This is going to be another choppy one

I feel defeated. I don't want to be defeated but I just want to throw my hands into the air. Did I used to be like this? Was I like this before I found this new self?

If there's one thing my parents did, it was to raise us with confidence. Too much confidence in one way, not enough confidence to believe in it. I wonder sometimes. Am I wrong? Do they not see something in me that I know is there? How do I show them? How do I let them see I am wonderful? Why can't I just tell them and they believe me? lol

I know. But someone give me a job, already. I forgot how long this takes. How hard it is to look for a job. Especially when you already have one. I work all day with these people I love and in this job I love and I'm so frustrated. I want more. It's like dating and wanting to love the person you're with but you just can't. It would be easier.

Then I start to think, do they see something I don't see?

Is it bad?

ARE THEY RIGHT??

Why did I start here? In this position. Actually, no, I started in BC working 11 hours a week. Well, hired for 11 hours a week and working 10 hours a day. I loved the whole concept of the retirement industry and how well - how impossibly well - it fit with my work life. To me, it looks like I've been training for this job since I was nine years old.

I started babysitting when I was nine years old. A few years ago I asked my mother what the hECk she was thinking, allowing a nine year old to babysit. She said it was just down the street from where we lived, but it was actually in the next town. The kid was an infant, and a nine year old child was responsible for her life. Ruby is seven. In two years we'll be lucky if we can let Ruby be responsible for her own life. (She's kind of a free spirit.) (And an inspiration, quite frankly.)

My mother said I was really mature so they didn't worry too much. And I completely agree with her. I begged to babysit this child. I would've begged on my hands and knees if it would've helped but what I did instead was show I could handle it. I did my chores, almost always on time. I was responsible and mature.

I knew exactly what to do in the event of an emergency. I'd gone over the procedures in my mind a thousand times. They taught me to change her diaper, how to feed her, how to rock her to sleep. And I sucked up everything they told me and sang it back to them in tune of some lullaby and they believed in me.

I want someone to believe in me again. I want someone to say "I value you" or "you can do this". What I have instead is someone who had decided who I am and nothing I can do will change her mind. I can't argue with her, it will only confirm her belief. I can't get so frustrated that I cry because the last time I did that she took away one of the things I loved most, certainly the only thing that motivated me.

I need to be the teacher's pet. I need to be the best and the most awesomest. I told my mother once when we entered in a bowling tournament with work: you have to be the best or you have to be the worst, no one else gets the same kind of attention. I don't like being the worst so I have to be the best. (At work. Home is very very different.)

Work is math. I go to work, I get paid. I go to work, I will be nice and patient no matter what else is going on in my life (except for dire emergencies, obv). I go to work, I feel nice, then I feel better. I'm professional, I try my hardest. Ergo (*teehee*), I go to work, I feel better. And feeling better makes me try harder.

Part of the reason I went into this line of work is because it makes me slow down. I am forced to pull back, I walk a little slower, I keep pace with whomever I am with. I make them feel good and worthwhile and I make them smile. I relate, I comisserate, I try to help them settle in, I program their remote and restart their computers and compliment them on a new hairdo or a new shirt. I laugh and flirt, I frown and shake my head, I pat on the arm, I tease them and call every single one of them by name as often as I can.

So going to work makes me feel better. But right now it also is ubearably frustrating. I like my boss, she's a good person, she tries sometimes; she's just the worst person I've ever dealt with in a work setting. The. Worst. Her concept of customer service makes my blood boil, and her shit show of employee leadership attempt fails are a thorn in my side. I hate that she is teaching my co-managers these terrible, terrible techniques of dealing with people. I hate how she treats the residents, and the staff. Virtually everyone in that place (I'm talking 115 residents and 53 staff members) has felt or currently feels that she does not like them and/or that she's never even spoken to them.

I've had residents come up to me and ask who she is because they've never seen her before. (The woman sits in her office with the door closed-are you kidding me?) I've had several residents who didn't want to leave compliment cards for the staff because they didn't want to have to hand them to her. When I said I'd take it and put it in her inbox or told them to slip them under her office door when she's not there, they said okay and took the form. And brought it back, too.

I said something to someone one day and she laughed when I said I genuinely meant the nice thing I said. She gestured toward my boss and said she knew I was genuine unlike some people. She says I'm like their parent and I have to go out and put them in line from time to time and they quiet down. (The fact that they do quiet down after is half her problem.)

We had a resident saying he was moving out and made it perfectly clear that it was because of our general manager. She told us about it at a meeting and laughed when she said "and I've never even spoken to the man!" Can you believe that? Not, "oh, I should go introduce myself and see if there's anything I can do to talk him out of leaving." Not even "would someone talk to him and see if there's anything we can do to change his mind?" You know why? Because she can't be wrong.

Okay, I'm off on a damn tangent again. Blood is boiling, what can I say? I was stomping around this morning and he was making what-a-bitch sounds and I said "I don't want to go to work, don't you understand? You feel crappy and say you're going to call in sick, I get frustrated and mad because I want to cry and I can't cry because I have to go to FUCKING WORK MOTHER FUCKER GOD DAMN. Ahem. I think he understood what I was saying, though. I hope.

I'm so unchallenged. I'm so unmotivated. She thinks she must motivate like a mean old nun or something. She's right to a degree, though, I think because I do find it motivating to avoid having her come into my office and try to look all casual and supportive while she tells me something that I did wrong. And it's all my fault. I shouldn't feel bad about it, though. Don't lose your sleep over it, there, Bevie.

The only thing I'm losing sleep over is that I have to go in there again tomorrow. And the next day. And next week. And desperately, desperately I shout a plea out into the world where good juju and karma live and I say not another month. Please, not another year.

I have good ideas. I know how to deal with people. I know how to budget. I know how to juggle the budget. I know how to fill in reports and watch for trending and keep track of the regulations and ensure they're all followed. And I can do it a damn sight better than she. She thinks she such a hero for running around putting out fires all the time but what she's actually doing is strolling around handing out matches. i.e. She causes the fires and thinks she's a hero for putting it out and can't for the life of her even stop for a moment to see if there was any way for her to stop the fire from starting in the first place. Eek!

I can do so much better. At least do so much more than I'm doing right now. I don't mind proving myself. I've proved myself with the company I at now but there is no opportunity to improve myself. I've drained every bit of learning I could out of this experience. I want to stay in retirement. I want to continue to be a GM, and beyond. I'm not waiting 10 years for the industry to kick off and then graciously accepting a manager job after all of my co-managers.

I need to get moving on this now. If I can't find what I want I'm going to have to find what I can get. I don't want to move laterally but I will. No, I won't. I don't want to do this anymore. I don't want to have the word "assistant" anywhere near my title. When Joe asked me to run his company I told him I would only do it if he gave me complete authority and the front office. I was the starting point for everything and I loved it and I was good at it. I want to be that again. At least, I want to be more. I can work up to everything. I just can't get past where I am with this company. And I'm pretty okay with that and ready to start somewhere new.