentally and emotionally and don't have anyone to talk to about it, I'm speaking to a councilor but we've hardly had chance to discuss this and it's awfully difficult to do so using What's App, which I am finding I hate more and more.  I want to get rid of the darn thing, but I'm in so many groups that it's really hard to do so.  I could exit the groups I guess, but I'm sure that that may be frowned upon.  I don't care to be honest.

 

More and more I'm disengaging with the "team" and can see the end game coming and I find myself trying to think of ways of advancing it closer.  It's no way to be thinking is it, but it's what I'm doing.  I guess it's a form of self harm, without actually physically attacking myself.  I've not resorted back to doing that yet, but I have felt my mood slip to points where in the past I have considered that and have gone through with that.  I'm slightly better off right now, but not much better if I'm being truthful.    

Bemused

 I posted earlier today about the fact of how frustrated I'm becoming, I went out shopping and decided to post in Facebook, and to do a cryptic post, the problem is that I was a tried to be positive in the post though I'm not feeling at all positive and though the message is clear in what I've written, people think I'm in a good place because of the positivity.  It's a falsehood, it's bemused me to say the least, but at least I've got away this time with my clues to my mood on facebook.  If I continue to post as I did today, I wonder when someone will cotton on to what I'm saying...