APD Part XI––You’re Fired, Part II
I so enjoyed giving a break to all my negative APD stuff by talking about what’s happening now. I’ll do that again soon. Getting fired from a job with APD is tantamount with being rejected as a human being. Click to Tweet #amwriting #rejection #APD
From Wikipedia:
- Problems in occupational functioning
I moved to Pennsylvania to do a voluntary service term. Things didn’t go very well with that assignment, and the agency wouldn’t give me a recommendation. I decided to stay in PA and see if I could get a job. Well, not in my chosen field, of course. It seems the only job I could actually keep without being fired, was secretarial. Sheesh.
And yet, my first permanent job only lasted six months. An insurance company asked me to resign when I couldn’t keep up with the work. Never mind tons more work was created while I was in that position. I learned later that two people were hired after me, both fired. Then they got wise and hired two new people for the position I and two others had been trying to do on our own. It could have been better, if the other two clerical workers in the department hadn’t been afraid I was out to steal their jobs. They wouldn’t help me at all.
Finally, in the late 1980s, I had a period of job peace. I started a temp job, which turned permanent, staying at that engineering firm for four years. That was the longest I’d been anywhere. I even got my one and only “promotion” from a word processor to a marketing assistant.
And…I found the love of my life and we got married in 1987. A measure of healing floods me.
In 1990, I changed engineering firms with a better job, but alas, I got laid off. I wasn’t the only one that day. That didn’t hurt quite as bad, because I knew the bosses had visited every client the week before to see what work would be coming in. Not enough to support us all. The day after the 1992 election, I cried, because it was the first time in seven years I didn’t have a job to go to.
I tried being an independent contractor in the marketing field for A/E (architectural/engineering) firms, but there wasn’t enough local business to really sustain it. So…I tried several other things that didn’t bring in enough money.
In the meantime, my nurturing instinct went into effect and I adopted a dog.
Eventually, I got a job with a lady lawyer, whose larger-than-life negative personality started to affect me temperamentally. My husband wanted me to quit. Mom wanted me to quit. But I stubbornly held on at least two-three extra months. All the while, my anger level rising to the point where I’d have a temper tantrum and not even remember it, let alone the horrible things I said.
It took God telling me at the end of a church service, telling me directly, to quit. “You need to leave. She’ll be all right, but you won’t be if you stay.” Yikes! I quit the next week.
So…job failures on top of job failures fueled my sensitivities and killed my self-esteem, what little I could ever muster up. But rejection wasn’t done with me yet. Remember to treat those with rejection issues with tender loving care and understanding. Click to Tweet #amwriting #rejection #APD
Donna L.H. Smith 