Rough Week

We have both had a rough week at the wharf. IK was on study leave last week and had been revising laboriously for his 6 hour exams. I bade him good luck this morning and he is still in the exam hall as we speak.

I, on the other hand, have had so many things on my plate at work that I have been losing precious sleep at night feeling overwhelmed thinking about the pile of paper work I had to face each morning. Work has been hell. Demanding. Stressful.

Stressful really is an understatement.

It does not help that I have an appalling team to work with. One does not even bother to do any work and hence the other will off-load everything on to me.

Thursday was the most distressing day at work for me. My manager sent me to two meetings for Thursday morning citing ‘I am taking my wife to the hospital’ to the chairperson of the meetings while to his own manager, ‘I am sorting out my nanny’s visa’. Both times I was copied in the emails. WTF. What was he playing at? Two different stories to two different senior management and carbon copied me in as well. He must think I’m so dim to not be able to put two and two together. I suspect he forgot what he sent out earlier and all he wanted was probably a lie-in because he couldn’t be bothered to get in for the 8.30 am meeting. And why did he have to send me in as his representative? Why? As it is I had a million other things to do, top priority being rcsa.

To add salt to injury, he came in at 1 pm, interrupted my lunch, this was me ‘stabbing’ my pasta at my desk, to ask for some assistance in drawing excel charts for, get this, his *schoolwork* (he is undergoing a part time Masters course), not even proper office work. Can you even begin to comprehend all this? He interrupts my lunch for his own personal work. How unbelievably outrageous is that?

I was fuming and I’m sure smoke was billowing out of my ears by then. In between gritted teeth I *did* all that shit and still continued managing the tasks assigned to me.

That's just not it ok. Sorry but there is more gripe to 'share'.

There has been three resignations thus far in my team and due to the freeze we are not hiring new staff. As a result I have had to take on more responsibilities covering for the three jokers who left. I mean it is not like I don't have enough on my plate. They unload it on to me simply because I never utter a single word of complain. One day I will break down I'm sure but I think my limit is incredibly high. I somehow can withstand so much crap thanks to my first intense and highly stressful job in AA. My ex managers would be proud of what I've become; a true product of AA.

Sometimes I get so angry for not standing up for myself. I don’t know how to handle these situations, and as a result I get bullied not only by my own team, but even people from other business areas as well.

The thing is, I absolutely hate confrontations and will try my best to avoid it. Then there's the other concern that there's a big possibility of me breaking down and start tearing if I do decide to speak up and be heard about my dissatisfaction of the treatment I am getting from these slave drivers. As you can imagine I would not want my manager to see this, would I? Hell NO.

You see, I have problems controlling my emotions. I admit I am a weakling. Not the best of characters really. I get upset so easily and cry even more effortlessly. Sigh. All these undesirable characteristics bestowed upon me. I should have gone for more team building activities when I was a child huh.

Further more, I am a very idealistic person, as IK tells me, ‘They are not like you, you cannot expect them to behave the way you want them to’ in response to my ‘Why can’t they realise that it is not right and unacceptable, I would never do that to other people’ uproar.

I seriously believe in the idiom ‘do unto others as you would others do unto you’ and even more strongly on ‘what goes around comes around’. Sadly, just believing firmly in that does not get me very far. At the end of the day, I am the one who gets upset, stressed and exhausted. Not them, just me. Silly old stupid idealistic karma-believing me.

It is a sad reality but I think everyone at work bullies me and takes me for a fool who will do everything they tell me to. I don’t know why this happens to me. I try to be nice to everyone, always remember not to step on anyone's toes, mind my own business and expect the same from them but instead I get trampled on mercilessly. Big fat sigh.

This is how I keep my sanity and I reassure myself constantly with these in mind:

• that God will not test you if he does not think you can handle it.


• that you cannot have a perfect life (not that mine is), something has to go wrong somewhere in order to keep you challenged, keep your feet firmly on the ground and be more appreciative of other aspects in life.

I seriously need to learn to be more firm and stand my ground, to speak up if I am overwhelmed and to learn to set my boundaries and limits. Until then I think I will always face this problem, no matter where I work. And poor IK , bless his cotton socks, he is the one who has to bear with my endless bitching about the grief I get from work.

OK enough whining, the work will not clear itself or dissappear. I am off to the office now. Have a great weekend peeps.