Working

At work I've "ran the board" for the last three days. That's the most difficult of the supervisor's roles - organizing all the employees, making sure they get all their breaks, making sure enough tills are open, as well as doing all the other little supervisor tasks. And looking back I pretty much rocked it. Before last week I'd never done this for an entire shift before, and a few months ago it stressed me out so much that it would make me cry. Having stood up to the challenge, I'm a better supervisor at the end of this week.

Not that it's been easy. I've missed four breaks in three days (personally). Justin (not the one who left, the other one) tells me I look all intense and grumpy when I'm on the "broad" (yeah, that's right), so he's started calling me "Mavis" ('cause it's a grumpy name). (But he's been grumpy this week too, so I'm calling him "Edgar.") Tonight the line-up went back probably five aisles (not okay!). By 8:00 I'm completely frustrated and angry, and I have wanted to cry by the time we close.

Today was both the worst and best day of the three. I got there and I just felt frustrated. An important piece of paperwork that I base the rest of my day on wasn't filled out, and that would have been okay, I could just do it myself, except that it's the pet project of the person I took over for and the fact that she didn't do it makes me feel like I care more about her project than she does. I started doing it and someone else offered to finish it for me. That was nice of her, but I told her three times what I needed on there ("cashier numbers and names") and she came back with only half of the information, which wasn't very useful to me. I felt like I didn't have enough staff, and I was in a bad mood so everything seemed even worse than it was. My stomach was starting to hurt because of all the deep breathing I was doing to try to handle my anxiety. Then I had to go for lunch half an hour early because I had to get back before the only other person who knew how to run the board was off. I knew I wouldn't get a last break, so an early lunch made my final stretch four and a half hours long, and that did not please me. Actually, a personal meltdown would not have surprised me today. But instead things got better after lunch break! I had a lot of support from my manager, which was really helpful. Plus, the fact that he was helping me meant that he couldn't blame me for all the things that were not ideal. And he told me I did really well.

I had this conversation with Brandon today:
"The anxiety is getting to me today."
"Why? What's bugging you?"
"Nothing in particular... Maybe I have an anxiety disorder."
"I have three separate anxiety disorders. And they all play off each other."
"That's gotta suck. I think my anxiety stems from my depression."
"Yeah, I have depression too."
And then I had to run off for something. But he brought it up again later. "How's your anxiety? Has it gone down?" And these conversations meant a lot to me. I wouldn't expect it from him. He's got a lot of attitude and a lot of confidence and he's always talking smack. I'm glad to have been given a glimpse inside.