I moved!

Over here.

I've changed a lot since I made this blog in middle school. I don't think that's something that's out of the ordinary, and I'm glad I did. I just don't know if I want those things on a public forum on the same wavelength as the things that I'm going to continue posting.

But I don't want to delete any of the old stuff. As cringeworthy as it is, it's a time capsule. And I want to be able to look back at that time in my life and see where I was at the time and where I came from.

While this blog was a document of my teenage years, the new one will be a testament to my adulthood, hopefully with less embarrassing content. It'll still be me, but in a different way. A place to put my loud, overtaking thoughts.

Keep existing. See you there.

What a Hostile Work Environment Really Means

I don't have my job because I want it. I don't put numbers in a computer because it's something that I enjoy. I don't like helping a corporation buy and sell goods that I don't care about. I have my job because I need it. And therein lies the danger that capitalism as laissez-faire as we have it right now causes.

My job provides health insurance. It's not great, but it's better than nothing, and better than what I had before. My job makes it so that I can pay rent. I don't know how much more clear I can make it that if I could survive without it, I would quit in a heartbeat.

But I can't. So here we are.

Almost a year ago, I was contacted by a recruitment agency after having lost $4,000 in an employment scam, and at this point I was desperate for anything that might give me a glimmer of hope of getting me out of the massive crater of debt in which I had dug myself. At least something to help me survive. I had been job hunting for almost three months. I was so relieved that someone was willing to hire me, I looked right past the first red flag: that the building was shitty and run-down, and probably violated all kinds of safety standards, let alone accessibility standards.

That was all fine. Better than retail, I was sure.

It was my first time working in an office, and I had a lot to learn. So much, in fact, that I was horribly overwhelmed and fell behind on a lot of my work because of my prominent avoidance mechanism that kicks in at any sign of anxiety. It didn't help that the person who trained me had a month-long leave of absence about a week or two into my employment, and I was so deathly afraid of coming to my boss with questions, and I didn't know who else to ask, that a large pile of problems accumulated on and around my desk.

The fact that that wasn't grounds for immediate termination as I had expected (or as it would have been in a similar situation in the ruthless world of retail) soothed my anxieties immensely, despite the fact that I worked on figuring out that pile of problems for weeks.

I'm a fast learner, and I have a mind for efficiency. The more I learned about the functions of my job, how to differentiate the subsections of my responsibilities, and why it is that my department does what it does, the more I attempted to reorganize myself and my workstation to better get things done.

But apparently my organization wasn't correct. Because it wasn't the way that my boss liked it.

I have PTSD. One of my biggest anxieties that comes from this is the fear that I don't really own anything, that personal space doesn't exist, and that my self and the environment that I build around it isn't truly mine. A very simple way to activate this trigger is by taking things from my spaces without asking, or at the very basest level, notifying me. Especially when I'm not there.

I came into work one day to find everything on my desk moved around drastically, and several things that I was working on missing, with no notification of their new location.

I was scolded later that day for having things that were past due (which was valid) and for not organizing in such a way that it would make it easier for someone to find something of mine that they were looking for (which was questionable).

After I got used to my job enough that I could work quickly and get everything done in a timely manner, I ended up having a lot of free time on my hands to do nothing. My discontented brain, in desperate need of stimulation, employed my curious, nosy, eavesdropping manner and caused me to notice things that I wouldn't if I had been distracted by a satisfactory amount of work.

I noticed what other people were doing. I noticed the imbalance of responsibility.

I noticed favoritism. And I noticed bullying.

Over time, I discovered that the majority (approximately 15 out of 19 people) had been in my department for less than two years, and that my boss had only had her position for about that length of time. And that turnover since she started had been immense.

Something can probably be said about the fact that 2 out of the 19 people in my department are men. Stereotypes suggest that in that kind of environment (i.e., one dominated by women), gossip and passive-aggressive bickering would be rampant. Possibly luckily, possibly not so, that kind of behavior and that kind of environment bothers the crap out of me.

So I listened. I heard people complain about the same exact things from different angles, and I had fueled their respective fires enough in individual conversations about work that I had not only seen exactly how these people felt, but also probably inadvertently made them more upset about it. That last part was probably a mistake. But I was also upset.

The first step I took was to put something in the "suggestion box" that my boss has available for our department meetings. A meeting happened, and the problem that I put in the box was addressed - but only in the fact that we were told not to complain about it.

Later, I was also told that somebody else had put something in the box, and it was completely ignored.

So the "suggestion box" was useless.

I was eventually asked to train someone. Amazingly, after having been working there for seven and a half months, they decided that I had enough relative seniority, and understood enough about the functions of the department, that I was qualified enough to train someone.

After I had trained her, my boss decided that almost half of my assignments would go to her.

So I was left with nothing to do but to come up with some kind of plan.

So I did. I took a couple of days to formulate an overhaul of the department that, from my perspective, and based on the things that I knew, would increase productivity and lower overall stress. I printed off a couple of copies of this proposal, which was only a first draft, and secretively gave them to some people who I knew were as frustrated as I was, if not more so. I asked them to give me feedback.

A couple of days passed and the only things that I got back were the fact that it was admirable that I had done this.

Then there was a meeting. Only the people who had been working there the longest, excluding the two men, were invited.

We sat around a table in the conference room for an hour and were berated for "gossiping".

Several people voiced some frustrations, but none of it was surrounding the things that I knew were problems. The subject was gossiping, because my boss and her right hand were paranoid that people were talking shit about them personally. Therefore, anybody who said anything mostly just said things about how gossiping was indeed bad, and fingers were pointed at the two men in the department who (by sheer coincidence of individual behavior) made everybody uncomfortable.

I knew this wasn't the source of the frustration. But I wasn't sure how to bring anything else up, at least in that setting.

So, after that meeting, I arranged a private meeting with my boss to discuss my proposal.

It didn't go as well as I'd hoped, but I felt heard, and I felt like my opinions and viewpoints were somewhat considered. I got my point across, and my boss and her right hand understood the basis of my arguments. They said they'd think about it.

It's been approximately one month since they said they'd think about it. The only thing that's changed is the fact that I have basically been left alone, and nobody has been breathing down my neck like I felt like was the case previously.

But most of all, the overall behavior and attitude hasn't changed.

One of my coworkers is being bullied by the management, for the pure and simple reason that they don't want to fire her.

She is a single mother with two dependent children, who is going to court as the plaintiff of a domestic violence case. Understandably, she's had to adjust her hours and make up a lot of time that she's missed because of her children's needs. Her son has a learning disability. Their father is physically abusive. They need their mother.

Despite her unpredictable attendance patterns, she is not lazy by any means. Her work ethic is admirable, she's an amazing multitasker, her communication skills are incredible, and she gets shit done.

Initially, they tried to phase her out. They gave all her previous work to a new hire without any sort of notification, a few days before giving her an ultimatum: that she go part-time (and therefore lose all her benefits), or quit.

She refused to go quietly.

She accepted part-time, because she needed some sort of income with which to support her children. She kept working, and she kept working hard. She has been doing everything asked of her to the absolute best of her ability, and she has been doing it well.

They ran out of things to scold her for, so they started scolding her for doing things that everybody else is allowed to do. Answering personal phone calls regarding her children or from her lawyer? Not allowed. Short, friendly conversation with another coworker? Nope. Not dropping everything and doing every task she's assigned the moment it's assigned to her, even when she's in the midst of doing something else? Unacceptable.

Another one of my coworkers (one whose work ethic and Get-Shit-Done capacity I also admire) has had persistent medical issues recently, and has been in and out of the doctor's office frequently as they tried to figure out what was wrong with her. She had to have an emergency medical procedure done, which put her out of the office for a few days. When she got back, she notified my boss that she would have to go back to the hospital soon as a follow-up, to monitor her condition. She was told that if she missed another day, she would be fired. And that her taking personal phone calls "all day" (which is just plain untrue) was unacceptable.

All around me, people are bullied. They feel denied, unappreciated, smothered, stifled, stepped on, used, degraded, and belittled, every single day. Sure, nobody is in danger of physical harm, nor are they in danger of sexual harassment. But hostility is not just physical. The psychological warfare that happens every day in my department is capable of causing emotional damage. And it has.

It's no secret that favorites are played. Two of my coworkers are family members of people in charge and are never berated nearly as badly as those who aren't. And even though it seems like I am one of the favorites, I see the unfairness in it. I see the frustration and the unhappiness and the stress.

Maybe I'll get in trouble for posting this online for anyone to see despite the anonymity. But, though I don't want to lose my job because I still need health insurance and I still have to pay rent (my living situation, although not the same as the last one, is a different kind of hell altogether), I don't particularly care. I've done all I can do, and nothing has been done.

I am tired.

Everybody is tired.

~*~

 

Right now in my life, the urge to run has never been stronger.

 

It's natural for me though; I am the personification of an avoidance mechanism. I run from any sign of conflict. Always flight, never fight.

 

Where I am right now, the only escape from conflict is on my commute to and from work. I'm gone 12 hours a day at a job that's nothing but stress, and then I come home to loud roommates who are in a toxic relationship which has lately crossed the borderline of abuse. But, none of us can afford to live there if one of us leaves.

 

The lease is up in the spring, and I'm not intending on staying if they decide to renew it.

 

I'm going to Chicago next month. We'll see if I want to stay when I come back.

Dear Shitty Roommate

I can't say I'm not grateful.

I'm new to adulthood. I'm 20 years old. I've never signed a lease, I've never taken out a loan, I've never made car payments. After moving out of my parents' house less than a year ago in June, I've moved houses twice more, yours being the second.

At the time, I was staying at a friend-of-the-family's house. She didn't really have a spare bedroom, so I kept my furniture and my boxes in her garage while I slept in her daughter's bed and lived out of suitcases. She let me stay there rent-free under the condition that I cleaned her kitchen. This worked for a while, but it was uncomfortable, and, after finally landing a job (one that I enjoyed for a change), I was actively looking for somewhere to live, not just somewhere to stay.

In late August, she notified me of a distant friend of hers, who was looking for someone to rent out a room in his house. She gave me your contact information, and I came over on my lunch hour to meet you and to see the house, even though I was halfway out the door already, ready to pounce on any opportunity that would get me out of where I was then.

You were talkative but, from what I could tell, you were genuine. A divorcee in his forties with an adorable dog, supporting his family with the money he made, looking for a little extra income by renting out one of two extra bedrooms. Rent was reasonable, due before the first of the month. I disclosed that I was a private introvert, and you disclosed that you had lived in community housing before, and was used to living with roommates. I got no red flags, and I moved in less than two weeks later.

It was good for a while.

Then I got fired.

I was distraught; I loved the job, I loved the hours, I loved the company, I loved my coworkers. But one day, I was a single solitary minute late to work, and suddenly that was the last straw.

I hoped that I would be able to find a job before the next due date. It approached quickly, however, and things were not looking good. That's when I told you.

You seemed to be okay with it, but I started noticing a pattern in our conversations by this point. You did 95% of the talking, and you would talk forever. And you tried to father me. You turned everything into a life lesson, most of the time either telling me things I had already been told by my own father, or things that really weren't helpful at all.

After missing two months' rent, and after falling victim to an employment scam which stole from me $4,000 that I didn't have, I finally got a job. It was boring and soul-crushing, but it was a job. We worked out a plan to pay you back what I owed, and while those payments were staggered and uneven as I worked out paydays, had to get my own phone plan, and made payments toward massive amounts of debt, they happened. I paid off what I owed you in four months.

If you had been less of an ass, that would have been the whole story.

I don't take particularly kindly to know-it-alls. One of the things that I'm wisest to in my young age is the fact that the only thing anybody knows for sure is the fact that they don't know everything for sure. The thing that annoys me the most about some people is that they claim to know everything, condescendingly and scornfully. It's even worse when those people are doing it because they're older than you, and if you try in any way to point out any flaw in their logic, they will dismiss you immediately because you're younger than them, so how could you possibly know anything more than they do?

I got miserably sick during my first month of employment, and I took a day and a half off. You know, for my health. I know my capacities. I know how to take care of myself. I know myself better than you do. So don't tell me that taking a day off when I can't breathe because of the copious amounts of mucous flooding my lungs is a good way to get fired. Don't tell me to go into work when I'm sick so that they'll tell me to go home, because if they tell me to go home, I can't get fired. Don't fucking joke, when I start coughing while you're telling me all this and I really just want to go to bed, that, yes, that's a great example of how to act! Act sick, act like you're dying! Play it up! Spread the germs to your coworkers and take everyone else out with you! Don't take care of yourself, capitalism is more important!

You asked me what my plans for Christmas were. I answered honestly: I was going back home to see my parents.

"Good," you said, "You should respect your parents."

Uh... Okay... "I do," I responded.

You, in your wise-man, overly-fatherly, sage way, said one thing I will never forget.

"Not enough."

It takes a lot to make me angry. Sure, I get peeved, I get miffed, I get annoyed, just like most people. But seething rage takes some serious causation. There are two ways that are almost guaranteed to make me see red, to shake with anger, to clench my teeth, to see my pulse behind my eyes. One of these is to make assumptions such as this on my family.

Generally, if I get mad, I hold in my words. Mostly because I can't think straight enough to get out a coherent sentence, but also because if I can think of something, it's scathing, and it hurts. I'm good at using my words as weapons, and I don't like to rock the boat. I don't like to disturb the peace, I don't like to hurt people, I don't like to escalate a bad situation.

But my thoughts were loud, and they were plenty. How dare you. How dare you make assumptions about me, about my relationships, about my life. Is there something about me that tips you off to the idea that I hate my parents? My parents are my best friends. You've never met them, and you don't know me as well as you apparently think you do.

I couldn't help myself. "You don't know anything about my relationship with my parents. You've never met them."

"Well they never visit."

What the fuck?

"They hate the city," I told him honestly. It's why they moved to the country. It's not like they weren't invited. Plus, it's not like I would have anything to offer if I hosted them. They had come for my birthday, and we had a lovely time out. I had gone home to visit many times since living here. Who were you to claim that I didn't respect my parents enough because they never came to the house?

"That's weird," you said in disbelief, because god forbid anybody has a differing opinion.

I ended it there, but there were so many things I could have said, the premier of which being the good old classic "Fuck You".

There were little things on top of that. You came home while I was trying to sleep and made as much noise as you possibly could. Your dog didn't like me - she bit me, and it scarred. You were a hypocrite about the dishes; I left a cooking pot to soak after having cheese in it, and you got upset with me for not cleaning up after myself, when you ran the dishwasher possibly three times the entire time I lived there. I know, because you didn't buy detergent, obviously not knowing that we were out, for a whole week, and the dishes sat dirty in the dishwasher until I got paid and could afford to buy more. Not to mention the fact that I was the one who put your dishes in the dishwasher almost every time after you had left them in the sink, even though it was apparently a problem when I left mine in the sink for two seconds.

I've never felt more like I was living with a parent than when I was living here. Even at my own parents' house, I felt like I had more freedom, like I actually lived there. Now I barely feel like my room is my own. I feel like a prisoner.

When an old acquaintance from middle school posted on Facebook that she and her boyfriend were getting kicked out of their place short-notice and needed a roommate ASAP, I jumped at the chance. We connected, met up for coffee, talked logistics, and before I knew it she signed the lease. I was ready to move in by the end of that month.

I didn't want to tell you via text. I felt like that would be douchey. So I waited until a fateful evening when you might have been home while I was awake.

I was cooking. You said hi. I told you I had something I wanted to tell you. I told you I was moving at the end of the month. You said "okay," no big deal.

There was a moment of silence. Then you said, "That's in two weeks, isn't it?"

"Yeah, it is."

"That's less than 30 days' notice."

"Yeah, sorry about that. It was a little sudden."

It was silent some more, you sifted through the mail that I had brought in, then went upstairs.

Ten minutes later, you came back down. I was eating my noodles, minding my own business, when you decided to stir up some shit.

"You shouldn't take advantage of people."

What?

"...Am I taking advantage of people?" I genuinely asked.

"Yes, you're taking advantage of me. I didn't ask for first and last months' rent, you didn't give me 30 days' notice, so now I have to figure out some way to bridge that gap, and finding a new roommate is going to take a while."

Let's take apart the little nuggets of bullshit in that statement, shall we?

First of all, you're not a homeowner's association. You're not even a landlord. Based on the spending patterns that I've seen thus far, if I had given you first and last, you would have spent it all on bulk household items that you don't even use anyway so it wouldn't have done any good. You say you use your money to support your family, so why did you buy a new car, adding to the three you already had*? Why do you have four pairs of hiking boots? Why did you get a new stereo? Who are you buying all that Costco food for, when it just sits in the fridge or on the counter and rots? "Supporting your family" is a choice you make, especially when you don't even have any kids. If you can't afford to buy them the new things that they're asking for, then don't. You don't think I wish my parents supported me financially? They can't afford to, so they don't. And I still love them, and I still associate with them. I understand. I'm sure yours can too. And if they don't, they're frankly not worth your time, effort, and most of all, your money.

After you said that, you walked away.

"I'm sorry," I said meekly. I didn't know what else to say. The way you brushed it off initially gave me a false sense of security, so your random attack caught me off-guard.

"You're not sorry," you said, preparing to leave the house again, "because it doesn't affect you. You're just saying words, you're not really sorry."

You said goodbye to your dog, and with a slam of the door, you were gone again.

The second way to make me truly angry is to assume things about my character that are not true, especially when you automatically accept them as fact and don't give me room to defend myself. It infuriates me when a person is so closed-minded that the opinions that they have spun in their heads as facts are so rigid they can't be changed.

You know what? I am sorry. I'm sorry you don't believe humans can have empathy unless it serves them personally (that really says something about you, the fact that you believe that to be true). I'm sorry you haven't aged mentally past fifteen, despite telling me how to live my life like you know any better. I'm sorry you think you know everything. I'm sorry you think that all people are the same, that they want the same things, need the same things, feel the same way, experience life the same way. I'm sorry you don't see variance in personality, I'm sorry you don't see richness in diversity, and I'm sorry you're a manipulative child.

I'm not sorry for thinking these things or for feeling this way.

I was sorry for leaving you in the dust on short notice, but that remorse is gone. I'm not sorry for leaving.

I used to tell myself that I didn't hate you, I just hated living with you. But now I'm glad that, after I move, I have the freedom to block your number and to never interact with you again for as long as I live.

 Love,
Kayleigh