Reality check - Anxiety, Depression, PTSD

[Mathy]

Hi All, I live with PTSD, Anxiety and Depression. My PTSD is pretty good, but the other 2 monsters not so. Last year I had arrived at a point where I was medication free, happy and functioning well. Then moving house and an incident at work left me back in the hole again. The work incident was a combination of a complete restructure of my hours and change of leadership - too much change, not handled well. I got suspended, and the process wasn’t handled well, so I bailed out of work for 3 weeks. In 6 years I’ve had 11 managers and #12 arrived 6 months ago, along with a change of 2/3 under managers. New manager is ok (but clueless) and the 2 new “under managers” are inclined to be variously, aggressive, rude and sarcastic. I guess that’s the reality of the “fast paced” world of retai - ha!

Slowly, over the last 6 months I’ve struggled to go to work, get out of bed, lost motivation, and lost the enjoyment of playing my sport - which ironically is important for maintaining my mental health. Sport is golf - so, exercise, challenge, discipline and friendships. I’m single, so this is important to me.

2 weeks ago I ran myself through a checklist and realised that I was NOT travelling at all well, so I upped my ADs and made an appt with my Psych - which is in 3 weeks time. Last Friday I had an enormous panic attack, following a Thursday night at work with the least favourite of the under managers. I guess my mind has decided it’s had enough, I ended up in ER (I’m 61, so can’t assume not a heart attack). So, I now have an appt with GP tomorrow and a sick certificate until next Monday - and I feel like rubbish.

So, if someone says to you that your work rate is “not good enough, *insert my name*”, in front of others, it could be interpreted as a joke or not. I’ve worked for this business for over 9 years, I work my butt off, and I found this insulting, joke or not. What do others feel? If once a week/fortnight one consistently had this sort of, or sarcastic interactions what would you think/feel? I guess I’m trying to decide if I’m being overly sensitive and possibly unfair.

Thoughts would be much appreciated, cheers M 🙂

[Mathy]

Hey folks,

So, here I am the day before going to see the psychologist I haven’t seen for 14 years, and I’m trying to organise my thoughts.

For the last 2 days I have been badly distracted by my House Sparrow. See, he and his mate have a nest up in my garage roof, and a little while ago, they were busy refurbishing it - signs of spring you know 🙂 Anyway he’s been calling out incessantly, and I realised that the female wasn’t around. I did a google about the life of a sparrow, and apparently they mate for life, and the incessant calling was about finding a mate. So, I’m guessing that his mate has died :(. Well, for all of his calling out, he wasn’t getting much attention from the ladies, and there’s a bit of competition, and I’m feeling really sorry for him. So, I decided to buy one of those hang up bird bird seed thingies for him. My thinking was that if he had a superior food supply, then he might find a new lady sparrow friend. Well, it has worked, there are 2 lady sparrows hanging around, but he’s yet to make a connection with them.

The sparrows have been a massive distraction from the things I should be considering. When an appt is 50 mins, planning is needed to make the best of it..

One thing that annoys me is that these 2 under managers are female, as am I. I marched in the 70s as a feminist for rights to equal pay and to end discrimination against women at work. I’ve since discovered a couple of young people at work who have also been negatively affected by these 2 women.It makes me angry, I didn’t do all that stuff that could get me arrested so those in the future, who benefitted, could behave badly.

To end on a positive note, my sparrow has been eating at the “superior food thingie” with a lone female - hopefully his future is on the up 🙂

I have yet more thinking to do about my appointment.

[Guest_128]

Oh Mathy,

I so enjoyed reading your post,

Thankyou very much

As for tomorrow say whatever the h you want,your paying for it.

Dory

[BballJ]

Hi Mathy,

Wow, what an awesome story about the sparrows, that is so cool and what great thinking it was to hang bird food there for them to help him out. Great stuff and sounded like a great distraction.

Bad managers are bad managers, male or female, not everyone is cut out for managing and some people who aren't let it go to their head and struggle to do it properly. I think with the appointment tomorrow, speak about whatever you feel is right at the time.

Please, let us know how it goes.

My best,

Jay

[Mathy]

When I got up this morning, there was my sparrow and one lady sparrow eating at the sparrow restaurant I created, they seem to be hanging out together, and he isn’t calling, fingers crossed 🙂

Still processing my appointment, will return.

[Guest_128]

Hey Mathy,

Have you processed your app yet?

Dory

[Mathy]

Hey Dory, thanks for your response.

I’m still processing at the moment.

This is the first time I’ve tried to process a work type problem, that was related to my MH. So, being quite a generic Buddhist in my philosophy, I’m trying to align the psychologist’s thoughts with what I think is fair.

So, I’m doing a lot of thinking 🙂

Thx for your reply, will be back 🙂

[Mathy]

So, my Sparrow’s lady friend seems to be blowing a bit hot and cold - might take some time, this relationship.

My PTSD was caused by a roof collapse at the golf club I belonged to. In SA, Ladies day is generally on a Tuesday, so this accident, which killed 2 of our Lady members, reverberated around the women’s golfing community, because they were sitting down to lunch at the same time as we were. It was 15 years ago, and in that time I have been to the funerals of 2 of the survivors and the general illness rate amongst the rest seems to be fairly high. I count it a major plus that I continue to play golf, but no longer at that club. It still kind of scares me that the stress of that event may cause me an early death. I take heart that I was one of a very small number that actively sought psychiatric assistance, those that have died or suffer from illness, are those who didn’t.

I work in retail, yesterday I went to some “Better Service” training because my store (and apparently the rest in the Nation) are failing on some KPIs. My Employer has won the Reader’s Digest Australia Most Valued Business for Customer Service for the last 10 years, so I’m thinking WTF is going wrong here?

The training incorporated role playing and scenarios - blah blah. The trainer said that if you couldn’t cope with people being abusive, then you were in the wrong job. We are paid (grabs uniform shirt, and thumbs chest) to wear this and deliver service. NO thoughts on dealing with abusive customers, whilst maintaining one’s dignity and keeping one’s job.

I’m thinking really? As a nation we have issues with domestic violence, bullying and discrimination, but you the trainer are advocating that it’s ok to be violent and abusive towards someone in their paid employment?

I DON’T THINK SO.

So as far as processing my psychologist appt, I’m still in a quandary. Tomorrow, I’m seeing my Psychiatrist.

More to come, thanks for your responses, cheers M 🙂

[Mathy]

Sorry, I wrote a reply and it’s disappeared. It didn’t contain anything that was remotely worth moderating.

Now I have to reconstruct it.

This is not ok 😞

[BballJ]

Hi Mathy,

It looks like the post came through which is good.

Sorry about that traumatic experience at the golf club, that would of caused a lot of grief so I can see how that could affect you. I hope that you continue seeking the help to overcome it that you so rightly deserve.

Regarding the workplace training, it is funny because I had similar training today and they gave us tips on how to deal with abusive customers and how to de-escalate the situation. Very bad training if they say you just have to put up with it, no one deserves mental abuse at all.

Will await your next response about the psychologist appointment.

My best,

Jay

[Mathy]

Thank you Jay, yep, that workplace training was a bit of an eye - opener, and very puzzling seeing as we self insure for OHS issues. So, tips on de-escalating would have been far more helpful!

And I think I did a classic “cross-over” with my posts. Server must have been running a bit slow that night.

Thabk you for your usual thoughtful comments, appreciate them, cheers M 🙂