I almost had a meltdown last night at work

[Captain Jigglypuff]

For the past five months, my stress has been increasingly worse because I’m constantly in the dish room by myself and there are so many tasks that I have to do by myself. I’m literally doing the work of two people! Some of my coworkers have to help me because it’s way too much for one person to handle. Before Covid and the pandemic forced us to close off the dining room, there were always two people scheduled to work in the dish room. When the quarantine happened, the number of people scheduled to work each shift was cut in half. The two units we deliver meal to were all put onto trays on a cart. If any unit had residents who caught Covid, it immediately went into red level and sealed off and we had to send their meals on the cart. I was able to do the job by myself because it’s far easier to wash everything when you don’t have a dining room and we needed to wait for the phone call for units in red that we could get the trays since the food was served in disposable containers and they had to use plastic eating utensils. Now that the dining room is open again, I’m constantly struggling to clean it up once all the residents leave, wash all of the dishes, and keep bringing things to the units when they call us.

Last Wednesday I began to suffer the symptoms that we tend to get when we were about to have a meltdown and I knew any little thing could lead to a full body shutdown for me and so I asked to go home. I called off for the other two days that I was supposed to work because I was still on edge. Then I had my psychic vision on Sunday and most of the pressure of having a meltdown went away until last night. I noticed that the lights were occasionally causing my eyes to hurt and everything was slowly becoming louder to me and I began to be on edge again. I had delivered the last cart to the unit we had to pick up because not enough workers to put on the schedule and the nursing aide told me that they needed coffee and a bowl of mashed potatoes and I told her that I’d get it down to them as soon as I could. I got the coffee and saw we were out of mashed potatoes and I told the woman politely that we were out of mashed potatoes and she got really snippy with me and said, “Well you’d better go make some then! We need it now!” I told her that I didn’t know where the cook was and that I had so many other things that I needed to do but she didn’t care. I almost started to scream loudly because now I was being triggered but didn’t because their eating area had residents and some guests. From there the noises were even louder and I was hyperventilating to trying to calm down for the next twenty minutes. I felt my knees ready to give out and force my body to collapse onto the ground.

I keep telling my boss that I really need help in the dish room and yeah new people get hired but then they are immediately scheduled to mornings or the days that I’m not working. I don’t know how much more I can take. The morning shift always has two people in the dish room every day. Hell some days they have three! And then there are the two high school girls who are extremely lazy and don’t do anything to help any of us out after they’re done serving their units! They act so entitled and have already made me snap and scream at them because they were laughing at me because I kept dropping something and the cook kept telling to stop laughing and to be nice and they didn’t. I was dropping things because I was having an off day where my autistic symptoms were more present than usual. This incident was the beginning of my current state of mind. From there I became more easily angered and to the point of starting to yell at everyone if someone said something that triggered me again and everything has been getting worse since then. I don’t want to quit because this is my source of extra income to pay my bills and anything that my house might need and it’s the best job I’ve had other than helping my dad with his business. But it’s starting to take a toll on me and I feel like I desperately need some sort of break but I need the money and I already took off an entire week. I’m afraid that I’m going to snap one of these days there and something bad happens to my employment status. I’ve thought about threatening to quit if they don’t hire someone to help me in the dish room and have another person in there with me every shift that I work but am not sure if my bluff will even work. I mean what if they don’t hire someone and the two weeks that I gave notice comes? I need more help at work and can’t do anything about it. I come home so exhausted. I’m supposed to open a can of applesauce when I am at work for the residents’ use for taking their meds and some days I just don’t do it because I don’t have enough time to do it because I must get stuff for two or three more units that we must serve because people either call off or just don’t show up. This is a very common thing that keeps happening! We lost another cook because she couldn’t stand how the entire evening shift is suffering from lack of people who are scheduled to work everyday and how we keep getting calls from nursing aides demanding we bring them stuff even after we’ve served everyone. We are literally down to two cooks and it is very bad because we haven’t had only two cooks in the kitchen since Covid. One of the cook only works mornings and the other isn’t even supposed to be cooking as she’s supposed to be a supervisor.

 

[Grondhammar]

I know it sounds too simple to work, but my advice would be three steps...

First, get to know and accept the limits of what you can do volume-wise. It sounds like the amount of work is overwhelming. That's frustrating for anyone, but especially for autistics (autists? never sure the right word) because we love to have things orderly to lower the sensory input & processing. So, get to know what you can do without overload.

Second, communicate that clearly to the shift manager/supervisor. If you don't feel comfortable doing that, do you have someone who can be your advocate/help you communicate that? Put it in writing if you need to so you're not flustered when talking about it.

And third, start sticking to your "this is what I can do" limit. If things don't get done, tell the manager that you communicated your limits and you expect good help to handle the rest. This will take some courage on your part. But you're worth it! You deserve to have an environment in which you can do good work and feel good about being there. If you need to, and you live in the UK/Canada/USA (at least, probably other places but I don't know directly) pull out the accommodations card.

The alternative is burnout, and that's no fun for anyone.

Most of the time, your manager will absolutely listen. I can say from experience that hiring to replace someone is a real pain, and almost all managers would much, much rather that their employees stay where they are, and they can work out a solution to the problem rather than go through the hiring process again (and again, etc).

 

[Aspychata]

Face it, you are being taken advantage of, and many employers are doing that because they can't keep employees. This sounds like a retirement home l worked in. But without the turnover. Go apply elsewhere? Employers know what they are doing, they are cutting costs with the dinner shift, by just having you.

 

[Captain Jigglypuff]

I’m planning on writing a grievance letter about the prep cook who answered the call when I called off. I do not like how she said that my reason was that I was feeling “mentally sick.” I said that I was mentally unwell because of anxiety. Mentally sick makes it sound like I’m schizophrenic and dangerous and others can see the call off sheet that we need to sign if we call off. She also wasn’t very sympathetic towards me when I was trying to tell her that I went 24 hours straight without any sleep and I knew that was a huge safety hazard since I work around hot water and steam. Falling asleep while help to serve the food from a steam table is not a very good or safe thing to do.

 

[the_tortoise]

Mentally sick makes it sound like I’m schizophrenic and dangerous and others can see the call off sheet that we need to sign if we call off

I don't understand how it's anyone's business what kind of "sick" you were. That seems like it should be private always, for everyone.

Also...being schizophrenic does not mean a person is dangerous.... I am guessing you know that and your point is just you don't want to be judged and stigmatized and that is very understandable!

I hope you are able to get help on your shift, or find a better job.

And if you file a grievance I hope it is taken seriously and your privacy respected in future if you stay at your current job.

 

[Captain Jigglypuff]

I don't understand how it's anyone's business what kind of "sick" you were. That seems like it should be private always, for everyone.

Also...being schizophrenic does not mean a person is dangerous.... I am guessing you know that and your point is just you don't want to be judged and stigmatized and that is very understandable!

I hope you are able to get help on your shift, or find a better job.

And if you file a grievance I hope it is taken seriously and your privacy respected in future if you stay at your current job.

I do know that being schizophrenic doesn’t necessarily make someone dangerous and it is stigmatized that way which is why I didn’t like how the lady said I was feeling unwell. She actually wrote it TWICE on the call Off slip in big letters. One of them is in the upper corner and very noticeable.