Month: September 2010

It figures

Posted on by kmarrs

All my adult life and most of my teenage life, I have meticulously kept track of every appointment, work schedule and everything in my day planner. Not a single work shift has gone unnoted. It’s all written down. Don’t give me a reminder card, I’ll just lose it. But if someone ever mugs me I’m requesting my day planner. I’m lost without it.

This week, for some reason, my work schedule has not made it into my little book. I don’t know why. I think hell is freezing over for it, but that’s how it is. I haven’t worried too much about it because I can access my schedule online from home. That and I’ve been just checking the posted schedule at work for the next work day. I obsessively do that anyway in case for some reason it’s changed or I wrote it down wrong or whatever.

Only I forgot to do that tonight when I left work. I think it’s because I left out the front door and not the employee exit.

Do you see where this is going?

So when I got home I realized that I had no idea when I work tomorrow. No problem, I can look it up online. I open explorer, which is the only browser that supports this particular website, and I type in my user name which is my employee number and I type in my password which is the last 6 digits of my ssn followed by the number 10. Invalid. Ok maybe I typed it wrong. I try again. Ok maybe two keys are stuck together so when I type one, both click down. Hey, it’s happened recently. And it’s not like I can see the numbers typed of the password. It’s all *********. So I open word and type the password there. It looks ok. I copy. I paste. Still nothing. I’m locked out of the website. It’s not in my book. And I know I work 8.5 hours tomorrow but there are a lot of possible start times for that.

Fuck

So I call my boss. It rings it rings it rings. It patches me through to customer service. Where I get a very helpful coworker who informs me that my password probably expired and that it doesn’t tell you so unless you are accessing the website from the store.

How nice.

So he treks all the way to the back of the store and looks at the schedule.

He treks all the way to the front of the store where I’m on hold.

10- 6:30

My standard shift these days.

If I were going to randomly show up to work tomorrow not knowing when I started, 10 would be when I randomly showed up.

At least I know I won’t be waiting around forever.

Living Life with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD)

Posted on by kmarrs

To someone with BPD, their psychiatrist, if they have the right one, is beyond white. They are next to god. (Incidentally, if you do not feel this way about your meds doctor, it’s time to go shopping for a new one.) I’m not sure why this is. I suspect it’s because they are the ones that dispense the magic little colorful pills that make someone with BPD feel better. (If they are on the right meds.)

Running into your psychiatrist in the real world, out side that office, can be earth shattering. Suddenly this god like being is a real person with a real life. They eat, drink, and sleep. They might even poop. Realizing all this can be devastating. It has been known to shatter the relationship.

I ran into my psychiatrist at work today. She was shopping at my grocery store with her husband. Instead of her usual business casual, she was in track pants, a steelers t-shirt, and a light jacket. She was buying her weekly groceries like a real person.

And it’s funny, if she hadn’t greeted me by name like she knew me, I never would have recognized her. Even then it took a solid minute of staring at her for it to click. Never mind I’ve been seeing her regularly for the past few years.

She told me she hesitated in saying hi. For all the reasons stated above.

But I gotta tell you, even hours later, I’m glad she did.

And I find comfort in knowing that I can handle my meds doctor being a regular person.

The Mew From Under the Sofa

Posted on by kmarrs

So when Sophie, our kitty, ran away earlier this year, we had always intended to get a new cat. It was just the matter of having the 70$ to go to the shelter and rescue one. We have left over litter, food and all that jazz. We just needed the rescue to love.

Meet Willow Wisp, or Wispy for short. She was rescued from a friend of my mother-in-law’s basement. A feral cat got in and gave to a litter of 5. The litter was abandoned at 4 weeks, the kitties destined for a life on the streets or a shelter.

The other 4 got taken to the pound. But not Wispy. She took a liking to my husband and well, he’s got a soft spot for blue tabbies. And cats. And animals. Sophie was a blue tabby, for those keeping track.

At 4 weeks old, Wispy is just barely weened. She missed her mommy. She cries all the time when she’s not sleeping or cuddled up with my husband. She currently lives up under the sofa. She is skittish and very scared. But she is already loved. Even though Pat is the only one in this house she isn’t scared of, we all love her anyways.

Pat would like to point out she is very much his cat. I’m just glad I’m not, for once, in charge of the litter box.

17 Days

Posted on by kmarrs

In 17 days I become a wedding photographer.

But more importantly:

In 17 days my sister becomes somebody’s wife.

Joe is awesome. A much-welcomed addition to the family.

Everyone cross your fingers, a lot of things are going not quite right in the wedding planning. My sister could use all the luck she can get.

Assuming everything goes as planned, this is going to be the most kick-ass wedding. It’s steampunk themed.

Let’s just say my sister won’t be wearing a white gown down the aisle.

Don’t even get me started on the cake.

Kick-ass!

Paths and Decisions

Posted on by kmarrs

I’m working weird hours these days. And my schedule is always changing. One week, I’ll be working mostly 10am to 6:30pm and the next it’s 4:15pm to 12:30am. This week it’s the 4:15-12:30. Next week it’ll be 2:30pm to 9pm, or something else completely different from this week.

I get it, I had to keep my availability open to have my full-time hours. And this is what comes with an open availability in a store that’s open 24hours.

But part of my BPD means I’m like a child in a lot of ways. And as a child, I crave a set schedule. Not only that but I’ve been fighting to get on a sleep schedule and I can’t do this if I’m working past my pre-determined bedtime. I’m still sticking to the bedtime when I can. I need to. But work is making it hard.

As much as my other job wasn’t good for me in the sense that I was getting bored and I had no hours, I have to give them credit in one area; I had a set schedule. Friday 10-3, Saturday 11-5, Sunday 12-4. It was impossible to support my family with that schedule, but it was healthier for me.

I think what I’m going to have to do eventually, is change my availability to where I can’t work past 9. That has me in bed by 11. I’m just worried I’ll lose my hours.

So maybe I should be job hunting. I mean, I don’t exactly like my job. I mean it’s a job and the pay is kinda decent considering what I’m doing. It requires no brain but I’m making almost 8$ an hour. And ok, I know 8$ and hour kinda sucks, but that’s good for retail. And I know I need to get out of the retail hole, or at least get myself back into management. But I honestly don’t know where to turn. I’m just kinda stuck.

I’m facing the fact that my current career goal is going to be remaining a hobby, so it seems, but I don’t know what plan B is. What should I be trying to do in school? I mean I want to go for small business management and photography, and the business side of that is still a good goal, but photography won’t pay my bills. There are too many of us out there struggling to be something. It would be one thing if Pat made enough to where he was the main financial backbone of the household and my hobby could just help pitch in. But he isn’t. So I have to be.

And that’s fine. I knew what I was getting myself into before we even started dating. But I kinda wish I had known then what I know now. I wouldn’t change my mind. I mean I’d still have Pat as my husband and my kids, but wow I don’t really know how to finish that statement.

I was in school, college, when I started things with Pat. Or rather I was about to start college. When things got serious I was officially in college. After about a month I dropped out. I don’t think I was ready for it. Like now, I didn’t know what I wanted to be when I grew up. So I put growing up on hold. Then I got pregnant. And as my mom hates knowing, my pregnancy wasn’t an accident. But in some respects that forced me to grow up. I started working full-time for circuit city. I got benefits. Within a year of dating Pat I got married and had a kid.

Real grown up.

But I still didn’t know what I wanted to be. I’ve drifted from one retail job to another. I’ve even been in a management position twice now. But for various reasons, I’ve had to move on each time.

I think if I had to do things differently, I would have waited. I still would have dated Pat but he didn’t get to see my BPD at it’s worse before he married me. And I would have waited to have the kids. I hate saying that because my kids are my life. At any age or stage in life I could have had kids, but they wouldn’t be the kids I have now.

I don’t regret the kids or the marriage. But if I had been truly grown up I would have waited.

Now, 8 years later I’m stuck working full-time in a dead end job I hate (there I said it) struggling to go back to school, trying to figure out what I want to do with my life. And none of the choices I’ve made on this path I took, are making that any easier.

Wow, this post did not go as intended. It was originally a “This ‘N’ That”. Oh well, I’ll leave it be.

On a side note, let’s play a game: How many times did I contradict myself in this post? I count at least once.