Walk of shame and ghosts of the past..

I often am forced into positions where I have to humble myself, less so over the past few months, but is comes with a territory when you’re work-searching in a neurotypical-world.

I have had many-years now of jumping about the community, and to deal with ghosts, having failed to stabilise my various-circumstances. Sometimes I run into situation where I have to confront old-rivals or re-engage with various service-providers. The walk of shame occurs when I’m meeting up with these people, and having to engage in their current service-provisions, when they have undermined or failed to stabilise me in the past.

Today I was called upon to go to a Jobs-Fair, when one of the venues I had to engage-with, was a teaching-company that I had volunteered-for in the past. I felt like a was internally eye-roll the whole-time at the indignity of it all. They had chewed me up and spat me out, yet I was having to share the same space with them, and in the spirit of focusing on opportunities and positive-interventions.

But it’s not a totally-rancorous experience for me as such, because having embraced my diagnosis and the post-diagnosis resources, I feel a lot happier. But not thanks to their efforts..

Parents
  • DeSpereaux

    Your post reminds of a time when I was 'between jobs' and sent to a Training and Enterprise Council establishment to tackle business admin. I succeeded, got a few diplomas and ended up working there, unpaid, under a government 'placement' scheme, as a trainee trainer. This was long before my diagnosis.

    I stayed there for about a year, where I met many people struggling to hold down employment and coming through the system for a second or third time, or even fourth or fifth.  Some laughed it off, some were bitter and snide, some blamed the system, some blamed me, some liked me...  or were they just sucking up to teacher? I don't know.

    Anyway, I eventually fell apart, turned to dust and left there for the safety and comfort of sitting at home counting my meagre welfare benefits. 

    I never returned.

    Ben  

Reply
  • DeSpereaux

    Your post reminds of a time when I was 'between jobs' and sent to a Training and Enterprise Council establishment to tackle business admin. I succeeded, got a few diplomas and ended up working there, unpaid, under a government 'placement' scheme, as a trainee trainer. This was long before my diagnosis.

    I stayed there for about a year, where I met many people struggling to hold down employment and coming through the system for a second or third time, or even fourth or fifth.  Some laughed it off, some were bitter and snide, some blamed the system, some blamed me, some liked me...  or were they just sucking up to teacher? I don't know.

    Anyway, I eventually fell apart, turned to dust and left there for the safety and comfort of sitting at home counting my meagre welfare benefits. 

    I never returned.

    Ben  

Children
  • Wow.. That’s a pretty-expressive account, it’s doesn’t seem to be uncommon, that the social-aspects of the job undo us.  

    Mainly in these types of situations, I can’t manage snideness or comedy, I just sort-of sit-there with a facially-numbing grimace on my face. When I get back out of the venue and blankly mosey-on-home having taken in nothing. 
    When I return the next week for a brief/debrief I do the same thing again, mostly I just am thinking about my finances, and how to stretch them to the next month.

    I reckon that I used to use at least 80% of my energy masking, these days I use about 40%, but the less-dependent I am on results-based income for stability, the better I feel the more I can think.