Set Up for a Health Disaster, part 2 of 9

~how did job-stress bring me to the brink of disaster~
(aka, "I want to be worshipped!")

This is not so simple as it appears, on the surface. The conventional wisdom, it would seem, is that job-stress is a major contributor to the health and wellness or lack thereof for most everyone. However, being something of a ruminator, I find my "insights" are far more of a metaphysical nature, than merely physical....

Adrenalin and 12 Hour Days:
I was "on the run" for many years, working for a local bank come super-regional bank, in the midst of the subprime mortgage lending boom of the end of the 1990's to mid-2000's. Mercifully, I was in "servicing" and not originations [that is, I was not a loan officer (though I had that set as a goal)] so my area of speciality became escrow servicing and analysis - dealing primarily with taxing authorities and insurance companies on behalf of our customers. Eventually, I worked my way up from the bottom (twice, but that's another story) to end up as a team supervisor, and set my sights on management and eventually VP.

I quickly became one of the most experienced go-to persons in our 200+ person department, and it was normative to have a sea of people at my desk asking questions and transfering irate customers to me to calm and assist at any given point on any given day. Reps would come to me rather than going to their own supervisors because they knew I would give them accurate and reliable information - and I was flattered by their attention even though it meant every day was a battle with adrenalin.

I prided myself on being able to juggle 47 balls in the air at one time - and took a secret delight in, on the one hand, being praised for my intelligence and problem-solving skills, and, on the other, bad-mouthing my employer for putting me in this position without any viable help to speak of (by virtue of what I was quick to identify as bad hiring practices, and poor managerial involvement with those "on the front line").

I lived and breathed my job. The irony is, I also hated the stress.

Mind you, I LOVED being so valued by my team members and the others in the department, and I LOVED getting customer compliments - turning their monetary disasters into workable solutions - mediating between them and the big-bad-bank wherever possible! I suppose you could say I saw myself as something of a savior to both my customers and my fellow employees. But I also have vivid memories of walking past the Security Guard station on my way in to my office chanting in my head "Death would be preferable, death would be preferable to this!" I was already heading to a very dark place, emotionally and spiritually, dealing with depression and chronic migraines, even "seeing things" in my peripheral vision, and blaming all of it on my job.

Craving peace and quiet!
I resigned from my job at the bank in 2005 because of an unexpected opportunity to join a small, family owned business - downgrading from a 200+ person department to a 2 person office, and simultaneously downgrading my salary, my benefits to next to nothing, and landing in a position of almost 0 vacation and no health insurance. There were many reasons behind this decision, not the least of which was the longing for quiet....But I also still longed for approval and to be perceived as not only "excellent" in my job, but BEST in it. And this was an opportunity to eventually move into a primary position - taking over for the wife of the owner of the business who was hoping to soon retire.

I walked in the doors of my new office with high hopes, high expectations, and a very high approval rating from my new employer.

Unfortunately, through a series of circumstances I will not detail, over the next year and a half, my relationship with the wife of the owner of the business deteriorated rapidly as she refused to relenquish various tasks, ultimately relegating me to the position of a glorified file clerk - which was a direct assualt to my pride. Try as I may, I could not establish a trust with this woman, and one by one, all the balls I felt fully capable of keeping in the air were snatched from my hands. And in a cumulative flurry of relational conflicts, we mutually agreed that I would not be a good fit in this position, and we simultaneously began looking for our respective replacements.

In the end, I was now nearly 2 years into a job in which I had had no vacation time, no health insurance, and an unexpected escalated series of stresses far worse than anything I had experienced at the bank. And I left. Humiliated, relationally wounded and angry, and now unemployed....and sick.

My last week on the job was my first trip to the Urgent Care Center, and my first diagnosis with Pneumonia.

Some Lessons Learned?
*I was largely dependent (!) on the good opinions of others to sustain me.

*I "kept going" by virtue of "adrenalin" - and conceived of this "rush" as if it were my "energy" level - only more recently have I learned that this was one more way of deceiving myself, of "appearing" to be healthy while ignoring some very serious, root issues.

*I perceived that my relationships were defining to me - for better and for worse....without people who would admire or love me or need me, I felt like my life was worthless, meaningless, a failure.

*My FIRST reaction was to pass blame - to my employer, to people lined up at my desk, to my circumstances. I was SLOW to look for ways to influence my circumstances, and so both felt, and indeed was, "tossed about like a wave of the sea," unstable in all my ways....

*I could only be "impressive" for so long....and I KNEW I couldn't sustain the illusion, and feared losing respect, feared losing control, feared losing momentum.