I’m not the only one…
Anyone else suffering from the stress of this pandemic? I did okay for the first few weeks – just the odd moments where things were annoying. This past week though was harder – I don’t know if it’s the number of deaths, the never-ending talk about covid, the loneliness of working at home, or the spring time blues.
Knock on wood that I am not aware of anyone who has died of anything related to covid. But a few people recently have had parents pass away. One of D’s grandmother is not doing well at all - the prognosis went from weeks to months to even a possible 3 years to a couple months to… well, we are not sure. She is back in the hospital due to pneumonia. It’s hard watching people not take this pandemic seriously. Seeing all the models of what could happen – are we losing 11,000 or 50,000 – and that’s assuming people take this seriously. The first couple weeks you could hear the difference when you stepped outside – the roads were quiet. I live near lots of busy roads – I’m used to the hum of traffic at all hours. It was 3 am quiet, or maybe even quieter. This week – the hum is back. That tells me people are not taking this as serious. People are not staying home. I want to scream at people to stay the ‘F’ home. Stop driving around just for the sake of it. Stop visiting people ‘from afar’. I’ve seen the video – those people visiting are NOT practicing social distancing. It’s hard thinking about all the people who will come out of this alone – missing parents, lovers, spouses, children. I worry about my own families – the parents are retired, but are of an age where anything could happen. The SIL is off for medical reasons already. So many are deemed essential still though – me, D, bro and wife, L, work friends. Some are off because they are non-essential, some are out of jobs right now. And then how will this affect all the kids,including my nieces and nephews.
And goodness, I’m tired of all the hype, the talk, the stupidity around covid. I’ve started limiting my time reading/watching news. I don’t want to live in denial, but I certainly cannot handle all of this ever-changing landscape. I watch enough to know what the latest rules are. I’m hitting the point where it is too much saturation, too much stress. I was doing so well – setting up a new routine for work, seeing where I could be supportive of other people while also doing self-care. I don’t know what happened this week – it’s like death by a thousand paper cuts. The little things just starting adding up and this week, I just want to hole up and not deal with anything. I should do some crochet – I have a few projects on the go. I’ve done a couple jigsaw puzzles. Now I just want to sit and eat. I don’t want to do anything productive.
Working from home has been interesting. It has really shown some gaps. Can I work at home? Yes. I follow a similar routine as before except I have a bit more time at home before work starts as my commute is super short. I try to eat my lunch in my dining room – something I suck at as I used to eat my lunch at my desk. I’ve set up my office desk so that I can easily move work out of the way for weekends and set it back up for during the week. I still get dressed for work, though I wear more cardigans than suit jackets. I was getting into a routine of exercising after work to replace my commute home. I was even doing well (until this past week) with not eating throughout the day. I was trying to move more during the day even just to walk in place or stretch. We are using some fun programs that allow us to essentially message each other. The first week we set up a few with friends who I usually talk to as well as for our team, the second week we set up one for our crochet club. I try to have regular conversation with friends at work as well as do video conferences a couple times a week so we ‘see’ each other. I was getting things done. There is a lot of good.
Technical problems have been a hassle. Trying to connect to the work system can take a really long time. And I can't do a lot of my work unless I'm connected. I sometimes can only download emails a couple times a day. It makes it hard. Our IT has been working really hard to keep things working and ensuring we can access things we need. It is certainly better in week 4 than it was in week 1. I have access to a couple screens and a printer. I've got a lot of what I need so at least I can do my job.
That being said, I’ve been struggling with one person in my unit. There always seems to be one. We get along and can talk about many things – sci-fi, crochet, tv, etc. – but bring in work, and it’s a struggle. For me, I just don’t like her work ethic. She is a minimal effort person unless it is something that she ‘owns.’ Which is funny, because she was the one to tell me when I started that I should not own anything because it changes so much after I’ve done my part. Get her talking about the one main thing she works on and she can talk for hours. Try to get her involved in other things – suddenly she is super busy. Except – for the most part, she spends much of her days on her phone, or talking to people about crochet, or not at her desk. The main task she does was a huge part of her day last year, until about August. Since then it’s been super slow. So you’d think she’d get involved in other things. Maybe help out those of us who have been consistently busy all along. Nope – she’ll get involved in committees, but will not offer to help even if you ask for help. And when we are supposed to talk about our top 3 things we are working on, she talk about the 3 things she works on only – when the manager asked her to do a fourth thing, she said she was too busy and would have to give up one of her other tasks. Meanwhile, the rest of us are working on several different items at a time and the top 3 is just that - the top 3.
I’ve really tried to give her the benefit of the doubt –I don’t know what it going on in her life that could be affecting work, everyone has their skills and abilities, our experiences are different, it’s the manager’s job to handle performance issues. It just gets hard to keep giving the benefit of the doubt when you see evidence to the contrary. I asked two simple questions on our work chat last week about an email she was talking about. And her response was completely from left field. I tried to give her the benefit and explained why I asked the question. She didn’t respond. To add fodder to the flames, the manager responded that we should take our petty argument to a private chat. I still don’t understand that response. I asked another co-worker if my words had tone or were out of line. She didn’t think so and agreed both responses were completely out of place.
So yeah – mental health took a blow that day. I know how hard it is to talk via writing. There is no tone, there is no body language. So the question is why does she seem to take everything I say from a point of negativity or criticism or I don’t know what. And you can’t ask her – or at least I can’t. I’ve tried having a conversation in person about a situation where her response was completely out of line with what was being said and she just blows it off. I’ve tried explaining it from my point of view, I’ve asked her to explain what she understood. I can’t get an answer out of her.
This week was just tough. It’s like I keep getting responses or feedback that is completely out of line with what is happening or that is completely opposite. My manager said another manager thought my feedback was too prescriptive. I suggested one word change and moved one paragraph below as it made more sense. I thought I loosened the wording.
Anyway, it’s different working from home. You don’t get the interaction, the non-verbal clues, or the information. Because we are not in the same office, the information is not being shared. I constantly feel like I’m out of the loop. If not for friends who work in other units, I swear I would have no idea what is going on.
And then you add in that I work from home. I get off work and I am don’t really interact with anyone after hours. I'm usually a home body, but it’s just a bit too much home.
And then there is the spring time blues – the weather is getting nicer, but the yard is not ready for any fun to start. My lilies are making an appearance (and so is grass in the lily garden). I love the sign of the lilies (not the grass). I just want to dig into the garden and start planning and prepping. Except all other gardens are covered in snow. The back yard in particular is completely covered in snow. Thankfully, Canadian Tire and Lowe's are still open. Will they still be in May? Will there be seed potatoes and onions when I’m ready? I was going to build a raised garden in my front yard. Will I be able to do that? Will I have to move that to the back? At least then I have a reason to go outside and just be with nature. Right now, it’s that in-between weather – nice enough to want to go out, but chilly and wet enough to want to stay in. It was nice -I actually talked to my neighbor yesterday – we were 20+ feet apart, but it was nice just to chat with people.
There are lots of things to do in my house – so much organizing and cleaning – I just don’t have the energy to do it right now. The disadvantage of being home so much is I can see so much that needs to be done. My to do list keeps growing. I was even thinking today – I need some help to pick out colours and flooring. Yeah – it’s funny – my heart says we could do all these things that would be fun, productive, and/or pretty, while my head just wants to retreat. My self-care this week has not been enough obviously.
Anyway, I thought it would help to share some of this. So thanks for ‘listening.’ Hope everyone stays safe.
Knock on wood that I am not aware of anyone who has died of anything related to covid. But a few people recently have had parents pass away. One of D’s grandmother is not doing well at all - the prognosis went from weeks to months to even a possible 3 years to a couple months to… well, we are not sure. She is back in the hospital due to pneumonia. It’s hard watching people not take this pandemic seriously. Seeing all the models of what could happen – are we losing 11,000 or 50,000 – and that’s assuming people take this seriously. The first couple weeks you could hear the difference when you stepped outside – the roads were quiet. I live near lots of busy roads – I’m used to the hum of traffic at all hours. It was 3 am quiet, or maybe even quieter. This week – the hum is back. That tells me people are not taking this as serious. People are not staying home. I want to scream at people to stay the ‘F’ home. Stop driving around just for the sake of it. Stop visiting people ‘from afar’. I’ve seen the video – those people visiting are NOT practicing social distancing. It’s hard thinking about all the people who will come out of this alone – missing parents, lovers, spouses, children. I worry about my own families – the parents are retired, but are of an age where anything could happen. The SIL is off for medical reasons already. So many are deemed essential still though – me, D, bro and wife, L, work friends. Some are off because they are non-essential, some are out of jobs right now. And then how will this affect all the kids,including my nieces and nephews.
And goodness, I’m tired of all the hype, the talk, the stupidity around covid. I’ve started limiting my time reading/watching news. I don’t want to live in denial, but I certainly cannot handle all of this ever-changing landscape. I watch enough to know what the latest rules are. I’m hitting the point where it is too much saturation, too much stress. I was doing so well – setting up a new routine for work, seeing where I could be supportive of other people while also doing self-care. I don’t know what happened this week – it’s like death by a thousand paper cuts. The little things just starting adding up and this week, I just want to hole up and not deal with anything. I should do some crochet – I have a few projects on the go. I’ve done a couple jigsaw puzzles. Now I just want to sit and eat. I don’t want to do anything productive.
Working from home has been interesting. It has really shown some gaps. Can I work at home? Yes. I follow a similar routine as before except I have a bit more time at home before work starts as my commute is super short. I try to eat my lunch in my dining room – something I suck at as I used to eat my lunch at my desk. I’ve set up my office desk so that I can easily move work out of the way for weekends and set it back up for during the week. I still get dressed for work, though I wear more cardigans than suit jackets. I was getting into a routine of exercising after work to replace my commute home. I was even doing well (until this past week) with not eating throughout the day. I was trying to move more during the day even just to walk in place or stretch. We are using some fun programs that allow us to essentially message each other. The first week we set up a few with friends who I usually talk to as well as for our team, the second week we set up one for our crochet club. I try to have regular conversation with friends at work as well as do video conferences a couple times a week so we ‘see’ each other. I was getting things done. There is a lot of good.
Technical problems have been a hassle. Trying to connect to the work system can take a really long time. And I can't do a lot of my work unless I'm connected. I sometimes can only download emails a couple times a day. It makes it hard. Our IT has been working really hard to keep things working and ensuring we can access things we need. It is certainly better in week 4 than it was in week 1. I have access to a couple screens and a printer. I've got a lot of what I need so at least I can do my job.
That being said, I’ve been struggling with one person in my unit. There always seems to be one. We get along and can talk about many things – sci-fi, crochet, tv, etc. – but bring in work, and it’s a struggle. For me, I just don’t like her work ethic. She is a minimal effort person unless it is something that she ‘owns.’ Which is funny, because she was the one to tell me when I started that I should not own anything because it changes so much after I’ve done my part. Get her talking about the one main thing she works on and she can talk for hours. Try to get her involved in other things – suddenly she is super busy. Except – for the most part, she spends much of her days on her phone, or talking to people about crochet, or not at her desk. The main task she does was a huge part of her day last year, until about August. Since then it’s been super slow. So you’d think she’d get involved in other things. Maybe help out those of us who have been consistently busy all along. Nope – she’ll get involved in committees, but will not offer to help even if you ask for help. And when we are supposed to talk about our top 3 things we are working on, she talk about the 3 things she works on only – when the manager asked her to do a fourth thing, she said she was too busy and would have to give up one of her other tasks. Meanwhile, the rest of us are working on several different items at a time and the top 3 is just that - the top 3.
I’ve really tried to give her the benefit of the doubt –I don’t know what it going on in her life that could be affecting work, everyone has their skills and abilities, our experiences are different, it’s the manager’s job to handle performance issues. It just gets hard to keep giving the benefit of the doubt when you see evidence to the contrary. I asked two simple questions on our work chat last week about an email she was talking about. And her response was completely from left field. I tried to give her the benefit and explained why I asked the question. She didn’t respond. To add fodder to the flames, the manager responded that we should take our petty argument to a private chat. I still don’t understand that response. I asked another co-worker if my words had tone or were out of line. She didn’t think so and agreed both responses were completely out of place.
So yeah – mental health took a blow that day. I know how hard it is to talk via writing. There is no tone, there is no body language. So the question is why does she seem to take everything I say from a point of negativity or criticism or I don’t know what. And you can’t ask her – or at least I can’t. I’ve tried having a conversation in person about a situation where her response was completely out of line with what was being said and she just blows it off. I’ve tried explaining it from my point of view, I’ve asked her to explain what she understood. I can’t get an answer out of her.
This week was just tough. It’s like I keep getting responses or feedback that is completely out of line with what is happening or that is completely opposite. My manager said another manager thought my feedback was too prescriptive. I suggested one word change and moved one paragraph below as it made more sense. I thought I loosened the wording.
Anyway, it’s different working from home. You don’t get the interaction, the non-verbal clues, or the information. Because we are not in the same office, the information is not being shared. I constantly feel like I’m out of the loop. If not for friends who work in other units, I swear I would have no idea what is going on.
And then you add in that I work from home. I get off work and I am don’t really interact with anyone after hours. I'm usually a home body, but it’s just a bit too much home.
And then there is the spring time blues – the weather is getting nicer, but the yard is not ready for any fun to start. My lilies are making an appearance (and so is grass in the lily garden). I love the sign of the lilies (not the grass). I just want to dig into the garden and start planning and prepping. Except all other gardens are covered in snow. The back yard in particular is completely covered in snow. Thankfully, Canadian Tire and Lowe's are still open. Will they still be in May? Will there be seed potatoes and onions when I’m ready? I was going to build a raised garden in my front yard. Will I be able to do that? Will I have to move that to the back? At least then I have a reason to go outside and just be with nature. Right now, it’s that in-between weather – nice enough to want to go out, but chilly and wet enough to want to stay in. It was nice -I actually talked to my neighbor yesterday – we were 20+ feet apart, but it was nice just to chat with people.
There are lots of things to do in my house – so much organizing and cleaning – I just don’t have the energy to do it right now. The disadvantage of being home so much is I can see so much that needs to be done. My to do list keeps growing. I was even thinking today – I need some help to pick out colours and flooring. Yeah – it’s funny – my heart says we could do all these things that would be fun, productive, and/or pretty, while my head just wants to retreat. My self-care this week has not been enough obviously.
Anyway, I thought it would help to share some of this. So thanks for ‘listening.’ Hope everyone stays safe.
posted by Taryn at 5:34 pm
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home