Couch 230: Decent Communications

Hopefully he's vaccinated (I can't remember who's t's are or aren't, bad memory) and of course wears a mask and stuff.

Maybe you have to be vaxxed to travel, i don't even know that.

I'm not minding the 2 hours overtime every day this week too much at all, since they're keeping their promise so far, it's doing our normal job. Our messages have really jumped since we gave half our team to the project and the rest of us started taking calls 2 days a week. We're gonna be behind quickly even with the OT. As of this morning we were back up to close to 1600 messages waiting to be worked. Yesterday morning we were at 1200. wheeeeeeeeeeeee

Wow, that sounds stressful! I hate when I have something that carries over to the next day. I can't imagine carrying over 1600 messages! You're a stronger woman than I, Artie! Hang in there buttercup! Just remember to stock away your overtime pay in your go to Hawaii fund!

Yes, he got vaccinated way back, like in phase 1 when the health care people were getting it.

I let management keep the stress when it's our normal job. Since it's basically responding to emails after doing whatever they ask us to do or researching their questions, it's not live, so the immediacy isn't in our face like on the phone or in chat and it doesn't feel stressful knowing they're there. I still make sure I process more than the minimum requirement every day, of course. It feels more like job security to me - I like seeing the high numbers. I get nervous when we have only like 120 messages. I like this job and want to keep it!
And yes - my Hawaii fund will be added to once I get this paycheck!

'Atta Girl!

I'd worry about that, too. Are you sure he's still going? It does look like you need to have a negative test to fly there at least.

I *officially* started saving for my trip to Ethiopia which won't happen until sometime after the pandemic is over. But still I need time to save up. I only put $50 aside so far but it's a start and I'm pleased. I put an "auto save" on the account so that every month it will get added to and then one of these days I'll have enough money to go!

The closer it gets to my 4 PM appointment with Dr. K the more nervous I get. Too late to cancel now. Just have to go with it. Sigh.

Today’s my last day at my mom’s, which also means the last day with lone dog and new cat for a while. New cat has been clingy all day, like she knows. Accordingly I currently cannot move my legs.

"You can't leave him in the hands of 20th century medicine!" -- Dr McCoy.

He keeps bringing it up, so yes. I think he's excited. Apparently, he's going with an old group of friends. I'm glad he gets to go and I wish he wasn't going. I'm having a harder time with this one than I have in a while.

I hope your session goes well, Kit.

Has he been away much lately where he couldn't meet with you? I know he goes away some but could still do remote sessions. I really struggled with Dr. T's vacation a few weeks ago because it had been so long since he'd been out for more than 5 days.

I love that movie. I will watch it again after my chores.

Thanks, LT. Feeling about the same but I did an over the counter antigen test and that was negative, so that's something. Work will require an actual PCR, which is a pain because I have to drive to another town to get it (additional insanity, I live in a major US city and work for one of the largest hospitals on this coast; why the #^&! can't I get a test closer to where I live???) but is also appropriate because the PCR test has fewer false negatives.

Minions sometimes must be pinned

He was gone for a week week before last. I've also just been struggling a lot more lately with feeling hopeless and with stress from work. And with him, there have been several times recently where it felt like we weren't on the same wavelength.

I had a dream last night that I was with a man whose identity kept changing - he was my dad, and a partner, and maybe my therapist. We were shopping together and I broke my ankle in the frozen pizza aisle and couldn't walk. The dad/bf/therapist figure told me he would go find a shopping cart that I could lean on to walk and left...and just never came back. I was waiting and waiting and tried to go look for him, but couldn't get out of the aisle I was in. It felt awful being abandoned when I needed some help. I can't help but think this dream is somehow related to him leaving for vacation and eventually leaving for good.

That is ridiculous that you have to go there to get a PCR test. I've read that the antigen ones tend to be more accurate if you have symptoms, which I think you said you did? I took one (I forget the name, it's by Abbott--sort of like a pregnancy test with two lines) last week as a precaution and was negative. I think it was just allergies, but I was taking my D to my parents' for an overnight, so wanted to check.

It does sound like that dream might be about that. How he'll help you, but then will go away. Would you feel comfortable talking about that dream with him? Or is he like my T, where he doesn't put that much stock in dreams? Though we have had good discussions about a few.

I wouldn’t say it’s just about the therapist. Your father “abandoned” you by dying. Your husband (the bf) abandoned you emotionally and then physically. And you feel stuck in a rut (the aisle). So it’s kind of about the therapist leaving, but it’s also you projecting other relationships that aren’t actually the same onto your relationship with the therapist.

Haha. I actually emailed him about it. We have our last in-person session tomorrow (we have a phone session Friday, but not the same thing) and I asked if I could borrow something from his office while he's gone. I don't think he'd have any issue with it, but I didn't want to put him on the spot either.

No, I agree 100%. It's hard to think of someone dying as abandoning you, but when your deep in the feels, it can feel like that.

This is insane -- I got a VM at 4:30 pm saying I am not cleared to work and I need to call occ health and speak with a nurse to schedule a test. My phone did not ring; I think they must have used one of those direct-to-voicemails services. I call back right away and they told me that the nurses leave at 4:30 pm so they can't help me and I'll have to call back tomorrow.

WTF??? I called them at 10:30 am! I should have been tested and had a result by now. I don't want to use up my sick days because somebody designed a completely idiotic system. Why the *^# should I work so hard and continually expose myself to this constantly-mutating virus if my employer can't even bother to take care of me?