Self esteem

Flashback

Gather round the village wise woman, as I take you back to the long lost days of the mid 2000s. When I was working at my last job as an assistant, I had my face on a photoboard of the staff team, in the waiting room. Nothing odd you may think, but the photograph made me look a lot like Myra Hindley the moors murderer. On a bad hair day. I would go so far to say that photograph is probably why many people that I was told to meet usually gave the feedback "it didn't go as badly as I thought it would". Yes, because they probably thought looking at the photograph they would be ending the session in body parts in a wheelie bin outside the surgery.

This photograph was the second worst thing about my job. The first was by far members of the public who thought because you worked as a public servant they could treat you like rubbish. Most people were lovely and a genuine pleasure to work with. Not everyone though. I wasn't expecting people to get on their knees but perhaps the odd thank you would have been nice. What I wasn't really expecting were the random threats and abusive comments that were pretty much par for the course. I remember in particular one irate gentleman who called me a "stuck up bitch with a stick up my arse" in an inpenetrable accent. Now I know I am not the most self aware of people, but surely I didn't deserve this for simply telling him that as he had missed 45 minutes of a 1 hour meeting the best I could do would be to arrange his appointment for next week.

My trainee friends always used to tell me about having sympathy for the vulnerable, those neglected by society and those who often had far worse problems than I could possibly imagine. That may be the case, but I have heard stories of other support in various jobs getting what I got on a regular basis or worse. Being attacked, racial abuse, sexually innapropriately propositioned, are stories that I have heard about but were often swept under the carpet, or just seen as part of the job. Perhaps its a macho thing?

Its stuff I wouldnt even think about taking today, but I reckon plenty still do.