The Voices in My Head

(Control – JJ Heller)

There are lots of thoughts spinning in my head that could each individually make a post. And I don’t have time for that. So here are a lot of disjointed thoughts.

On Monday I was very proud. After two weeks of struggling to get food into my body unless someone was sitting with me expecting me to eat (and even then not 100% having success), the grief cloud finally lessened enough that I was able to eat lunch and dinner. It was a lot of work and a lot of pushing myself (which if you know me you know is not “normal” when food is involved), but I did it. Step two is maintaining that and step three adding breakfast back in, but I am so proud of that accomplishment.

It also is mildly problematic that trying to find something I’d be willing to try eating made me realize that I hadn’t exactly planned meals for this week. The weekend of August 7-8 I worked really hard on obtaining food in case I was interested in eating, and I think I had at least close to enough food to make it through the week. And I ate close to nothing. So the next weekend and this past weekend I was like well I’ve barely eaten anything so I don’t need to push through the exhaustion to make more food. And then I realized I have enough food prepared for about 3 days of kind of eating, but there are four days left before the next weekend and I really want to push myself to eat full meals…so I’m not totally sure what I’m planning on eating by the end of the week…I definitely don’t feel ready to use my social skills to make a mcdonalds run.

Sometimes people who really mean well just don’t understand. Especially for someone like me who struggles with communication and self-advocacy, there is a huge difference between ‘can I do this for you’ and ‘let me know if I can do anything for you.’ The first has identified an action you are willing to take, gives me the ownership to agree or to reject the offer, and likely offers me support that I need. The second sounds really good. It lets me know that probably you do care, but it is overwhelming. I might be too far gone to even identify what I need, but even if I do know exactly what would be helpful, that second statement puts the pressure on me to ask for something you might not be intending to give, and that is hard.

A few weeks ago at church, part of the sermon was about attachment. I thought it described really well what a good preceptor relationship should look like. It described three major components of a secure relationship.

1. Accessibility – the root of accessibility is “do I matter?”
2. Responsiveness – the root of responsiveness is “can I rely on you in distress?” which draws on our desire to be seen and heard
3. Engagement – the root of engagement is are you involved in my life, and am I known and understood?

Today also I got an email from someone whom I have had no positive interactions ever, which may slightly be skewing my perspective on just how dumb this idea is…but this person suggested that part of acting professionally is to respond to every email within two hours. Before we get into the really real stuff, there is the very practical issue of there are times greater than two hours at a time during which I am not even in front of an open computer, therefore making it not even physically possible to respond even if I wanted to. Getting away from that, even if I am in front of my computer it is not a good use of my time to drop everything every time I receive an email. Additionally, even if I did drop everything to reply to your email, many times it takes longer than two hours to think about what is being asked and to compose a thoughtful reply. Emails don’t just magically elucidate themselves in my brain and then magically send their own responses. Humans have to do that, and humans have to work within the confines of time and space. If you proposed every email is responded to within two business days I would be on board with that. I could most likely make that happen. Two hours on the other hand is not reasonable…and if you want that then don’t be surprised when I work smarter instead of harder and figure out how to use auto-responses so that every time you send me an email you get a response that is has been received and all requests will be evaluated in the order in which they are received…oh, and it gets better. In this same email that he expects a response to every email within two hours – a comment that multi-tasking during online meetings is not allowed, and laptops should be closed during in person meetings…so now the two hours is even less reasonable, because the vast majority of the time that I *am* in front of my computer is while I am sitting in a meeting…so yeah…not happening…not that I can write an email and be a part of a meeting at the same time anyway, but just the idea that we could both respond to emails immediately AND not multi-task meetings was so utterly ridiculous that the only response was to laugh. (And lol, sure, I can make sure my notifications are on, but that isn’t going to do anything for me while the program implicated is closed…) I had half a mind to throw my laptop at this self-entitled jerk’s head and walk out. I would never do that, but I was like dude, you are not building any bridges here.

Don’t think I’m not listening to you

(Don’t even try – Children 18:3)

A lot has happened in the last week or so. And a lot of it I am not ready to throw out into the world yet. But there is one part I am very ready to share.

A little over a week ago I was told that my manager wished I was not hired. The reason? Because when asked what I would look for in a job, I stated that while I definitely was most interested in NICU positions at this point, and had some preferences regarding what the position would be like and where it would be geographically located, what was likely going to be most important to me was the culture of the hospital in which I would be working. I was very careful to not bash the culture where I am currently working, so it isn’t like this was some emotional reaction to hard news. And I also had to hold my tongue and not reply that maybe I don’t want to be hired by someone who doesn’t care about workplace culture.

But it is true. If you don’t want to hire someone who cares about more than just the day to day tasks carried out in the job, then you probably are not someone I want to work for. It is my opinion that the best job in the world could be utter torture in a community that doesn’t support and value each other. On the other hand, I’ve had jobs or carried out roles that on paper might have sounded dreadful, but I absolutely loved it because I was doing it in a group that showed they cared about me. Having a job where the tasks are what I want to be doing is great, but a good workplace is so much more than a job description. It is a community. If you don’t see the value in supporting people and creating an inclusive and caring environment, we aren’t going to see eye to eye on much of anything.

I don’t want to show up at work every day to click buttons on the computer; I want to join together as part of a team to enhance the lives of both my patients and my coworkers, and I want to do it on a team that is doing the same for me. This isn’t to say we all have to have equal abilities to contribute – sometimes a person may not have anything to contribute and someone else may be shouldering more of the load, but I believe there should be a recognition that every member of the team matters. That person not rocking it today might need a little extra support today, but in a few months that person might be the one who is able to contribute something no one else can. Together we can do so much more than any of us can do as an island. I want to work in a culture where it is okay to ask questions. It is okay to need help, and it is also okay to have the answers and to do a little extra. I think it is when we can admit both our weakness and our strength that we can truly reach our potential, but that can only happen in the context of a community that makes it safe for that to happen.

So yeah, I will (eventually) address this, because I might not be able to independently change someone’s mind, but I can plant the seeds that other people water until they finally grow…but not this week, because if you’ve been following for a while you know this week and next week are likely my worst weeks of the year. I am doing a LOT better this year than I was last year at this time, but I’m still far from rocking it…I’ve been trying for over 5 hours now to get up and go to the grocery store, because I have about two servings of carrots in the freezer, and 3 or 4 apple sauces in the refrigerator and that is all in terms of fruits and vegetables, but the grocery store is incredibly difficult, so I’ve found so many other things to work on instead…all things that do ultimately need to get done…just not necessarily quite so important to do now…

But it is kind of important, because I am trying so hard to eat. And we’ll just put it this way, I am eating better right now than I was a year ago, but it’s been a few days since I had anything besides koolaid for breakfast, and things I ate at noon are starting to get counted towards dinner to make me feel at least a little bit accomplished…and I can’t even really pretend to be trying to eat if I have no appropriate food left to try to shove in my face. And let’s be honest, right now I am trying to figure out if there is anything else I can start writing about that feels safe to share that could take up some more time so I can continue to avoid grocery shopping. I know some people have told me that I should just shop online, but honestly while that avoids the social issues and the anxiety I feel being physically in a grocery store, there are other challenges (primarily involving anxiety) that online orders represent…so the vast majority of the time despite how hard grocery shopping is, doing that is the lesser of the evils when compared to online shopping. And now I have run out of things to say and should really just post this and then put my shoes on. I’m scared, but I can do this. Or maybe I can’t, because I am not going to push myself too hard like I did last time, because that is probably why this time the anxiety is so high before I’ve even walked in the door, but I am going to at least try. If I can’t walk through the door I will give myself grace (and maybe ask for some help in obtaining food), but I am going to at least get through the door of *my* apartment.