I look like a normal person but I am not.
I am a worry wart on the inside.
Despite what I appear to look like from the outside – calm and controlled. I am a woman sitting in a corporate job having moments of frustration, stressed out to the eyeballs, starting most days in overwhelm, wishing I could escape, toss it all in and just disappear to a deserted island.
My colleagues (other Executive Assistants) say to me if you can’t keep on top of your emails and you leave the office at the end of the day still feeling like you have heaps to do....don’t worry that’s completely “normal”, you will never get on top of it, even if you worked 24/7!
I breathe a sigh of relief because I was trying to stay on top, move faster, focus in on client only emails, get the expenses in early and try to stay ahead of the game.
Last minute changes to flights, meetings – all good I am flexible, I can handle it!
My boss sends me flowers says you are awesome, you are a machine!
No I am not. I am human and I break.
Meanwhile I have been online since 7 am and haven’t moved from my desk or eaten lunch or noticed it was raining outside.
I am starting to not sleep. Laying awake at night in fear of my boss and what I will face the next day, what “bus I will be thrown under”.
These feelings consist of sick to the stomach dread, nausea that makes my head hurt. Not to mention my heart. Because all of a sudden, the reason I thought I was doing this for - my husband and children, have been sidelined whilst ‘mummy works’.
The biggest feeling is a feeling of who can I trust. No one. I trust nobody only the feeling in the pit of my stomach that screams louder and louder each day... GET OUT!
Feelings of overwhelm include tears at the drop of a hat, my normal controlled balanced emotions seem to be swept up in a whirlwind of fear and anxiousness.
I start to miss personal appointments on the weekend or I get birthdays mixed up, turn up on Saturday to a Sunday appointment and vice versa. I can’t stop thinking about work that’s why... why am I not present in the moment.
My razor-sharp focus, empathy and kindness start to wane because my hands start to shake in fear.
I’ve learned that capitalism rewards sociopathic behaviour.
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