tea & sympathy

empathy: power of projecting one's personality into

(and so fully comprehending) the object of contemplation

Say what!? I thought I knew what it meant, and I guess when I break it down, I understand it.  So, in this equation...

the one doing the projecting is... me

the one doing the comprehending is... me again

the personality in question would be... my bosses (eeek) I guess

and the object of contemplation would be... my bosses apparent breakdown, again

You see - I thought I had a kind of sympathy well; for instance I can't stand to watch nature shows because they bring me to tears when the (substitute inferior animal) antelope, gets attacked by the (substitute animal kingdom 'top dog') lion.  When I hear about injustice, abuse, cruelty - I get upset, I get angry. When I think about my own mental health issues in the past, I get spooked and rattled.  Even when people treat me like a doormat, break my heart or disappoint me - I keep giving them chances.  Today's latest crisis however, has me searching for enlightenment.

My boss is having another mental breakdown of some sort - she hasn't been at work all week, and today we learnt she is not set to come back for the foreseeable future.  This has happened countless times in the past couple of years - there is always sickies, always dark clouds without silver linings - and her inability to lead is, well, well documented.  It's always the same unhealthy pattern; issue - don't deal, bury; personal issue - bring it to work, but don't really deal; work issue - hide, bury - BURNOUT.  It's this ridiculous cycle that is unhelpful in all the phases that manifest.  There are people relying on this woman - I'm not just talking about staff; I'm talking about patients - people with serious problems.  When I try to look at things from different perspectives I'm still at a loss.  From a staff point of view - I think fuck, not again! From a human being point of view - I think wow, that's terrible - but this person needs to get their shit together.

I just don't have any more words or thoughts of comfort or ease when it comes to her.  I don't want to deal with the fallout of this shit again; no, scrap that - I don't want to have to deal with the fallout of this shit again!  I don't get paid enough to lay awake at night pondering the plays of the next day - thinking about management issues on a shit kickers wage is not appropriate to say the least.  I know from the outside it looks like selfish - it looks like bitch, but I am truly not. I am just so tired of picking up the pieces of bad management.  Don't be spilling your life's crap into my lines - because I have got enough of my own to deal with - and the thing is, we all do!

And the thing is, the naive like to sit back and say, "well, no wonder she's hit a wall again - look at the state of everything".  But, I firmly believe that it doesn't matter how sunny the picture is, there is always going to be a reason for this woman to crash - because she is not dealing with something so fundamentally wrong within herself.  I find it difficult to have sympathy for someone who doesn't have the balls to bail out, for the sake of their team.

Rant end. Tomorrow I shall be biting my tongue as best I can.

SB xx