Workmates update:  yesterday in a fit of gratitude I sent out thank you notes to those who were in the PTSD ADA accommodation meeting you supported me about on Monday at the community college where I teach.  I almost didn't because, well, sometimes when people do the right thing they can't do it without providing some backlash.  

Sure enough, my boss Jenna's Jekyll and Hyde act continued.  She'd been cold to me last week about it, but then before the meeting on Monday we had a come to Jesus talk in which she said she cared how I felt.  Good thing for her is that she's Jekyll at the right times--she did the right thing in the meeting on Monday and backed me up.  But she's Hyde the next time you see her and gives you a little punishment because she did right by you.  

Today twice I had to touch base with her about legitimate department business (hiring a tutor, giving a student extra college credits) that required her signature, and she acted like I was a leper, like I was contagious.

I imagine it's because her boss the VP got to her again, like he did last week.  He's got an M.A. in psychology but fancies himself a Sigmund Freud. Unlike me, with post-grad clinical hospital internships and a hospital residency, he has no real world experience in counseling.  Just an ego.  That's how he rose to become a community college VP.  

So he didn't like it in Monday's meeting when I shut him down on his little amateur diagnostic speeches pretending to be an expert about my PTSD and I told him what it's really like for us instead.  I insisted on my right to my ADA accommodation on my terms, and not on his speeches about my "triggers" he knows nothing about.  I asserted my right not to work overloads for him any more and just pull a normal workload.  That's why it looks by her behavior the day after htat he had some choice instructions for my boss after our meeting about who she was supposed to care more about--him or me.

Nonetheless, I'm glad I acted on my thank you card impulse and sent them out to those who were in Monday's PTSD ADA accommodation meeting.  When my boss and the VP get their thank you cards from me now, they'll be reminded that in spite of themselves they did the right thing on Monday.  Ha!  They say "living well is the best revenge."  With these guys, "thanking them well is the best revenge."  

My normal workload already made me a better teacher one day later and paid off.  A new student from my one of my death and dying classes, came to see me to have a cry on my shoulder in my office today.  Instead of teaching that extra class, during that hour I listened to her.  She told me last year her husband pulled a gun on her in an argument.  She got their two babies and got away with them to safety.  She had a good cry in my office today, but then I told her some of my wacky life stories that made her laugh.  Since her tuition entitles her to 5 free sessions, I got her to our college counselor, a good therapist I also happen to know from one of the 2 little churches I've served for 5 years on weekends now.

In spite of my bosses and their inabiity to commit to having done the right thing in Monday's ADA meeting, it's worth it that I cut back my workload to normal so I would have time to lend and ear to a student like that.  I know my VP will have my boss watching me like a hawk now, but the next 3 years until retirement working a normal load now should be rewarding.