Here's a thought, if you don't like my posts, stop reading them.
But you won't because you need, desperately and sadly, someone to be nasty to at all times. You really are one of the nastiest, most spiteful people I've run across in my life.
I was venting on Tuesday, and my post today was just an update to the vent, as part of it has improved, while part of it continues. I post on other topics, I don't try to make RCTN about me at all times, unlike some.
You took something I said in another thread and dragged it here, poor netiquette, but that is you in a nutshell.
You claimed you plonked me, another lie from you. Try following thru this time, eh?
Must be nice to be in a position to scrap a job because you want to go play. I never had that option. I had to go to work sick because I couldn't afford to lose my job. Then I lost it anyway.
You're right, Pat. Anyone who whines for days about a sprained ankle and a cold deserves violins. Especially from those of us (you included) who deal with permanent disabilities far worse than that. I cannot imagine how bad Caryn's whining would be if she were afflicted with the level of pain I deal with every single day.
And as for her continuing accusations that I'm just too lazy to do anything -- look at her. What example is she setting her children by deciding to blow off her new job to have fun? Certainly not what either you or I would have taught our children. Who's too lazy to work: the person who went to work for two months on two hours' sleep every night, or the one who doesn't care if she gets fired for going out to play?
If you weren't looking at this through the fog of "I hate Karen", you'd be on her case for whining and being so irresponsible. But you reserve your venom for the person who responsibly went to work until her employer got fed up, and who started her own business when no one would hire her because what she had was a helluva lot worse than a cold and a sprained ankle.
Good Lord, if I felt the way Caryn does, with just a cold and a sprained ankle, I'd be turning cartwheels, because it would mean a 1000% increase in energy and a 95% reduction in pain.
If you want to know what people who REALLY know me, IRL, have to say about me, go read the most recent set of comments on my blog from people who know what they see for themselves with their own eyes, and hear with their own ears, not just what they read online. People who don't mistake the ability to do an hour's work lying on the couch with the ability to maintain gainful full-time employment, and who marvel at the fact that I'm able to do that much in the condition I'm in.
Fact is, from the other side of the computer, I appear just as healthy as anyone -- most of my clients aren't aware I'm disabled, or think that my only problem is carpal tunnel which afflicts a lot of secretaries who've spent years pounding out 50-100 pages a day at 100 WPM. So you don't realize that the occasional grumble about my health is just the tip of an iceberg I live with 24/7/365, because you don't see how sick I am at times I'm not posting. You don't hear me struggling for words, because all you see is the finished, thesaurused, spell-checked version of something that may have been initially written with a lot of blanks because the word I want doesn't come when I need it.
If you had IRL contact with me, you'd have a far different opinion of my "whining" -- DBF, who hears plenty of comments about my health, can't believe I don't complain more, and gets on my case for dismissing what he considers a major problem as "I don't need the ER, I only fainted, not like it was anything serious". He's stopped asking general questions like "how are you?" because he's realized that "pretty good" often means that I'm lying down with a cold compress, but don't require complete silence, so I'm able to listen to the radio. I now get specific questions, am I dizzy/upright/feverish/headache/blurred vision, what's my pain level, how much time have I spent in the bathroom? That gets him a more accurate read on my condition than "how are you?"
But, you go right ahead, Pat, giving your utmost sympathies to the spoiled little brat who thinks a sprained ankle and the sniffles is worth a three-day public whine, and that it's not necessary to go to work if you don't want to, while denigrating someone with a serious, incurable neuro-endocrine condition with cardiorespiratory involvement who occasionally dares to mention that she doesn't feel well. She wants your sympathy. I don't. I may occasionally be forced to swallow my pride to ask for help, but I will never ask for sympathy. I don't want it.
What I *do* want is an end to the snide remarks that CFS=laziness. There are innumerable research studies proving something is seriously wrong, and I have blood test results the doctor described as "off the charts" to prove that I'm not faking. Believe me, if I wanted sympathy, and were faking illness to get it, I'd pick something perceived as worse than "just a little tired". (Trust me, "just a little tired" compares to CFS like a drop of water compares to the Pacific Ocean.)
What an interesting reading, Karen! in my years of social work, this kind of text writers were the most intriguing to check out. A sprained ankle can be extremely painful, and quite hard to deal with if you have small kids, house chores etc... You might be surprised to hear that some people will complian more about , [seemingly to you] smaller and periodical ailments, than about chronical or permamnent disabilities. If somebody has a chronical or permanent problem , one will arrange one`s life around it and try to be as comfortable as one can in this hardship. mirjam
In Caryn's defense (whoda thunk?), the quoted bits I've seen do not indicate that she intends to blow off her job to play. What she said is that if she is called into work on a day that she is not already scheduled to go in on, she will refuse. If her boss is so unreasonable as to fire her over that, then I agree with her.
I understand that many people do not have the option of standing up to an unreasonable boss, but that doesn't meant that those who do have the option and take it are lazy or setting a bad example.
Hi: In defense of Caryn--Karen we must remember that EVERYONE'S level of tolerance of pain is different. We must also remember that she works in a retail store--not an office. And some retail employers feel that your there to work 24/7 regardless of what the schedule says. You have no personal time and since you choose to work retail you are at their call if someone calls in sick. And you'd better show up to cover.
As I said, Karen - I have a close friend who is just as bad as you, and has an epileptic son as well, but still really doesn`t inflict it on others, which is why she gets so much help from so many friends, maybe?
I don`t really regard myself as all that disabled (although the Government and medical people obviously do!) the only thing that sometimes REALLY bugs me is only being able to use one hand and being restricted in how many of my old hobbies I can do! I only ask for help if I really can`t avoid it, being an independent cuss. I do accept help gracefully, though.
I am in pain every day, I have chronic joint problems. I'm under a pain management regiment with my doctor. I just don't allow it to stop me from doing what I have to do.
I'm still maintaining the house as best I can. My kids are pitching in, but they are still learning. I work 7 hrs a day, commute by bike (still no drivers license) the 8 miles to work and back. I do all the things at work that Dorsey mentioned. We have nowhere to sit, I'm on my feet the entire time I'm working. We get daily shipments, which I am solely responsible for unloading and stocking shelves with.
I'm frustrated with the management of the store, today I'm going to work 13 hrs, because there just isn't anybody else who can. Tomorrow I get to be off, luckily the Asst Mgr of another store agreed to work that shift.
The combination of events, including the damn cold which is now in my chest and likely to turn into asthmatic bronchitis (seems to happen at least once a year), is making me less able to deal with the stress and frustration without an outlet to vent into. I don't even know what my schedule is beyond today, I may be working several 13 hr shifts next week.
It turns out that I won't be going to that game, no extra tickets were available. But I will at least be able to spend some time with my kids while Dude goes. Spending time with my family is much more important than my job. Karen, having made poor choices in her life when it comes to men, doesn't realize that children are a mother's top priority. It wasn't the wish "to play" it was the wish to have a great experience with a member of my family.
Or maybe she gets so much help from so many friends because she's lived in the same place most of her life and thus has MANY friends. My few "friends" here are all employed, most have husbands, don't have time in their busy lives for helping someone else when there's always something at their own job or home demanding their time. (Or at least that's the excuse I get.) Unfortunately, my lifelong friends are 3000 miles away and it's a little inconvenient for them to come help me (though one did send me Merry Maids as a birthday present).
Perhaps if I'd gone to school here, I'd know a few people who are SAHM, but the people I met here were through work -- careerwomen who are looking to hire a maid to do their own cleaning, not to volunteer to do someone else's dirty work.
I arrived in Sacramento already debilitated: I could work full-time and do very little socializing, or I could quit my job to have time to meet people outside work, but I could not do both. If I went to church on Sunday, I couldn't make it through the entire work week; Sunday was an enforced Day of Rest that had to be spent on the couch if I wasn't going to lose my job for taking too many sick days.
Everyone on my block is employed, so also don't really have time to help. One neighbor who loves to garden does take care of my front yard, but turns down requests for other assistance.
Off the top of my head, I can think of only a handful of people in town that I've had any contact with who aren't employed: 2 because they are also disabled, and the others because they have caregiver responsibilities at home. Obviously, I can't ask them to leave an Alzheimer's patient home alone so that they can come to help me out.
I thought I had a solution: I invited a friend and her husband to live with me for two months while he was between jobs. He was supposed to look for work, she was supposed to help me, and at the end of two months, they were supposed to be self-supporting and in their own apartment. Instead, he played computer games all day and apparently expected me to be his subservient female (instead of his boss), while she went out to work to pay their credit card bills. On the days she wasn't working, all I got was excuses. I did the cooking, I mopped the floor, I loaded the dishwasher, I went to the grocery store -- having them here was no help, only added expense, and more work because I was now cooking and washing dishes for three instead of one.
In 2.5 months (yes, they overstayed; they hadn't even looked for an apartment by the original move-out date), the carpets were not vacuumed even once, because I didn't do it myself. They claimed that they had tried once while I was out, but my vacuum didn't work, which does not explain why they couldn't use their own, which was standing in the hallway where I tripped over it daily. When I vacuumed after they left, they were correct that my vacuum didn't work properly; all I had to do to fix it was empty the bag. Take your pick whether they were that dumb that they didn't think of it, or that lazy that they were glad for the excuse.
When they left, boxes that I'd had stored in the guest room before they arrived were left in the living room, my canned food had been moved from the kitchen to the dining room (where it was ever so convenient, /sarcasm OFF), and even more storage spaces had been blocked by boxes I couldn't lift myself. THAT is the kind of help I get from my "friends" when I offer to help them in exchange for them helping me.
formatting link
says in 2002, living quarters for husband and wife were worth $564 a month, and meals were worth $10 a day per person, so they needed to do nearly $1200 of work for me each month before the Labor Board would require me to give them any cash compensation. At minimum wage, that's roughly 200 hours a month; at what I generally pay professional cleaners, it's 80 hours. I didn't get anywhere near 20 hours a week of help with the things that *I* needed done. Trust me, if they had done 80 hours cleaning a month for 2.5 months, this house would have been spotless when they left. Instead, I had to hire people to move boxes back where they moved them from for their convenience, had to hire people to do the chores that were on the husband's list (all of which he had said were within his competence when I first gave him the list), had to have someone move back the furniture that they'd moved for their convenience, and had to spend quite a few days putting away things that I had asked them to help me put away, but they were always "too busy" or "too tired" or apparently deaf when I asked.
Perhaps if I'd gotten the help they contracted to provide, I would have been more open to the idea of letting them stay longer, but I didn't see that I was getting enough return on investment to justify the higher food and utility bills I was paying to have them here NOT cleaning.
I'm sure you've heard of that saying 'you can't pick your family, but you can pick your friends'. What kind of friends would do this to you? I would've given them the boot long before that 2.5 months was up - and a damn good boot too.
Understood. But I was on my feet, dancing the polka (which is fairly strenuous) less than 24 hours after spraining my ankle. The group was counting on me to be there, I didn't think I had a choice. I also performed with bronchitis; the show must go on, and sniffles were not a good enough excuse. I also was on stage, dancing for two hours straight, six weeks after tearing up my knee. Again, as the leader, I had to set the example, and while, perhaps, I went a bit overboard in performing with torn cartilege in the knee, it got the message across that we had to be responsible and reliable.
And although I had an office job, I did not have a driver's license. To get to and from that office job, I generally had to walk as much as a mile to and/or from a bus stop. Which I did not only on a sprained ankle, but with a sprained ankle in dress shoes. More than once. And if my things to do that day included taking documents to court, I had to walk an extra mile or two in those dress shoes on a sprained ankle (or throbbing knee, since I still haven't had the surgery to fix the torn cartilege).
The configuration of my desk (and my long legs) meant that I could not put my foot up while working; best I could do was ice it (and have the icebag fall off whenever I had to walk to the printer, copy machine, mail room, typewriter, file cabinet, boss's office, etc., which was
15-20 times a day, or stand at the conference room table to assemble more packets of documents than I had room for on my desk). So don't be misled into thinking that working as a secretary means that you sit for
8 hours straight. There were days I didn't sit down except to eat my lunch.
Well said, Dorsey, and particularly when you`ve only just started, and have to cycle 8 miles each way to get there and back! (I think you said 8 miles, didn`t you Caryn?) then have the kids and home to cope with when you get back!
To HAVE a good friend - you have to BE one, don`t forget! Most of us get the friends we deserve. Two cliches for the price of one - true, all the same!)
No, you`re making an incorrect assumption there. My friend Suzy was brought up right the other side of the county but made many friends when she moved here to work (which is where I met her). Her husband is at work all day, too.
There`s ALWAYS time for helping someone else even if only in small ways. We`ve heard the rest of the sorry tale from you before - at least once, which is why I`ve snipped it. Suzy has so many friends because she`s always ready to listen to people`s problems and makes light of her own, and can still enjoy a good laugh. She`s a lovely person. We hardly ever hear her complain.
And some of us have "Sucker" tattooed on our forehead, and when we Do Unto Others first, discover that there's no return of the favors when we're the one in need.
I took people into my home, offered them two months free room and board in exchange for cleaning. I think that's being a damn good friend.
Instead of doing the cleaning they promised (which should have taken a healthy person about a week to get the place spotless with everything in its place), they made excuses and, in fact, made matters worse by blocking my access to the bedroom closet and dressers.
Once they were in, they thought they had a cushy situation forever. Kept trying to persuade me that I'm so fragile that I need 24/7 babysitting and it was in my best interest to keep them here forever; I do NOT need a babysitter, I need someone to come in an hour or two a week to help with the cleaning and laundry. When I'm in a serious downturn, I occasionally need someone to run errands and make sure that the food/water supply I can reach from the bed is replenished, but I don't need a live-in companion. I'm not that feeble yet (despite their best efforts to brainwash me into thinking that I can't survive without round-the-clock care).
Obviously, I should have charged them $1200/month in advance for the government-approved amount of room and board, and then let them earn it back at $10/hour instead of giving them the room and board first and hoping that they'd do enough work to compensate benefits already received. That's where I always get burned, by trusting people to return favors, in a state where the prevailing attitude is Me-Me-Me. I should know by now that many Californians see my favors to them as well-deserved compensation for allowing me the honor and privilege to hang out with such Fabulous People, not as something which needs to be reciprocated as a favor between equals.
It'll be a cold day in Hell before I invite anyone else to live in my home, and it's people like them, and a long string of roommates who regularly "forgot" to pay rent, who are responsible for my deciding that the next friend who needs a roof over her head can go apply for a spot at the homeless shelter, because I've been stuck with the bills once too often by being charitable.
Unlike you , i find that most people are quite nice to me and to others . I have mooved quite a lot in my life i.e. was new , had no local friends , wasn`t school there .... Both in Manchester UK , and Boston USA , i found that people were mostly helpful, we were well recieved and got loads of advice help and kindness from many people ,,, When we left and said Good byes in shops where we shopped or Laundramats were we washed , everybody offered again help to pack etc....and we stayed in contact with many people , for years. mirjam
InspirePoint website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here.
All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.