Posts Tagged ‘stress’

• Stress, workouts, and the little things

  Date: 2009.06.04 | Category: Life as we know it | Response: 0

  Switching to night shift is always difficult and the events of this week haven’t made it any easier. I’ve found that it takes a good 4-5 days for me to get my internal clock adjusted to working an off shift. I need copious amounts of caffeine to make this work because I can’t stay busy enough to keep myself awake. I’ve tried to keep myself busy but there have been times when I caught myself dozing while standing up. Summer has arrived in the state of Washington and in the land of no air conditioning our house tends to get a little toasty during the day even if all of the windows are open. If it’s dark I can usually sleep but when its warm like this I don’t sleep quite as well.

  Jessica has had a rough week. Jeff, her brother in-law, was in the hospital because of kidney stone and a brand new diagnosis of diabetes (boo!), her uncle passed away earlier this week, and she has been running on empty all week long. She has been stressed (obviously) and taking everything in like this simply wears a person down. Stress feeds stress and I haven’t been my normal self all week.

  My normal stress reliever is a trip to the gym. The heat and the lack of energy due to the time shift has prevented me from getting in a decent workout. I feel like a weakling right now. Its extremely difficult to time to calorie intake so that I have some energy come workout time. When I work on dayshift I normally workout 4-6 hours after my last meal and 1-2 hours after my last snack. When I am working nights I haven’t had anything to eat in at least 9 hours. I feel like I am trying to win a race with nothing in the gas tank. I have tried eating immediately after waking but I hardly have enough time to digest. My only options are to suck it up or wake up in the middle of the night (or day) and eating breakfast. Can you imagine waking up at 2AM to eat a meal? I can’t and I really enjoy my six hours of sleep a night.

  Little things at work have been driving me crazy. Communication from my shift to the other shifts is a one way street. I try to send out as much information as possible and in return I receive nothing. Dayshift may do something and have some solid reasoning behind it but without communication I feel that they have lost their damned minds. Ten to fifteen times I night I ask myself what the hell were they thinking. Oh well – I’ve vowed to get in a good workout tomorrow and the weekend is fast approaching. Hopefully I can ignore the little things and relax – this isn’t the end of the world and I need to stop acting like it is. I really want to be able to work myself to exhaustion but finding enough work to stay busy is a difficult task. I’m writing this post instead of doing something because I want to be able to stretch out my one hour of scheduled work for this evening. Motivation is difficult when you are working by yourself. When you have no communication with other people it’s hard to gauge how much work you need to finish to be a contributing member. I’d much rather work with someone I despise than work alone – at least I’d have some competition.

• It's Mine

  Date: 2008.11.22 | Category: work | Response: 2

  These past two weeks have been probably the most stressful weeks I’ve ever been through. About a month ago I was notified about an official position in my lab, with my exact job duties. Basically they are getting rid of my intern position and giving the production team another official tech. There was also a position for the other group that works in our lab, Germination Research. I am currently working with the production team so I applied that position. They told us that the research position and the production position would be interview together as a pool and they would pick from the pool. I then was giving a date for a phone interview on the 12th. It was weird. I have never been in a position where I can’t see the people asking the important questions. I guess I really like to be able to see if they think I’m complete idiot or not.

  The phone interview was 30 minutes, 8 questions. I got through it in about 10 minutes. I must have done O.K. because I was then scheduled an in person interview on the 17th. Yeah, I was freaking out with nervousness. I have to say that I didn’t think the interview went that bad. My answers had a little more substance to them as to take up more time. Then next day we had a “meet and greet” and program overview. They served us lunch and went over the basic idea of the project. Then, they brought in everyone from the lab. The people that I know and work with. This was the worst part of the whole experience. I didn’t want to be that person who was “buddy-buddy” with everyone in the room, making the other candidates feel awkward so I just hung back and watched everyone interact awkwardly. Then I had to leave the room so they could all give their input about the candidates. After that point I couldn’t really be nervous anymore. It was out of my control and all I could do is wait.

  Then, that night at about 6pm my phone rang. It was my boss who had called to let me know that I was the best candidate for the Production position and the job was mine. So as of December 15th, 2008 I will be an official Weyerhaeuser employee with full benefits and about $35K a year. Not too shabby for a first job. Looks like my hard work paid off. Go me!

• Graduations, Weddings, and Stress OH MY!

  Date: 2008.06.16 | Category: I was too lazy to organize these | Response: 0

  These past few weeks have been pretty stressful for me. I have had this looming stress of my pending graduation. And it 1.5 hours it was over. I still have one month of school left, but it’s not much. I am pretty much just waiting for my mouse cells to grow.

  My best friend got married the very next day after graduation. It was held at the Lodge at Mt. Rainer and it was amazingly beautiful, and so was she. It still amazes me that we are that grown up already. Marriage? Really? Are we old enough for those shenanigans? Well, she is and I couldn’t be more proud of her or happy for them. They have an unusual yet bomb proof relationship and I can’t wait to see them this happy in 50 years.

  So, when I let things get to me and get me stressed out, like a wedding and graduation in the same weekend, I get really emotional. John and I were watching T.V. and we saw this commercial for the WA State Lottery, and it brought me to tears. John looked at me like I was crazy, but I think it’s really cute. I will let you judge it for yourself and let me know what you think!

  [youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=BFEgvvvY8Sk]

• I Know, It's Been a While

  Date: 2008.03.09 | Category: I was too lazy to organize these | Response: 0

  I haven’t posted much in a while. I have been pretty wrapped up in other things, as of late. I’m getting down to the last bit of school and I’ve been a big ball of stress. I haven’t been working much which also adds to the stress. ( you know, no work no money) I’ m getting pretty excited because Vegas is just a few weeks away. YAY!

  Since John has been gone, I really haven’t spent time with a whole lot of people. Last weekend, though, was my dad’s 51st birthday weekend. So, my mom, dad, Leanne, Jeff Best Friend Jenni and myself did what we always do and went moonlight bowling for dollars. It was really fun. I didn’t win any dollars. That part wasn’t so fun. Then on Sunday, Leanne and I hosted a “PartyLite” candle party. John is going to KILL me when he see just how many candle and candle related things I received. I’m excited non the less.

  This weekend I managed to get some friend time in. Cassy and I have been friends since oh gosh like 5th grade but haven’t spent too much time together since high school. Friday night I took the time and went down to Lacey to visit her. It was a very fun weekend. We got some good girl time in, talking, sharing emotions, dying hair. It was a good, much needed weekend.

  I will be putting up some new pictures on my flickr for the enjoyment of others.

• Stress

  Date: 2007.10.02 | Category: I was too lazy to organize these | Response: 0

  Lately its been a whole lot of stress with seemingly little relief. I’ve been inundated with work (while at work obviously) that I haven’t had to deal with before. Almost everyone else that is my rank is on their way out so I’ve become to go-to-guy for most of the stuff. I’ve tried to dole out as much work as I possibly can but some of the work requires knowledge and the people below me have little of that. I know that I should try to educate them as much as possible but I don’t have the time to do that – I only have the time to do the work myself – and I’ll get it done as long was I stop getting more and more work piled on top.

  It rained for quite a while today so I got soaked. You know its bad when the rain soaks all the way through your coat. Its supposed to rain more tomorrow – what a thrill that will be.

  I wish I had something great to write about but its all been crap lately – steaming piles of donkey dung.

• An update of sorts

  Date: 2007.09.04 | Category: I was too lazy to organize these | Response: 0

  I have not posted anything of relative substance for quite some time as I’ve been busy doing this and that… it also doesn’t help that I only have a scant few readers so I’m less inclined to actually write something. Imagine if I was recieving 1,000 visits per day instead of the 10-15 unique visitors that I get. I’m still unsure as to why I feel that I should share almost everything in this forum as opposed to not letting anyone know whats going on. I guess I feel that this forum is relatively anonymous and potentially vouyeristic. I only tell stories about things that have happened to me and about how I react to those events.

  My writing style isn’t particularly refined and my stories are only so-so. Once in a while I’ll have a worthy story of note but odds are you’re bound to get the same drudge that you might here from anyone else that you might know.

  I’ve been looking on and off for a part time job and I think I’m going to slam one out for the rest of the year. In other words, I’m going to work myself to sheer and utter exhausting for a few months and get ahead on things. Its going to take insane time management and will drain me every day. I know that I can do this and I know that I must do this. I still haven’t had anyone hire me yet but it may not be the job of my dreams… then again, there are few jobs most of us dream of getting save for being professional athletes or high ranking politicians. Is it odd that the only jobs we dream of getting are those that are most likely to have unwanted fans and stalkers?

  After getting caught up on some things I plan to move out of my current residence into another that is slightly more spacious and that provides a few extra ammenities (a place to put a grill and a in appt washer and dryer). While those things may seem trivial, I have found that I am more than tired of going up and down the elevator in my building and fighting with the coin operated jobbies. Having a grill would be equally splendid because its one of the few cooking surfaces that I would no longer have to clean up. I’ve become fairly skilled in its operation and I would only become more skilled as opportunity increases.

  Jessica (the girlfriend) is doing well save for the stress she puts herself under. She’s got quite a few things on her plate at the moment and I’m sure that I would feel quite overwhelmed. Luckily for her, as of the 23rd of this month most of those things will be done and over with (Bridezilla… err I mean her sisters wedding).

  She’s on the ropes as to whether she should end her internship and finish her AA or stay there and only get a technical certificate. I think that the AA degree would only help in the end if she should get out of her career field at some point in time. The degree is in biotechnology and from what she has told me there are quite a few people with that degree and no job in the industry. I’m unsure if the degree program isn’t worth her time or if the other candidates were less than sterling. Needless to say, she’s got about as much on her plate as I have on mine. It creates a significant amount of stress on the both of us and as you can imagine we can take it out on eachother. Luckily, we know that neither partner deserves the extra (and misplaced) animosity so we’re quick to cut it off.

  Ok… thats the update of sorts. Hopefully I can provide something that is actually interesting to read at a later time.

• “If only your IQ was twenty points lower”

  Date: 2007.08.17 | Category: I was too lazy to organize these | Response: 0

  So, I’ve been freaking out lately because I tend to overanalyze and stress out about almost everything. It has gotten to the point when I begin a conversation with someone I feel that I’m being yelled at even if we are just conversing normally. The anxiety is driving me mad. So, I went to a doc and talked about my situation. I told her what I had done in the past with other problems I’ve had and she asked about my lifestyle. It turns out I was doing everything right. She had no suggestions to give me. At that point, she threw out the one liner “if only your IQ was twenty points lower, you probably wouldn’t have this problem.” When things are awry, I tend to look at the situation from every angle and ask myself if one of my bad traits is causing it or if I’m letting behavior win or emotions win. In essense, she said that I’m smart enough to drive myself insane.

  So, she gave me some homework (a book to read) and I’m going to try and destress myself. I tend to get stressed about getting rid of stress so this should be a fun exercise. All of my anxiety appears to be stress related so hopefully this constant anxious feeling can go away soon. I sure hope it goes away soon or I might drive myself insane as she predicted.

• Time off

  Date: 2007.06.10 | Category: I was too lazy to organize these | Response: 1

  I’ve got a little time off in my schedule… well, at least its a little here and a little there and that should hopefully cut down on the stress. Its not that I’m under a huge time crunch or I’m so busy with one project that I can’t even think its that I am busy with a large variety of things. I can handle it as I always have and this is a great opportunity to push through the crap and get on with it. So, a short list

  1. pig bbq
  2. tech order program
  3. rewarehousing
  4. retraining
  5. my troop
  6. flare program
  7. tdy guys
  8. self inspection
  9. remote lan access
  10. target

  the list could go on for a while but its just a bunch of things…

  well, best get started