One of *Those* Days

     Today was hard. I was so frustrated and overwhelmed by stress at one point I was ready to cry. It didn't start out that way. I actually had a very productive morning and felt good about where I stood with my workload. My co-worker and I get along very well and had a pleasant morning together, enjoying our hot tea and going over upcoming procedure changes. The key word there is "upcoming." As in, we're still suffering at the moment. Still, we were doing fine in our checkout area, me with my data entry, she with her billing. Then, the whole thing went straight down the toilet.

     I arrive at work at 7:00 and take my thirty minute (an agency wide time allotment) lunch around 13:00 (1:00pm). Today at 13:00 I was asked to cover a lunch at the front desk so other clerks could take the lunches they had not had. I was hungry and, I'll admit it, not very happy about waiting another half hour for my break (I had a feeling the front desk clerk wouldn't come back on time - after already showing up 13 minutes late that morning, delaying my work), but of course I said yes (I don't tell the boss no) and relieved the front desk clerk for lunch. Remember that foreboding I mentioned? Yeah, it's about to get important.

     An hour and twenty minutes later (forty minutes before I was supposed to leave for the day), I had to call my supervisor to see if anyone was available to relieve me at the front desk so I could take my lunch. I was starting to feel sick to my stomach from not eating. Ten minutes later, as my supervisor is coming to se me free, the front desk clerk returns. What did I get to do while the clerk was gone? I got to deal with angry clients complaining about how long they had been waiting to be seen, nurses telling me not to call and ask questions on behalf of clients, told to tell the clients the nurses were too busy for that (they had time to answer the phone just fine), handing clients comment cards begging them to fill them out so we could prove to supervisors the surprise new system implemented Monday wasn't working, and of course apologizing over and over again for things that weren't my fault, I couldn't control, and worst of all, I couldn't fix. It was somewhere in there when I found myself so emotionally frazzled I was ready to burst. I felt so judged by the angry people pacing in the lobby. I wanted to scream out, "It's not my fault!" I wanted someone else there to take the blame but the people to blame refused to arrive. 

     I didn't go to lunch until 14:50, wrung out like a wet dish towel. I was so upset by everything that was happening. My co-worker in the checkout area said clients had screamed at her about the long wait, as well. We couldn't understand what was going on and why no one was doing anything to fix the situation. In all honestly, I don't know what could have been done at that point. I wanted the clerks to stop checking in clients, the nurses to speed up on the clients we had (sitting around with no patients?), and I wanted everyone to get a better attitude (including the clients and myself) and pull together to get things done and make our clients happy again.

     Yeah, none of that happened.

     Now I know I'm not a nurse and I don't know what all they have to do in the clinics, and there were plenty of things going on that probably made other employees even more frustrated than I was. This isn't their blog, though. It's my blog, and quite frankly I've just about written myself to okay this evening by writing the whole story down. 

     Before I left work I went to our wellness center and go through a thirty minute yoga routine. Normally I'll ride the exercise bike for at least half an hour but I had no energy for it today. The yoga was exactly what I needed. I walked out of work feeling drained but calm, tired but relaxed. For the drive home, I rolled down my windows and listened to an iPod genius playlist with Joshua Radin and other soothing artists. I opened my blinds at home, put my feet up on the couch and read a magazine cover to cover. I ate dinner while watching BBC's on Netflix. Now I'm sitting on my balcony listening to my wind chimes enjoying the breeze, the sunshine, and the view:

     I had been planning to go to a girls' life group tonight but I couldn't do it after the madhouse of today. I'm an introvert to begin with and dealing with so much face to face conflict today had given me all the social interaction I could handle on one night's sleep. I was much slower on Tweeting my #28thanks for today - I still haven't finished. I have time, though. It's only 19:30 and I have plenty of my evening left to enjoy now that the recovery process has come to an end. I've written myself to okay.