Anxiety at work

[SilentAndShy]

It has been six months since I undertook more duties including being a line manager for a colleague, which I felt - with my anxiety - would be a positive challenge and to progress my career. However, despite my support in areas my colleague, who is 18, has been appreciated there have been times I've had to deliver bad news relating to office procedures and policies that have left me stumbling over my words, my heart beating exceptionally quicker than normal and flustered. The reason is whenever I've broached the subjects she's responded in animated way (she said on the first occasion that it was nothing personal to me but it still felt like she was venting her anger at me) that's brought about those aforementioned emotions and I don't know how to handle it better. This may lead to me being in a state (don't know if others with anxiety have experienced anything like that) that I forget things that were said despite making the odd notes. I find myself worrying on discussing issues she might not take kindly to.

I've been in my job for a while yet I feel my underlying anxiety is making me feel like a fraud.

 

[LoyalXenite]

I also have that problem of when anxiety sets in (which it always does) I completely forget everything I was supposed to remember. Its why I always do appalling bad in exams even when I know the content.

 

[Miserum]

You're not alone in this. If you're feeling threatened in a situation, it's hard to remember things after the fact because the threat itself was so salient; it might as well have been the only thing there.

As far as a remedy to this ailment goes, I haven't got a clue.

 

[PugofCrydee]

Yea its part of the process what we as SA /mental illness sufferers have happen to our brains. It's called "hijacking of the brain" or more specifically:
The “amygdala hijack”. The amygdala is the emotional part of the brain, which regulates the fight or flight response. When threatened - or perceives to be threatened it can respond irrationally. It can sometimes be triggered by other minor things too.

I have learned to lessen the severity of mine somewhat but it can still be quite difficult.
I believe the most effective therapies are usually CBT and or meds.

For me it was gaining an understanding of what was actually happening that allowed me to see it was faulty and irrational thinking.

 

[SilentAndShy]

I feel this girl that I manage feels she can get worked up, bordering on being pissed off, to me than the actual chief officer. I doubt she would raise grievances to him in the tone that she does to me. And also she sometimes isn't as polite to me, the odd look or disinterest when I'm trying to make conversation and I just feel like not bothering with her either. I manage to help and elevate young people, not deal with their whinges.

 

[Pacific_Loner]

I think most people here tend to assume, most of the time, that if there is a relationship or communication issue, they are the problem. But other people have their problems too and it's astonishing, when you take a good look around you, how many people have no or little control over their emotions. As you just mentioned yourself, maybe she simply has a bad attitude and it has nothing to do with you. No matter your social awkwardness and clumsiness, it's no excuse for the counterpart to get upset. My point is, I think if you realize that her attitude has nothing to do with you and you are just facing a person who herself has trouble dealing with her own emotions in a professional way, maybe it will help you to lower down your anxiety so you can focus on your job, because you won't feel so much that her anger or her bad attitude is directed at you.

That being said, working with people like this is very exhausting so I hope you're not stuck with her for too long.

 

[w*n*c*a*m]

Ugh speaking of I’m about to go to work and I’m having really bad anxiety RT. This often happens to me whenever I get the long shift and I dont know why. I’ve been silently stressing about this day for several days now. I just binged eat some chocolate wafers just to comfort me and it’s such a very unhealthy behavior. I hate this feeling

 

[SilentAndShy]

So, I took up this opportunity of being a manager in the hope that it would be a good career progression opportunity and hoped I would help elevate, and progress, the person under my management. However an incident yesterday has completely killed that hope, I believe.

I was scheduled to drop in on a meeting to discuss completion of my colleague's qualification with her tutor, who is external. I was told I wasn't needed, fine I thought and subsequently I got an email asking to rearrange.

I went to this second meeting and all seemed well. Then, the tutor mentioned that this person (who is around 15 years my junior) wanted to discuss issues concerning what she felt, was micro management. She listed off issues (I kept checking her timesheet daily rather than weekly, contrary to what we had agreed, she even knew I was keeping a log of her timings) and I was so in the moment that I had no understanding, until today when a friend pointed it out, that I had been blindsided and massively undermined in that situation by her actions.

She should not have done that as she's a full time employee but I was, as usual, in the moment not to think that and too nice not to blow my fuse.

I'm intending to write an email to my manager as frankly, I admit I may have made errors, but I don't want to bother with someone like that. Whether my manager listens is unlikely, but maybe I'm not a manager.