A Letter To My Colleague

[IamFree]

Dear collegues I could hardly say this to you in the middle of work so I will say it here

I know I am being a bit hypersensitive but that what ptsd does to you

I am sure you did not mean any real harm but telling me I look worn out when I am trying to just get on with my job good enough with the little energy I have to cope but it just is not helping anyone.

I know yous do not know what ptsd does to people but it still feels crap

and you know what..

if you mother and father abandoned you for heroin
if your mother got murderded
if you did not have anyone healthy to call family anymore
if you was worried sick all the time about what the hell is going to happen to you and them...

you would be worn out to so F off

 

[IamFree]

I wish I did not get so fragile in these situations but I just cannot accept anyone laughing at my pain how can I.

 

[cupfish]

Try compassion toward the co-worker who is insensitive and rude. Sounds godawful, and impossible but our disease fortunately doesn't override our inherent goodness. Through your willingness to share your sensitivities with us you are clearly not a jerk. If that person's comment was not meant to cause harm you can elevate your own self-esteem by forgiving and forgetting. I'm not suggesting you trust, that's different, and only very few in our circles can be trusted because we have to be hypervigilant. But for your own sense of personal control and maintenance of boundaries please consider forgiveness. None of this has to be said to the person, it needs to be resolved in your head. Taking the high road when we are triggered is hell, but it works as best as anything.

 

[aut555]

Dear collegues I could hardly say this to you in the middle of work so I will say it here

I know I am...

Sometimes you just have to tell the world off! It's ok, you don't have to put up your co-workers bs, they will never understand. You are working a job and you will keep it together despite their insensitivity. Some of us wouldn't made it as far as you have despite your tough odds. Try to focus that you are survivor and when the chips are down, you still move forward. Screw them.

 

[IamFree]

Thanks guys . its always important for me to downgrade my judgements of people who trigger me in the moment I can see them as these really wicked evil people. I must not dehumanise them..I think thinking of them as being a little bit silly is less emotionally loaded and does not turn them into the antichrist. indeed letting grudges go is important not easy when someone has jabbed you with a stick in a more primal wound but anger only poisons me in the end.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

I just cannot accept anyone laughing at my pain how can I

Nor should you? Would someone laugh at a blind man for not being able to see? Its what I hate about mental illness, people can't see your disablity!

Nice letter though! Wish I could say it to every one of my customers! Seriously! My co-workers don't really laugh at me. I don't socialize with any of them and so many know my name and say it while waving. Have no idea how one person becomes that well known in a call center. But i have no idea any of their names and just wave back with a crooked smile and a quick look up and then back and the ground where my eyes stay. Maybe thats why so many say hi to me. A way to make fun of me. I don't know but its hella uncomfortable for me. My perfect world is I ignore you and you ignore me. Though I am thankful if someone stops to help me or something so thats not fully true I suppose.

But my customers. Those are the ones that actually make fun. No kidding laughing at and making fun of for many, many, MANY minutes all of my quirky PTSD things. Mostly I can pretend I don't care though do and just take an FMLA break after to go kick a wall for 15 mins but then you have just that one. Just that one that goes so far I can't hold it back and boom...back in front of the supervisor begging for mercy when all I want to tell them all is how hard to go pound sand!

Work! Ugh!