Trust

It's one word, five letters; yet so powerful, so important, so easily damaged and so hard to repair.   I’ve had trust issues for most of my life.  My father is an ass.  Always has been, always will be.  For the last 20+ years that he’s been completely out of my life has been a blessing.  My ex-husband lost my trust early in the relationship and never even tried to regain it.  He lied, a lot or he’d purposely leave out pertinent information.  I didn’t trust him and it was a huge part of the demise of our marriage. 

In business, I’ve seen a lot of young bucks say “fake it until you make it”.  I remember doing that, I’d make up answers that sounded plausible, but I really didn’t know.  That burned me a few times and one of my best leaders taught me that “I don’t know, but I’ll find out and get back to you” is a WAY better answer than anything else I could say if I didn’t know.  Once people peg you as a liar, you lose their trust, and that’s ridiculously hard to earn back.

TCW (Toxic CoWorker) is a liar.  I’ve caught her a number of times either blatantly lying to cover her ass or getting hyperbolic and blowing things way out of proportion.  Now, I simply ignore her.  I know I can’t trust her.  It’s a shame; a lot of people do trust her and end up getting burned by her over and over again.  I did, in the beginning, but I’ve since learned my lesson.  It really sucks, having to keep your eye on someone who will knife you in the back faster than she’ll even smile at you.  She’s not even subtle about it.  I walked past her bitching about me to FCW (Flakey CoWorker) in FCW’s office with the door open.  She’d not said a word to me, but she’d bitched about me to one of the sales guys (who told me) so I knew what she was complaining about. 

Two weeks ago TCW was out with that Sales Guy and one of our US colleagues.   She’d texted me in the middle of the day “Do you know where Staples HO is?”  *sigh* again, complete lack of manners drives me absolutely bat-shit.  I was tempted to simply ignore her text, but there was no need to punish SG or USC because she’s a cow.  I simply responded with “yes” but at the same time emailed the address to her and SG.  Apparently, she exploded in the car calling me all sorts of names (she didn’t look at her email).  She texted back “please” and I immediately responded with “already emailed it to you”.  She was complaining about what a bitch I was to FCW, I just looked at both of them, smirked and walked away.

She’s taught me that no matter how nice she can appear I cannot trust her.   She also reminds me that I don’t want to lose other people's trust.  It’s very important, and obviously more important that she knows.  I've finally got a marriage based on trust, love and respect.  I've built a reputation at work based on trust, respect and quality.  I know and respect its value.  

Just because I make it look easy …

Ok, look out, rant ahead.  At work today, after a meeting with two coworkers (both women, neither has children) I was chit chatting about some of the recent goings-on around the office.  TCW had been having her eldest daughter working in our warehouse on an off for the past year since she dropped out of high school.   Today TCW is not in; apparently, she’d call the boss and said this same daughter had been throwing up for 3 days and was in the hospital with her.  My XH texted me randomly this morning to say he’d spotted TCW and the daughter in his Principles Office (XH is a teacher at the school she dropped out from).  Ok, there ya go, TCW was trying to get her daughter back into school because apparently, we fired her from her really lax warehouse job earlier this week.  Yes, the three-year long train wreck of a life for TCW (and family) continues.

When I was chatting with my other two coworkers, the subject of my XH and my kids came up.  Apparently, TCW likes to point out that I’m “lucky” to have such a good co-parenting relationship with XH and my kids are only good because they’re little, and were so young when we split.

DAFUQ?!?!?!?!??!

First off, luck has NOTHING to do with it.  My relationship with my XH could have gone to hell during the divorce, but it took a lot of hard work (on both parts) to constantly put the kids above all else.  We didn’t bother with each other’s personal lives, outside of inquiries as to the health of each other’s families.  We only really discussed the kids and acted in their best interests.  This created a healthy co-parenting relationship.  I won’t say we’re friends, we never really were friends, but we both do what we can to help the other out and keep the kids happy, healthy and safe.

Secondly, my kids were traumatized by the divorce too, but that doesn’t give ANYONE carte blanche to rebel and derail HARD.  TCW’s oldest dropped out of high school in her last year.  She started hanging around with kids who did some serious drugs, even her boyfriend robbed TCW’s house blind.  She told TCW that the school pushed her out, but (having an EX at THAT school) I found out she’d withdrawn (dropped out).  So she’s been working here for the past year on and off, but was always on her phone, wandering away from her job and basically being paid to sleep in her mother’s office.  Whenever she’d go off the rails hard (drugs, theft, etc) I’d ask TCW what were the repercussions of her actions?  Take her phone!  She said “then I wouldn’t be able to get a hold of her” … so, she just kept yelling at her.  Ya, obviously that works … NOT.  The daughter has had mom hand her everything, and now that she’s 18 she has absolutely no coping skills or mechanisms other than drugs.  Lovely.  She swears she doesn’t need counselling, she doesn’t implement any real rules at home, so why would the daughter straighten up?

She’s gotten the other coworkers thinking I’m just born under a lucky star, and they have NO CLUE how hard it is.  You make rules, you enforce them, and you provide repercussions for breaking the rules.  You stay consistent with that.  You have your kids learn from a young age that life isn’t handed to you on a silver platter.  You earn your keep.  You’re a contributing and important member of the family.

That’s not luck, that’s hard work.

Trying to let it go

Don't worry, I'm not about to bust into some Frozen tunes, but I'm finding myself challenged at work currently.  Don't get me wrong, I love my job, like most of my coworkers and have a great boss.  I'm happier here than I've ever been at a job.  Most days are great, but right now I'm annoyed beyond belief and need to figure it out.

I work in a department of 4 women, one man and a male boss.  Most of the time it's harmonious and pretty laid back.  Right to the point of sometimes punctuality goes right out the window.  Last week we were pretty bad for it.  The boss will randomly come in late, and we'll all start to follow that pattern.  We all started to abuse the flexibility last week to the point where the boss sent an email about respecting the start times, but it only went to the ladies.  The other male coworker is one of the worst offenders, but that is actually a different story.  

This happens, it's cyclical, we get told to straighten up, communicate with the team better and obey the rules and we usually do.  This time, however, TCW is still running rogue.  We've been told to honour the start times.  There are two approved start times, either 8-430 or 830-5, and TCW continues to stroll in around 915.  She says she works until 6 but I know from personal experience, that when the boss leaves (usually by 5) she's out the door minutes later.  We're also supposed to let the team know what's up. She never does.  She wasn't in the office at all yesterday, and today I found out it was due to an "off site meeting".  She took an ENTIRE day off for a 1 hour meeting with a 90 minute drive on either side of it.  Then today, she strolls in after 915 again.

I know it shouldn't be my business, but she's been promoted (to a level above me) during my employment there and she's also had her workload reduced, where I keep getting more dumped on me.  

I know that life isn't fair, but it's not equitable and it's starting to really piss me off.  I could go to my boss, but I don't know how to voice my concerns without sounding like a whiner.  I could go to HR, but that's TCWs style, not mine.  I know that I should just let it roll off my back and let Karma get her, but I'm having a hard time letting this one go.