I have a residential worker who I have been struggling with in communication lately. It seems she struggles with some things too, including communication, and she rubs me the wrong way at times.

Here is the current issue at hand: she is often late. She was 17 minutes late to our meeting today. We'd planned to meet at a coffee shop. She did call me twice, I saw, when I'd gotten to the coffee shop. She said she would be a few minutes late. I'm glad I brought a book.

I do not like when people are this late. Even 10 minutes late in my opinion, is rude and disrespectful of my time. Especially if it keeps happening. She's been over 15 minutes before. It grinds my gears!

So when she got there, I was visibly upset. She did not apologize. She just went right into "So HOW ARE YOU?" I said "Fine." She was like "That's GREAT!" It was clear I wasn't fine. I ended up just saying something. I said "what happened?" She said "didn't you get my messages?" She sounded annoyed. I said "yes, but you're really late." She said, annoyed, "well I was with another participant, it went over, and this was across town. We ask for a certain amt. of flexibility here in this program." That is not my problem though, and so then I was annoyed. I said "You sound defensive." She then seemed to cave completely and her affect completely changed and she was like "No, no. I am not being defensive." She looked like she was going to cry. Then I felt bad for her and was like "no no it's ok don't feel bad." Ugh.

I was struggling with some other things with her, and we worked those out. She showed me her autism ribbon pin, and I was like "oh that's really nice." She hasn't come out and said it, but I think she may have autism of some sort. She then, what seemed to me, out of the blue, said, "please don't be upset when I am late." She was trying to explain, but I don't remember what she said. All I remember, is feeling awful for feeling angry with her.

So I ended up apologizing a bunch of times, which In reflection, I don't think I needed to do. I am coming to realize, that I experience anger at times. And when I feel better, and the situation is better, I feel guilty for ever having been angry. Does that make sense? I am not cruel while being angry, I am not physically or emotionally abusive. Though to be honest, as a younger person, I was abusive to my family. We were all abusive with our anger (we'd yell, and say mean things, and throw things even at times).

I'm just trying to figure out where my guilt for being angry comes from. And I'm also wanting to make sure that being angry is OK in the instance of someone being 17 minutes late. We talked it out but it just didn't feel like I had any control over this issue while talking it out. I wasn't expecting her to act the way she acted.

She did call me. But she said she'd be a few minutes late. 17 minutes to me is not a few minutes. Perhaps I can tell her that if she is going to be that late, then to please tell me that. Or to cancel instead of making me wait that long.

I know it's not like she was 30 minutes late. It still bothers me though. She never even apologized.