Letting Go

So, the D.I.N.K?  Yeah, he got a job.  Apparently I should've bought a PS.3 and perfected my Cheech & Chong act because clearly that's what will get me back into the workplace.

It's incredibly hard to congratulate this person, not only because it shows that some people don't have to put any effort into finding work and it simply finds them (or in this case, ripped the bong from his hands and beat him over the head with it), but this particular person has been a Dr. Jekyll \ Mr. Hyde with me since flipping my lid and getting a pink slip.

One day it's "you're looking like you feel a little better", the next it's "you know, it's pretty silly that you're doing all of this because your grandmother died".  Incredibly sensitive on the latter, dontcha think?  I totally asked for this, all the kids are doing it and I didn't want to feel left out.  Interestingly enough, that statement wasn't too far off from something Candie said to me, while tag-teaming me in her office with Pammy just days before completely losing my mind.  "You brought this on yourself", she said.  Awesome.  Exactly what someone who is planning the best way to take their own life should hear.  Much like Candie, D.I.N.K truly believes everything that spews from his mouth is golden.  One of my all-time favorite pieces of advice from Mr. D.I.N.K was "you need to let it go.  You can't move forward if you keep letting this bother you.", and while true, coming from someone who benefits from the company cheapens it a bit.

Letting go, particularly letting go of words and actions of those that have irritated or wronged me is nearly impossible for me to do.  I don't forget anything anyone has said or done to me.  I replay them over and over in my head, twisting everything to the point that I believe I am at fault.  I over analyze everything, from facial expressions to the tone of someone's voice.  When you've lived the life I have, from childhood to present day, you rely heavily on the small things to build defense mechanisms to get through the most menial of tasks.  I have "pre-recorded" responses in my head for nearly any situation, not that I ever use them.  I tend to freeze up, agree with whomever I am interacting with, then add the situation to my growing list of "could-have's", as in could have done this better, could have said this, etc.  Press the auto-loop button and let the over analyzing begin.

Letting go of what the company, Candie and Pammy did to me is nearly impossible.  They are everywhere.  TV ads, logos on things I accumulated over the years for a job well done (slap.in.face), former co-workers who are friends.  The worst was getting an adorable Mother's Day card from my youngest, who carefully and thoughtfully drew and colored the card in school and proudly delivered to me on Mother's Day last year.  A mere 5 months, give or take, after officially being severed from the company, this precious token of love and appreciation was crafted on donated cardstock...with the company's embossed logo.  Then there's the reminder every time I apply, interview and hear nothing.  Did the interviewer have a connection with someone at the company (in one case, yes, but I have no way of proving that anything was said or done without facing a restraining order, I'm sure)?  After all, they had 4+ months of unlimited and uncontested access to stack my personnel file with anything that would damage my reputation, true or not.  Then there's the monthly reminder, twice a month actually, when I pay full price for the kid's medication.  Every 3 months when they have to go to the Dr., yup, no insurance...and apparently I was overdue for a reminder.  Every time they tell me their teeth hurt, because hey, Dentist visits aren't cheap and hey!  Remember, you don't have insurance anymore!  Every time my phone rings with a bill collector on the other end, the fact that we are going to be homeless VERY soon, pleading with the electric company to set up another payment plan...all reminders that I lost something so vital to our way of life.  We don't have much, never did, but cherish what we do have.  They took away my job, took away my ability to properly care for my family, took away my pride and took away my sanity.

As if the pain of fighting with clinical depression\anxiety wasn't enough, I have all the reminders I need, on a regular basis, of what I lost and what could be.

Letting go isn't an option.  The universe just won't allow it.

The One about the One that got away

Networking.  Fifteen years ago, it wasn't really part of the unemployed lingo, but now it's THE word in the unemployment world.  It seems the best way to get anywhere is to know someone who knows someone who may even you know, know someone.  Problem for me is most of the people I know that knows someone work for the company...and that's a road with a big ol' detour sign.

Facebook is a beautiful thing.  It's helped me reconnect with people I haven't seen for years on a personal level, and opened up avenues for networking.  One of those people I reconnected with, who I haven't really seen in the last 20 years, works for a local tech company...and they just happened to have an opening right up my alley.  So I ask Deidre* if she's still working for Tech-y*, what can she tell me about the opening, etc.  Interestingly enough, she started with the company many years ago in that very role, knows the person vacating it (in fact, trained them as her replacement after being promoted herself) and asked for my resume so she can hand deliver to the HR person in charge.  The very next day, I get a call from HR lady who then did a phone screening and sets up an interview for the following day.  Woo hoo!! 

I arrive for the interview 15 minutes early, meet with HR lady and a potential co-worker.  I always dread the part of any interview, because it is inevitable that the question comes up, of why did I leave the company.  I have 25 pages of "don't you dare tell anyone what really went down or we'll sue the pants off of you, providing you still have any pants left", so imagine my uneasiness when it comes up.  Throw in a healthy dose of anxiety and you've got potential disaster.  I answer like I always do:  I worked in a sales environment, the economy stinks, sales were down, they didn't need an extra warm body, etc.  The "why did you leave" question is always followed by "so, what have you been doing?".  Let me see...eating bon-bons?  Check.  Rolling around naked in my unemployment "earnings"?  Check.  Seriously, WHAT do you think I've been doing?  Waiting for the next person in charge of hiring to not acknowledge my resume, or to actually acknowledge my resume and call me in for an interview only to never speak to me again.  Ugh.

After meeting with HR lady and her drone, I get to meet with the person who is vacating the position (i.e. movinnnn' on uuuup!) and the department manager.  This interview went well.  I was able to keep my thoughts coherent and managed not to bad mouth the company or lose my train of thought.  Victory!!  Well, I'm still unemployed, so do please hold the champagne.

I'm told a decision will be made quickly, as they are looking to bring someone in prior to the first of the year (this was wayyyy back on 12/22) because of their bonus schedule.  Awesome.  I need to get out of my hole soon or I'll be breaking out the clippers like Britny Spears on a mental bender.  And school vacation is in full swing...fabulous.  A whole week devoted to "mom, he's doing or "mom, she's doing ", and mom subsequently developing alcoholism.

The very next day, I get a voicemail for HR lady.  Her voice?  Not comforting.  HR lady tells me that they have decided to promote from within, a company policy.  I admire that.  I do, really I do.  Call me selfish, but I would admire it more if I were working for Tech-y and saw it first hand.  Sadly, I didn't get the job, but she said that they thoroughly enjoyed meeting me, and if anything should come up and I feel that I am qualified, to contact her directly.  Slightly reassuring, yet still, not.  It takes every.single.fiber of my being to interview, and the more times I do it, the more it takes out of me instead of building the confidence of having another interview experience under my belt of interviewing ineptness.  Sadly, none of the other openings at  Tech-y were suited to my experience and skills but I couldn't help but wonder....

....what about the position being left vacant by the promoted employee?

So, I sent HR lady an email, with that very question.  No, not exactly like that, far more creative and word-y and special.  I instantly got a reply (!!!) stating that she is not handling that particular vacancy, but HR lady #2 is and she is forwarding my information to her attention.  Rock on!!

And you know what?  I heard nothing.  Just those damn crickets.

February rolls on by, and wouldn't you know it?  Another position, right up my alley, opens up at  Tech-y.  I mean, they literally looked at my resume and said, "hey, let's craft a job that has ALL of this!!".  Alright, not true, but man, it sure felt like it.  I went to Tech-y's website, applied for the job and forwarded my resume and another signed copy of a background check authorization form (I keep everything) to HR lady.  HR lady replies that yet again, HR lady #2 is handling this one (ugh), and HR lady is forwarding her my email.  I thanked her six ways to Sunday and waited....and waited....and you guessed it....waited.  Then, guess what??

Crickets.

No acknowledgement from HR lady #2, no more job posting, and honestly?  No more hope of ever getting in at  Tech-y.  Ever.  Seems that even in this day and age of networking, it still doesn't pay to know someone who knows someone, get the green light to contact directly, have boatloads of experience or the work ethic of a draft horse.  Sure, this is just one experience, I have one other for another post that is simply mind-boggling to me (when it involves your own family and you still get screwed...I mean, really?!?!?). 

No matter what the situation, you're still relying on the one person responsible for finding the "right fit" for that coveted opening to look at your resume (hopefully), see that you are unemployed and will most likley move on to the next resume.  Does the person they hired have as much experience as me?  Maybe, maybe not.  Are they currently employed?  Probably. 

But that's a subject for a whole different post.



*I'm having far too much fun thinking up names...need.job.now.

Week in Review 3.20.11 - 3.27.11

Finished the week with 5 apps in (well, technically 4, that 5th one is a tricky situation) and got a jump start on the upcoming week by tossing in an additional 4 yesterday.  Still waiting to hear back on a prospect I applied for back at the beginning of the month, and that would be the tricky 5th app of last week.

I had applied for a workflow administrator position with a local company dealing with the property and casualty market, got a screening call within 2 days of applying and was asked to come in the following Monday for a face-face interview.  As rare as it is to get an interview, it's hard not to get excited when one is requested.  I always find myself wondering, "is THIS the one??".  Just so happens that the day the interview is scheduled is like one of the many winter weather days we've had this year and the roads were atrocious.  No big deal, it's not like I don't know how to drive.  What happened next caught me by surprise - the HR person called and left me a voicemail 2 hours before my interview to state that she was very ill (and the roads were terrible, hoping to to catch me before I left) and would be leaving for the day and would like to keep our originally scheduled time the following day.  If anything should change, she would contact me and set something up, or if that didn't work out for me I was to leave her a message either that day or the following day and we would work it out.  No problem, right?

So I called the next morning anyway, I was GOING that day at the predetermined time regardless.  I'm not in a position to turn down interviews.  I stated that I would be there at 2pm, unless I hear from her otherwise, hoped that she was feeling better and thanked her for contacting me prior to leaving for the interview.  I arrived, early as usual, and was greeted with, "I'm so sorry, Jo-Ann* is out sick today".  Um, ok, now what?  The sweet receptionist offered to have me meet with the hiring manager, since I had driven all the way out there it would be a shame not to meet with someone.  I was thrilled, it's one thing to interview with someone in HR, but the person I would be reporting to?  Even better.  It was a great interview.  I found out more about what it is I would actually be doing (vs. some canned job description), and we really seemed to hit it off.  The Manager was worried, she usually sits in on interviews, not drive them, and felt like a fish out of water without Jo-Ann there.  I assured her that I thought she did well, she asked me questions of importance to her and to the role she supervises.  And then, well, she said something that I have never heard in an interview before..."I thought that went well".  WOW.  In hindsight, I don't know if that was in response to my interview, or her performance in the interview, but either way, it was strange.

The following day I got a call from one of my references, who happens to be a close friend and someone that I have worked with for many years in many different positions, to say that Jo-Ann had called her.  It seems they know each other and Jo-Ann was surprised to see her name on my references.  So my dear friend gives me a glowing reference, and I'm ready to start doing back flips.  In over a year, not once has one of my references been called.

Fast forward 2 weeks.  I have not heard anything, and decide to follow up with Jo-Ann for a status.  I thought it was rather strange that she hadn't contacted me to come in and interview with her, especially since she canceled our first meeting and basically didn't show up to the "rescheduled" one.  I was greeted with a hurried "hello" and told that she is in the process of hiring for 3 positions and has been busy...will call at the end of the week with an update.  End of the week comes around, no phone call.  By mid week of the following week, 3 weeks after going in for an interview (that I got stood up for), I see the position reposted, under a different title and with an extended application deadline.  I'm beside myself at this point...here comes Shirley.  So I did what any desperate job seeker would do...I crafted a wonderful email, thanking her for the phone screening, meeting with the Manager, taking the time to speak with me when I called for an update and expressed my interest in meeting with her.  I used applicable dates to emphasize the length of time this has been dragging on (and stress the fact that I have had nearly zero interaction with her), but remained sweet as honey.  I don't need to be shooting myself in the foot here.  I reattached my resume and references, asking to be considered for the "new" position.  At the end, I requested that if it had been predetermined that I am no longer a candidate, that I would be most grateful if she could contact me either via phone or email (which I provided) and confirm the status of my application.  That was last Wednesday.  No response....enter crickets.

So yes, I cheated and included this one in my list of "applied for" this week.  To the DOL, it counts, and buys me another week of UI, honestly.  I do know of certain people, a D.I.N.K to be exact, who has been collecting every week for over a year, holding out for "management" positions, a la Cousin Eddy in the "Vacation" movies.  While he rides his wife's coattails and benefits, he sits at home, every day, playing PS.3, high as a kite, and not looking for work. 

And I feel guilty filing every week...


*Yeah, that's not her real name.

Regrets...

One of the things I most regret while chugging through my quest for employment is education, or lack thereof.  I'm not from a well-to-do family, my parents always struggled while we were growing up.  College savings?  We were lucky to come home from school and still have power, money for college was a pipe dream.  I was always a middle of the road student, certainly not straight A's, but rather a mix of A's, B's with the occasional C thrown in for good measure (i.e. Chemistry...ugh.).  I never thought of college, after all, where was the money going to come from?  Scholarships?  Nah, there were 100 other classmates that were geniuses and swallowed up the available scholarships.  In those days there was no internet, and the thought of sitting in the guidance office shuffling through paperwork hunting for a couple hundred bucks scholarship was not my idea of a fun after school activity.  I just resigned myself to the fact that I was to work straight out of school, and get my education the way my parents did....on the job.

I had expressed some interest in college, but when my chosen path was shot down by my mother as "impractical", I threw in the towel.  Design wasn't something she thought was going to help me in life, or payback any student loans, so I gave up.  If I couldn't pursue something I was truly interested in, I may as well continue on with my grand plan of finding something local that would get my foot in the door and stick with that.  I don't like change, especially changing jobs.  So the mother figure shocks me and suggests I apply to the local community college.  At least it's something, she says.  So I did, and you know what?   I was a rock star in college.  No, not "Animal House" rock star, but I really understood what it was that I was learning.  I studied Office Management, a 2 year program, and earned my Associates Degree with a 3.9 gpa.  I learned that accounting is fun (twisted, I know), programming was fascinating, and presentations?  OMGEEEE!!  Presentations were a blast!!  Not only did I rock my 2 years in college, I did better than in my 12 years in public school.  I "got" it.  The best part?  I was working at the company for my entire second year, as a temp, but I already had my foot in the door so to speak.  They worked around my course schedule, easy to do given I was working in the records area and could easily put in a full day of course work followed by a near all-nighter amongst the files.  It was perfect.

And here is where the regrets come in.  While I have a degree, it is now 15 years old.  My degree is accentuated my 13+ years of hard experience, but not good enough for today's job postings.  It's heartbreaking to see an opening like this: 

"Administrative Assistant wanted!  $11.00\hr, Bachelor's degree required."

Not preferred, required.  As in, "don't bother applying, we'll see you don't have those extra 2 years and will toss you in the shredder faster than you can say unemployment isn't going to pay you forever" required.  Who knew that you needed a Bachelor's degree to remove a jam from a photocopier?  Or answer the phone?  Or run a report in Excel?  I think mom would be disappointed if she forked over $100k in tuition for me to make $11\hr.  Suddenly, Design sounds more appealing to her.

Another regret?   Not taking advantage of the company's education benefit.  They pay a certain amount of your tuition if you are a full time employee.  My first two years of employment were spent planning a wedding and getting divorced.  The next two years were spent working out the bugs from that divorce, meeting my wonderful new husband, and birthing my first child.  Work full time and go back to school?  Yeah, I didn't think so.  Work and home kept me so busy that finding time to add to my education was impossible.  I always thought I would eventually do it, but then baby #2 came along and seriously?  It was not going to happen.  Why start now?  I have a stable job, with a stable company and earning enough to get by.  Education...back seat please.

When looking at the job postings in my area, narrowing down the fields into Accounting, Administrative\Office Support, Insurance and Customer Service, you generally get a grand total of 75 openings within a 25 mile radius of my homestead.  Weed out the healthcare based administrative jobs (most require RN designation or prior experience in healthcare setting, even for simple reception or appointment scheduling positions), Bachelor's degree or state licensing required, managerial experience needed and sketchy fly-by-night call centers, that usually leaves 12-13 jobs left to choose from.  Break those down further by removing any openings with the company and it's in the 9-10 ballpark.  Not good odds. 

With college graduations looming, I may as well burn my resume.  The heat will come in handy in warming up my van down by the river.

Where do I begin?

So, I had every intention of starting this blog...a year ago.  And there it sat, empty and wordless for nearly a year.  Oh, the irony!  This blog, much like my insides, sat here, empty.  So, since I can't get a job (or any calls back on applications at that), I may as well occupy the cybersphere with my thoughts, as incoherent as they may be.  If you've found yourself here, welcome.  And, sorry.  This may not be what you're looking for.  Some things may hit home with you, while others will make you want to say "Good grief woman, get a grip.  And a job.".

Perhaps a little background may help, eh?  See, I'm a thirty-something married mom of two.  Two very different and ah-hem, unique children.  One of each, both with very different cases of ADHD.  That alone should be enough to guarantee my enrollment into Ha.ir Clu.b for Me.n.  But alas, the hair's still there, graying, but there.  Alright, enough about them...isn't this supposed to be a rant about being unemployed?

You see, I am unemployed.  I joined the ranks of so many other Americans in December 2009, and haven't given up once (despite my many rants to the contrary).  I send applications, I tweak my resume and cover letter and even draft up wonderful emails in an effort to sell my skills.  Sometimes I hear something, sometimes I don't.  Sometimes I get an interview.  Sometimes I get a (gasp!!  EEK!!) second interview.  Ok, that only happened once, and it was at the second interview I found out that the job was actually supervisory in nature, and well, my experience doesn't include that.  Nuts.  Next??

In addition to being "Employment Challenged", I also suffer from clinical depression.  Wanna hear the best part?  I was being treated for said depression while I was "laid off" (not sure why it was deemed a "lay-off" since I can't EVER go back there, but whatever.  I digress).  This depression, I'll call her "Shirley", has always been a part of my life.  Didn't know it, like that 4th cousin who shows up on your doorstep looking for a place to stay, she reared her ugliness after the passing of my grandmother (Mem).  Mem was me, plus 50 years.  She was the picture of what I would be at 82, one of my best friends, closest confidants and daycare for my youngest who was not of school age.  She was so much more than daycare, she was the extension of me whilst I was slaving away at work.  My son was her bestest buddy, and she his.  When Mem left us in March of 2009, I thought I was ok.  I had backup daycare with the provider my school-age daughter was attending before and after care.  All would be ok, I've lost loved ones before after all.  Wrong.  All wasn't ok.  Me, the person who could lay their head on a pillow for 2 minutes and be dead to the world for 8+ glorious hours, found herself tossing and turning all night.  Dreams became night terrors.  I lost all sense of who I thought I had become.  I got up every morning, showered, went to work for 8, 9, sometimes even 10 hours but couldn't recall anything that ever happened during the course of day.  I was on the worse kind of auto-pilot. 

My job was providing administrative support to sales reps, selling insurance for a For.tune 500 company, and that support was more than photocopying, answering phones, etc.  It was actually finding out what the rate for coverage would be by taking all of the employee demographics for interested companies, running that information through the system, compiling the data, running it by the rep, sending out the proposal, setting up the plan if it sold.  Doesn't sound like much, but there were details.  Lots of them.  Details that would get lost in my haze.  And see, auto-pilot would have been so much easier on my job if I had actually had proper training, but alas, that never happened.  I was in a "learn as you go" deal, without any proper mentoring or feedback.  In the two years I was in that job, I got feedback once, during a review, a year after I started the job.  My "boss", we'll call her Pammy, was a first time manager, and her boss?  Well, she's a whole different story.  Twenty year veteran of the company and dimmer than a 20 watt bulb.  Recipe for disaster.

Somewhere along the way, hairs were across asses when it came to me.  Was it because I wasn't cute and blond like the reps apparently favored, like my newlywed, child free counterparts?  Was it because I expressed my concern for a thieving coworker?  I don't know.  You see, in corporate America, that information is usually shared between managers while a different story is shared face-to-face.  All I know is this:  the first instance of "concern" for my performance came when I had to "abruptly" leave during quarter end closing at the end of March 2009, two weeks after burying Mem.  I had already put in 9.5 hours for the day (in my non-exempt, hourly, no we are not paying your overtime even though you worked it job) and my arrangements to pick up my children at daycare fell through.  I couldn't afford to pay the extra $$ for each 10 minutes for each child to be there beyond closing time, since I was 40 minutes away from daycare.  I checked with my coworkers, one was already downing a beer while chatting with the other who had to hit enter on the last sold case.  All was fine and I was told to go, quickly.

I arrived the following morning to a scathing email from my boss' boss (ahh, corporate America) stating it was inappropriate to leave without consulting her first, leaving my coworkers to finish the work, etc.  Conveniently, her email didn't mention that she too was not in the office for said consultation, since she had already high-tailed it to the nearest happy hour.  This was the opening of the flood gates for months of torture, literally mental torture that drove me to near suicide.  Somehow, after over 13 years of employment with an exceptional service record and years of outstanding reviews, I was labeled "that" employee.  The office was filled with a number of "that" employees, but my boss was on a mission.  Pammy began her campaign of "I'm here to help you, but will do everything in my power to shoot you down", scheduling weekly meetings with me, and analyzing every minute of my day.  I was lucky to take one bathroom break a day in an effort to keep up with my busy sales rep, but that was not ok with her.  And to anyone reading this who is saying "why didn't you consult HR\DOL??"  keep in mind that I was not right in mine.  I faithfully listened to the barrage of attacks from Pammy, trying to do what she asked me to do in an effort to keep my job.  It seemed like everything she suggested to improve, and I did, turned into something I did wrong the following week.  I was in a cycle where she was setting me up to fail, and coming from a family with a history of mental illness, she knew exactly what she was doing.  This endured for months, until I finally broke down and called my Dr., on the verge of suicide, in July.

I was immediately pulled from duty, placed on short term disability and some serious medication.  The first 4 weeks were a blur.  I think I slept more than anything.  I didn't want to eat, bathe, or even interact with my children.  I just wanted to get back to work and do the only thing I knew how to do...work.  I started talk therapy, got my medication tweaked a few times, then a few times more.  It just never seemed like I was truly getting better.  Talk therapy helped a little, but we never got to discuss work.  It all started at the beginning, discussing my childhood (ugh) and why Mem played such an important role in my life and how her death contributed my mental decline.  Somewhere around September, my claims were suddenly not being paid.  I called my handler, who never answered or returned calls.  See, I was the bread winner for the family, and this was causing some serious stress that I certainly didn't need right in the middle of treatment.  I would get one or two paycycles resolved, only to have my handler purposely schedule "check in" for the next cycle approval prior to my next Dr. visit and then document that the information wasn't received and not approve my claim further.  This went on for almost 2 months (given the size and nature of the company, they certainly would not want this information out...and since I can't afford a lawyer, the company will remain "the company" in this blog).  My checking account was so far in the red because automatic mortgage payments were being deducted, but my disability pay was not being deposited.  It was a nightmare.  I was referred to a specialist, because the medication and talk therapy was leaving me at a plateau. 

Two weeks before I was scheduled to see my specialist and provide an update to my handler, I got a call from Candie, Pammy's boss.  Candie was shocked (actually, disappointed) that I answered.  Candie made no effort to ask how I was doing (nor did Pammy the entire time I was on short term disability) and abruptly stated that so-and-so from HR was jumping on the call.  RED FLAG!!  RED FLAG!!  I got the "the economy sucks, sales are down, and we have to eliminate your position" speech, that they are committed to retaining "top performers", i.e. beer swillers on company property during business hours.  I was told that if I needed to continue on disability, that I would be allowed to do so in lieu of accepting severance pay.  Candie then said something that made my blood boil:  Pammy would also be losing her job, that there isn't a need for an additional manager in an office of 20 service employees, but would be performing the duties of my position until something opens up in the home office location, which of course did.  I personally didn't think it was necessary or professional to divulge this information if not to twist the knife further, but hey, who am I to have a say in anything.  Without nary an apology, or even offering to provide a reference, she left the call to HR to wrap up.  After all, happy hour was calling! 

Given that I was already $2k in the red in my checking account, half a year severance or long term disability hanging over my head, I begged my specialist to state that I was able to return to work, thus closing my claim.  I accepted my severance paperwork, signed under extreme emotional duress and lingering disability, and attempted to move on. 

So, here I am.  Still unemployed, still applying, still hoping someone will acknowledge my resume and call me in for an interview, and still very much clinically depressed.  I not only lost my job, I lost health benefits and could no longer seek medical treatment.  I'm trying to find a job, rather fighting for a job, with thousands of other people in my area while fighting for my life.  No, it's not cancer or anything that serious, but when the thought of taking your own life runs through your mind thirty times a day, that's a fight for your life.  It's kind of a toss up, who's losing faster...the job hunt, or my life.