Ok, work rant ahead.

I work full time for one company that runs a number of different group homes in this area. But I work at three different locations (it used to be four, but my schedule got changed) on a regular two-week rotation. By which I mean that my schedule repeats itself every two weeks, not that I spend two weeks working at one location, then move on to two weeks at the next, etc. Although my schedule presents a challenge to keep straight (yes, I have found myself driving toward the wrong house on occasion, why do you ask?) it also affords me an excellent opportunity to stay fresh. Just about the time that any one person's individual quirks start to get under my skin, I'm already at a different location. I feel really well balanced and able to prevent burn-out like this.

Recently we have had some massive turnover at one of the houses. The director who worked there for years left. Several full-time direct care staff left (quit, or were fired, or asked for hours at other locations) in December. At that time, one of the people who lives there had a severe increase in violent and otherwise challenging behaviors due to a medication change. This was severe enough that the county coughed up funding for that person to have 1:1 staffing during the day. Several medications and a hospital stay later, the original medication was restored. Behavior has gradually improved and is back to what I consider as per usual. Then last month, we went through yet another massive turnover. The long and the short of it is, There is one staff member other than me who has been there for more than a year, and one more who was hired in January who is still here.

We had just started to really gel together as a team and now the team is all busted up.

Part of the reason for the turnover is due to the (non-profit) company's false economy of not hiring any more full-timers. When a full-timer leaves, they (try to) replace 'em with a couple part-timers - who cost just as much to train but do not last as long. So they are betting that the cost of training over and over again together with the cost of overtime when we are short-handed due to turnover are smaller than the cost of full-time benefits. I highly doubt it.

Part of the reason for the turnover is mismanagement. Some of the mismanagement may have been due to inexperience. But the new director is transferring to another location (no great loss, other than the stress of having to break in yet another one).

The increased need for staffing coupled with the sudden reduction in the number of staff members available led the regional director to ask me to pick up more shifts at this house provided my other houses could find someone to take my shifts there. One of the houses let me go. The other house, the director said "Oh, hell no!" (Ok, more politely, but she was quite firm.) For several weeks I worked mostly at the most challenging house, with one or two days at the house with the firm director.

They have hired some new people and are almost up to full complement.

Before everyone quit, I had put in for some time off. I'd been feeling a little run down. And in the shuffle of turnover back in December, my request to cash out some PTO had gotten lost. I have come up to the limit of PTO that I can carry over. So I'm at the use-it-or-lose-it stage with it. But when everyone quit I figured it would be a bit of a mountain-moving experience to get my PTO approved. However I worked the "You want me to take that extra shift this week? Yes, I can help you with that. By the way, have you been able to approve that time off I asked for, I know it is a challenge, so I will completely understand if you can't," angle. It worked. I ran myself ragged for a couple of weeks. I was so tired by the time I had my vacation, I could not concentrate well enough to read more than a paragraph.

Y'all, I couldn't read fic.

Or books.

It took two days of doing pretty much nothing to be able to read again.

The time off did me a world of good. But now the other shoe drops. I am back (continued...)

( continues...) to my regular schedule. But the long absence has done a number on the relationships, the trust, with some of the people at the house they pulled me from. One of the women can speak, but is uncomfortable doing so with people she does not know well. It took me two years for her to trust me enough to regularly answer questions that I ask her. (She started making hilariously snarky replies to some of my silly questions about one year.) The first day I was back there, she wouldn't talk to me or look at me. And another person has been testing boundaries with me just like I was brand new.

I am so angry about this I could cry.

One of my most valuable abilities in this work is the relationship I build with these people. The mutual trust and respect and care are my stock in trade.

But then again, at least with specific examples of how such major changes to my schedule disrupt these relationships, this trust - I can fend off any future ... I'm going to say attacks. It is not how the powers that be meant it, but that is how it feels from my perspective.

Thanks for listening.

Windsparrow, I say document the hell out of all these instances of breakdown in that trust relationship. If your higher-ups don't understand how important it is, they shouldn't have their jobs.

I have done the work you do, and I could not stay with it. After two years I was completely and permanently burned out. FWIW, I have huge admiration for you, for doing that job so well and for so long.

Thanks, Zenkitty. And you are right about documenting.

Want to hear something weird? (To be filed under "Steph Doesn't Know Shit About Anatomy".)

When several people were doing the 30-day squats challenge, where the number of squats they do increases each day, I thought, holy crap, I could never do 250 squats. That's madness.

I haven't done 250 squats. This isn't that kind of dramatic reveal.

The more people posted about it on FB, the more I thought, well, I'm not in fantastic physical shape, but...I bet I could do 25 squats. (Which my quads screamed about the next day. Like I said, not in fantastic physical shape.)

But I've been gradually adding more squats, and I'm up to 50. And here's the weird thing: my hips don't hurt so much any more. They still get a little annoyed if I try to sleep too long, but -- they pretty much don't hurt. I guess because stronger quad muscles balance the load properly and don't shift too much work to the hips? (Like I said, I don't know shit about anatomy, so that might not be right. I just know my hips don't hurt any more.)

I'm never going to do 250 squats, though.

I guess because stronger quad muscles balance the load properly and don't shift too much work to the hips?

It sure helps. As a catcher, Emmett needs to work on his thigh muscles to help support his knees and hips since he's in a squat all the time.

I'm never going to do 250 squats, though.

Let's get you to 100 and see.

I'm never going to do 250 squats, though.

Let's get you to 100 and see.

I strongly suspect I'm never going to do 100. But stranger things have happened.

I've been thinking about the squat challenge again, and I was thinking about trying again with a pathetically small number, like 5, because starting wherever the challenge started was not a good idea for me.

Huh. My hip hurts too. Steph's post prompted me to go look at the Facebook page, and thence to the video of how to do squats, and...huh. That's not what I thought a squat was. This? I can do this.

So I did! I did 20 skwaats, and ow, so I went and emptied the dishwasher, then I went back and did 10 more.

I did 30 squats, y'all! This is major.

I was thinking about trying again with a pathetically small number, like 5

For real, my quads hurt so much after Day 1 of 25 squats, that I really wished I had started with 10. But it is kind of amazing how quickly you build strength and can add more.