Surface Pressure in Current Events

My coordinator buckled under the pressure. He disclosed to me that he had a nervous breakdown the day prior. He’s only human. He needs to put himself first and is considering taking a leave of absence.

I want him to be okay. We are carrying a lot of vicarious trauma. We are under a lot of pressure from operations, and our participants have been very challenging, to say the least. We had to deal with violence over the weekend, and that is what broke him. He told me that he was angry and upset before we left that day. I told him not to suppress it and to create space for it… Then he imploded.

I am buckling under the pressure myself. He is my support system; I don’t want him to go on leave. This will be way too hard to do on my own. I explained that I would not be taking on any of his responsibilities unless I was making the wage that goes with it. That was probably insensitive at the moment, but I had to make my boundary crystal clear.

Once the shock wore off, and I was able to have a clear thought, I went back to his office and told him to clear our schedule for the next two days. We canceled our programs. I got him to call our part-time mentor to come in for a day shift today. We know what our problems are, that’s half of our solutions right there. We started to brainstorm on how we can make this easier for ourselves. We need to prioritize our own wellness. At the end of each group program, we will talk to each other about our self-care plans for when we get home. We will do wellness checks and be honest with each other. Today should be a good one.

He made a comment last week that has been echoing in my head. It was one of those half-serious ones. We should just switch jobs. That would make managing my manager a lot easier. That would take the pressure off of him. I’ll see if that option is actually an option. I don’t want his job, but if it is hurting him, I can do it. I know how to lead. To be honest, things will run a lot smoother. He is new in his role; I have been helping him with that. I have experience as a manager, and developing managers was my favorite part. I know he wants to move up. Either way, I have him advocating for me to get a raise. I know that we all know my worth. There will be no hard feelings if I don’t get it.

The knowledge keeper that we hired to work with our program said that he wanted to do spiritual work with us youth mentors. He was coming this evening to do a teaching for our participants. I’ll notify him of our change of plans and ask him to start that spiritual work. Then we will go to our private boxing lesson. We usually take the kids, but we adults will use it to blow off some steam.

I didn’t air our dirty laundry, but I reached out to other programs to ask about how they prioritize wellness. This led to all of us going to a sweat lodge at the earliest opportunity. I think this is a great opportunity for everyone.

I am feeling hopeful today. We are going to have some tough conversations today and do some serious restructuring. He opened up to me about the reason for a lot of his choices so far. I can see the picture so much clearer. He has been feeling this immense pressure from the get-go. I can work with that.