Some stuff happened at the end of last year that was kind of the final straw for me in my job. I try REALLY hard in that place but I don’t have a flipping clue what I’m doing, I feel so out of my depth. I’m the boss, and I report to a board. The previous Chair became really awful to me over the first 18 months I was in the job and I’ve never really gotten over it. Micromanaging, ripped apart everything I did, tore me apart in board meetings, in meetings with people in my team. I was on the verge of asking a member of the team to leave a meeting where I was being ripped apart because I was so humiliated, but I decided it was better that someone, anyone, saw how bad it was for me. It obliterated any confidence I had, which wasn’t a lot. Lots of the board saw how it was, nobody said or did anything.
I’ve had to deal with a lot of toxic people in the team. Good people at heart, in the main, but people who needed to leave and be somewhere else, who were negative about anything and everything and it wouldn’t have mattered what I did, it would never be good enough. And every time someone’s moved on I’ve thought ‘ok, we’ve got it this time, we’ve got the positive team, we can do this’ only for me to then find out there is someone else behaving toxically. At the end of last year I learned that there is still a negative force lurking about. I have people having public meltdowns if they perceive they don’t know about something that’s going on, when they could come and talk to me about it and get some clarity, then when I make a really conscious effort to engage with them, they tell me they’re ‘too busy’ and don’t get back to me. I can’t win.
They’re all so passive aggressive. Nobody ever raises anything properly or even tries to talk to me about stuff. And when I do find out what people are saying and thinking and I try to address it, they just shut me down and don’t want to listen. Or they try to tell me things ‘off the record’ but I shouldn’t say or do anything because that will out them. They over involve themselves in each other’s lives then when the tit hits the fan they suddenly come running to me and I’m expected to wave a magic wand and make it all ok with no knowledge of what’s going on. I just can’t do that, I’m not a miracle worker. I try really hard to be collaborative, to not micro-manage, to respect the skills and the experience the team has. Do I always get it right? No way. Am I the first to admit I’m only human and mess up? Absolutely. Does it make a difference? Not at all. The team don’t respect me and I’m out of ideas on how to gain/earn that respect. I’m doing the job of multiple people, im doing the best I can and it’s not good enough. I’m not even paid well to make up for it.
I’m back at work and my heart isn’t in it. I need to move on from the job, 100%, but it’s not exactly that simple as it never is. There aren’t an abundance of jobs around here, we’re tied into a fixed rate mortgage (pre Liz Truss/Kwasi Kwarteng financial crisis though, one small mercy) so moving away somewhere else isn’t really doable.
2023 was a crappy year for me, work was a total bin fire and my physical and mental health took a serious kicking as a result. Instead of channelling that into feeling hopeful for 2024 I just feel defeated and worn out. And it’s the 4th of January. It doesn’t bode well.
I'll do some digging xx
my friend has gone onto antidepressants and she said she feels brand new.
!!! I tell myself I'll be understanding towards her with all the hormones flying around but there's only so much you can bloody take! I've just had a big cry and I feel a lot better. Still fed up but !!!!!
today has been a slightly better day probably because everyone is unwell but silver linings and all that x