One rule you (should) learn rather quickly as a mentally ill person is to never EVER disclose your diagnosis in an interview. Don't even elude to it, if you can.
I recently broke this rule (he asked why I left DI, what plausible lie would've sufficed?), and the interviewer immediately became uncomfortable. His body position shifted, his face subtly became strained and worried, his voice became sympathetic. Ugh. His concern was that he'd heard "people with depression have a hard time with needing a lot of sleep." He continued "Is that going to be a problem for you?"
First of all, most people with unipolar depression actually sleep and eat LESS. It's not my case (and yet another reason why the GP thinks I'm bipolar), but that's more normal. Second, even after I assured him staying awake from 10pm to 7:30am would not be a problem for me, he still seemed uneasy. It was heartbreaking, honestly. I saw my chances at this job evaporate before my eyes.
It's hard because there aren't a lot of jobs I can do in the first place. This was one of few opportunities that he just eliminated based on his misunderstanding of people with one of my conditions. A bigger problem for me personally is a marked lack of motivation and energy. The only other issue I've had with work is stress-response.
He had no idea, but two days before my interview with him, I started my first day at another job. I actually enjoyed it (who wouldn't enjoy putting labels on boxes alone for 6 hours straight?). However, I was moved to a much faster-paced area of the production line and people were unhappy with my lack of experience. I wasn't doing things the way my coworkers liked (they all gave me different instructions), and they were getting frustrated. Which, in turn, made me frustrated. And disappointed in myself. I absolutely hate being the weak link. The negative wheels started turning and, despite every effort to interject rational thoughts, a few tears started seeping out. I tried as covertly as possible to wipe them away and continue unnoticed. No such luck.
Somehow, this girl with some level of authority came over and asked what was wrong. I said: "Nothing is wrong." She asked my coworkers in Spanish, they didn't know. She kind of huffed and walked off. Soon afterward, my supervisor approached with the same question. "Nothing is wrong." I lied. "Just trying to work." She asked if I wanted to go home. "Is my shift over?" I asked, looking at the clock. No. Then the answer is HELL no. "I want to finish my shift at least." I answered. She said "Okay." and she walked off too. Then, my freaking manager shows up. By this time, I'm highly embarrassed and doing my very best to stifle my thoughts and tears, and work as hard as possible so no more attention will be drawn. He asks what's wrong. Slightly frustrated, I reply "Nothing!". He asks if it's because of something from home or from work. It's from neither. The problem is from my stupid brain, but I can't explain that now. "Neither! I wish people would just stop asking!" I'm suddenly taking my gloves off and walking out. On auto-pilot. I'm devastated I'm losing this job like this! That I couldn't even finish my first 10 hour shift. Beyond frustrated with myself. Embarrassed as fu*k. What adult does this?! Needless to say, the car ride home and subsequent suicidal gesture were emotionally-charged and there was plenty of screaming and sobbing.
But yeah, I had no problem getting up at 4am to be there at 6am.
Thursday, November 16, 2017
Friday, November 3, 2017
Like
We all have our passions in life. Today, I got to talk about mine!
It started with an article about Richard Ramirez; The Nightstalker. Basically, he would go out at night and enter unlocked doors of homes and bludgeon (beat, rape, sodomize) his victims to death. His crimes were horrific, but I think what fascinates people most about him is his little following of girls. Yeah...this guy brutalizes innocent people in the worst way, and yet the girls adored his good looks and mystery so much that they'd flock to all his court appearances.
Anyway, this article was more of a criminology perspective of why he did what he did. Interesting as hell, of course. I took a criminal profiling class (they hate that term, btw) from a retired FBI agent with the Behavioral Science Unit. Basically, I learned that a) people don't just "break". b) the difference between a psychopath and a sociopath is that the psychopath is born without empathy and the sociopath is conditioned to lack empathy. c) my husband's ex is literally a sociopath, and it helped on all the tests because I just had to list attributes about her. I'm not kidding.
The article theorizes that Richard Ramirez is a sociopath who suffered alleged physical abuse from his father and had 2 traumatic head injuries - a dresser fell on his head, causing a laceration in infancy, and getting knocked out after being hit by a swing (he suffered seizures from then on). To top it all off, his mother worked in a boot-making factory and was exposed to chemical fumes when pregnant with all her children. All of his siblings suffered defects. And, to me, if a mom would put all of her kids at risk after seeing the damage to the first ones, there was neglect. Or a low IQ. Most devastating, in my opinion, was that he was shown photos of raped and murdered Vietnamese women by his soldier cousin. When he was 13. Developing sexually. They think this made a connection in his brain between sexual arousal and violence. He became aroused by violence.
So fascinating. I still think he should be punished for his heinous crimes, but I also sympathize. Did he really have a chance? A lot of comments (from those who obviously didn't read the article) claimed: "I had a bad childhood and I didn't kill anyone!" or "It's entirely his choice. Doesn't anyone take responsibility anymore?!". Silly. And true. A LOT of people suffer messed up childhoods, and yet don't kill anyone. So we need to examine these guys and figure out what makes them different. What is the tipping point? A gene? A personality trait? Different brain shape or chemistry?
I could go on and on. And I did. I just took poor Stephen on this ride, rambling on about my theories and branching into different crimes. I remember a lot of different crimes. Lots of details. It's a neat party trick.
But I was actually somewhat excited about something. I feel things when I talk about this kind of stuff. I love criminal justice. I really love just how intricate and unique each case is. Justice bends to suit every participant. There is real, raw emotion from all parties involved. Or sometimes a lack of it. All very interesting. All real. It matters. It all matters.
I just wonder if that's why I like the things I like. Because it makes me feel. It saves me from the constant boredom and emptiness. Music, crime, epidemiology and thanatology. It's so stupid, because that's the way everyone works, I think. We all like what we like because it actually gets our attention. We actually find those things important in some way. I don't know. So simple. So obvious.
It started with an article about Richard Ramirez; The Nightstalker. Basically, he would go out at night and enter unlocked doors of homes and bludgeon (beat, rape, sodomize) his victims to death. His crimes were horrific, but I think what fascinates people most about him is his little following of girls. Yeah...this guy brutalizes innocent people in the worst way, and yet the girls adored his good looks and mystery so much that they'd flock to all his court appearances.
Anyway, this article was more of a criminology perspective of why he did what he did. Interesting as hell, of course. I took a criminal profiling class (they hate that term, btw) from a retired FBI agent with the Behavioral Science Unit. Basically, I learned that a) people don't just "break". b) the difference between a psychopath and a sociopath is that the psychopath is born without empathy and the sociopath is conditioned to lack empathy. c) my husband's ex is literally a sociopath, and it helped on all the tests because I just had to list attributes about her. I'm not kidding.
The article theorizes that Richard Ramirez is a sociopath who suffered alleged physical abuse from his father and had 2 traumatic head injuries - a dresser fell on his head, causing a laceration in infancy, and getting knocked out after being hit by a swing (he suffered seizures from then on). To top it all off, his mother worked in a boot-making factory and was exposed to chemical fumes when pregnant with all her children. All of his siblings suffered defects. And, to me, if a mom would put all of her kids at risk after seeing the damage to the first ones, there was neglect. Or a low IQ. Most devastating, in my opinion, was that he was shown photos of raped and murdered Vietnamese women by his soldier cousin. When he was 13. Developing sexually. They think this made a connection in his brain between sexual arousal and violence. He became aroused by violence.
So fascinating. I still think he should be punished for his heinous crimes, but I also sympathize. Did he really have a chance? A lot of comments (from those who obviously didn't read the article) claimed: "I had a bad childhood and I didn't kill anyone!" or "It's entirely his choice. Doesn't anyone take responsibility anymore?!". Silly. And true. A LOT of people suffer messed up childhoods, and yet don't kill anyone. So we need to examine these guys and figure out what makes them different. What is the tipping point? A gene? A personality trait? Different brain shape or chemistry?
I could go on and on. And I did. I just took poor Stephen on this ride, rambling on about my theories and branching into different crimes. I remember a lot of different crimes. Lots of details. It's a neat party trick.
But I was actually somewhat excited about something. I feel things when I talk about this kind of stuff. I love criminal justice. I really love just how intricate and unique each case is. Justice bends to suit every participant. There is real, raw emotion from all parties involved. Or sometimes a lack of it. All very interesting. All real. It matters. It all matters.
I just wonder if that's why I like the things I like. Because it makes me feel. It saves me from the constant boredom and emptiness. Music, crime, epidemiology and thanatology. It's so stupid, because that's the way everyone works, I think. We all like what we like because it actually gets our attention. We actually find those things important in some way. I don't know. So simple. So obvious.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)