Don't Be A Complete Tool

Thanks to Blogger's new Stats option, I now have to wonder why my blog can be found using the search phrase "the reason therapists don't like guns".






Yeah, that's seriously all I've got right now.  Sorry!

WARNING: Regardless of what you've read here in the past, I'm normally not a hateful asshole.  The following post comes from one of the darkest corners of my heart and, as horrible as it is, I mean every dark, spite-filled word of it.

Dear EmployeeVonMunchausen:

For the past three years, I've had to put up with some craziness from you that would try the patience of a Buddhist monk. For starters, you're a liar.  I don't want to hear any more about the 40,000 medical conditions that your 60,000 doctors are currently testing you for.  There's nothing wrong with you that couldn't be fixed very easily with some in-patient time in a mental ward.

Please stop trying to tug on my heartstrings with fake stories about being diagnosed with cancer.  Your claim of the dreaded "C" word came at a time when you knew you were in line for a disciplinary discussion.  That is the lowest way that any of my employees have tried to get out of a written warning.  How dare you spit in the faces of people who are sincerely struggling with this deadly illness.  Take responsibility for your actions like a grown up.

Anyone who thinks that's harsh: she magically didn't have cancer anymore once a) we administered the warning even after her tearful claim; b) she called Human Resources to verify that we, indeed, had the right to put her on a warning; and also consider c) the kind of cancer she supposedly had changed more frequently than her underpants.  Now, if you thought that was harsh....

For three years, I've heard all about your depression.  I've heard countless numbers of times about your feelings of overwhelming sadness.  You've even expressed a few times that you've thought about suicide.  The first year, I was shocked and saddened.  I referred you to our employee assistance hotline who put you in touch with a counselor.  The second year, I highly recommended that you step up your periodic visits to a counselor or see an actual therapist.  You did, for a little while.  This year, I'm just ignoring you.

You know what your life means to you.  The decision to live or die is yours, just as your decision to continue to live in misery for no reason is yours.  If you have decided that your life is worthless and you don't deserve good experiences, then you are beyond my help or advice.  Your claims of overwhelming sadness and cries for help are not my problem or my responsibility.  I will not try to fix you and I no longer pity you.  You mope around making depressing statements about yourself and your life and you expect everyone else to lift you up.  You are a happiness leech and I despise you for using us.

Now, you're on an intermittent leave (can call in any damn time she chooses) for "psychological reasons".  I know why and MisManager knows why.  The rest of the staff has been very unaware of the exact nature of your latest dependability issues.  MisManager and I prefer to keep it that way.  Apparently though, because you're no longer able to get the responses you need from us, you've moved on to your coworkers.  This is unacceptable.

The other day you called in, crying.  You don't have to tell me what's wrong anymore and, believe me when I say, it's a relief not to get spoon-fed horseshit.  When you came back in the next day, you thought it was appropriate to slip a note to Jailbait that said:

I didn't come in to work yesterday because I tried to kill myself.

He's a 20-year old kid, who I'm sure has not had to deal with the likes of this in his life.  It took that poor boy 6 hours to finally decide to come forward and say something to us.  He feels responsible for you now.  I know this was your intended result and I hate you for it.  I hate you with every ounce of emotion that I can stomach wasting on you.

Try to end your life or don't, but don't you think for one minute I'm going to allow you to emotionally terrorize anyone else on my staff you stupid sack of shit.

Very sincerely,

Awesomeness

Mr. A always goes grocery shopping with me.  Part of the reason he always accompanies me is because we carpool and stop by the store on the way home.  The rest of his purpose in escorting me through the store is to keep me from stabbing people like this in the eye:

Deaf old lady: You were in no less than 4 aisles with me.  In each of these aisles you somehow managed to park your damn cart in front of the one item I needed.  For example, if I wanted raisins, you parked your cart in front of the raisins to look at the pudding.  You studied that damn pudding like there was going to be a big test on it when you got to the front of the store.  "Excuse me please," didn't work.  You ignored me.

The Queen of Overshare: It makes sense that you would need to occupy yourself in some way in the checkout line.  You brought your 2 kids with you and they were busy chasing each other around, kicking each other and spilling their water all over the place.  I guess your only option was to turn around and talk to the girl that's trapped in line behind you.  Oh, joy.  I now know: where you live, where you work, what you do for a living, the fact that you got a ticket that morning, what you were cooking for dinner that night and about 80 other factoids that replaced useful information in my head.  I'm sure of that.

The bigger problem: You separated your groceries into 3 groups: the groceries you intended to pay for in cash, the groceries you intended to pay for with WIC vouchers and the groceries you intended to pay for with your food stamp card.  When the cashier rang up your cash items, you came up short.  You put some items back and we (eventually) moved on.  When she rang up your WIC items, you presented a couple of WIC vouchers that were no good.  Ugh.  So we finally get to your food stamp purchases.  You were 88 cents short.  Once again I had to wait while you went through and picked out an item that you could live without.

Half an hour.  This is how long I was in line behind her.  You would think after half an hour of waiting on one customer constantly blathering in her face that the cashier would be craving a little quiet time.  No, this was not my day.

Babbling Betty the Cashier: You are the biggest asshole of the night.  When you finally get to my purchases, you felt an almost desperate need to start explaining to me that you were supposed to be off work 15 minutes ago.  Less talky, more scanny asshole.  You were supposed to be off 15 minutes ago, you stayed late by 45 minutes 2 days ago.  I don't care.  I really and very, very sincerely just do not give a shit.  My silence during your tirade should have been a hint.  At the end of my transaction, a coworker walked up and let you know that your manager needed to see you when you were done.  Then I had to hear about that.  "I hope I'm not in trouble!  I mean, I don't think I did anything wrong.  She probably just wants to talk to me about my schedule...."  Ohmygodshutthefuckupandgetmeouttahere!!!!

This is why I hate the grocery store.

Dear Speech Therapy Clinic:

Thank you so much for being willing to see my kids on a weekly basis.  We were almost stunned that you didn't want to put us on a waiting list like the rest of the clinics in town.  We were even more shocked that you all were willing to come out to our house to work with our kids in their own environment.  When we get this process going, it's going to make an amazing difference for my family.

Yeah, let's see if we can get there, though.  When we started scheduling our weekly sessions, we agreed on Wednesday morning.  You quoted August 18 as our start date.  I was excited; I even took the day off so I didn't feel rushed at the end of our session to get into work.

August 18, 8:00 a.m.: we're all, all of us, sitting around waiting.  At 8:05, I figured the therapist had some troubles finding our house.  In suburbia, you almost need a Sherpa.  I could forgive that.  At 8:15 and no phone call, I started to wonder about our appointment.  I call the office and, sure enough: miscommunication.  I don't need to point out the irony of a clinic that deals in effective communication having communication problems, right?  Well, maybe.

I was told that future home visits were "most likely" set and I would get a call on Monday to confirm the appointment next week.  Okaaaaaaaaay...  When your "Scheduling Specialist" said, "Every Wednesday from 8:00 - 10:00," I guess I shouldn't have taken her so literally.

Next Monday: no call.  I waited until after 4:00 before calling you to confirm my appointment.  Your "Scheduling Specialist" said we were a go, and your therapist did show up the next Wednesday at 8:00, as promised.  Okay then.  One communication error does not constitute a total breech of confidence.

Two, on the other hand, has me on guard.

My kids went in for their initial evaluation in July.  The charge for the session went to my insurance and they paid their portion.  On August 1st, you billed me for the difference.  This was an amount that was substantially more than I thought I would pay.  Luckily, my paycheck at the end of the month is not dedicated to any of our bills in any firm kind of way.  It was going to hurt, but I could cover it.

Your bill stated that I have until September 2nd to pay.  Today is September 1st.  On August 31st, I received a second bill dated for September 1st, stating that the amount of the first bill was no longer current; it was posted in the 31-60 day column.

Now, I understand that August has 31 days, and technically if the bill was not paid on September 1st, that it would be on the 31st day.  However, this was obviously sent off well before September 1st.  You didn't even give me until the date that you set to pay this bill before counting it as past due.

I had plans to stop by your office today anyhow to pay this, as it's on my way in to work.  Now you'll get your stinkin' money, but it's going to come with a piece of my mind that might not be worth the trouble.  The next time you give me a fucking date to pay the fucking bill, you better motherfucking intend to fucking give me until that fucking day to pay it.

(I might be a little upset over this...)