Friday, January 25, 2008

That Pool Again

One of the staff is a royal bitch. She is abusive and actively encourages those two ladies who feel I ought not swim in 'their lane'. So if they are so concerned about it, why don't they get into it before I do? They can walk fast! They have ample opportunity and time to get there before me. They don't. Instead they try to intimidate me to move by swimming as close as they can to me.

This morning, the guard I am referring to was stood by the side of the pool chatting with one of the bullies. She saw me. I got in and swam across to the edge where I prefer to swim. Once I got there she screamed at me to get out as she was not yet ready and had to leave the poolside! Once I am in it is not so easy to get out. I get cold very quickly and also I have taken my GTN spray so my head pounds if I don't start to move str8 away. She knows this and she deliberately engineered this episode. I did not leave the pool. I swam with vigour though, I was not a happy bunny.

Worse still, the changing room floor was filthy as it has been all week. I did not complain until today. there was an odd smell, quite whiffy, in there. Today I realised that the trolley bed thing that i put my clothes on was soaked with urine!!!!!!! Okay so now I am upset. i go and get the manger. Nice as he is, he is ineffective.

This whole thing makes me feel bad. Some of the staff, not all, ostracise me for daring to complain about their attitude and lack of service. I go in at 6.30am or 7am (as soon as they open). I always say Good Morning cheerfully, knowing full well they will turn their back on me, look away and ignore me. They swipe my card but don't even look at me. They watch me struggle to get of the pool when I am done and never offer help, they don't even get my stick. Occasionally a member of the public will. I do not expect anyone to help me, I can manage perfectly well on my own as long as people give me time to get myself out.

It makes me wonder if I am at fault. Am I being a Victor Meldrew? A grumpy old man?

I treat people with respect always, regardless of how they treat me. I refuse to allow my behaviour to be dictated by another person's behaviour.

Do I not have the right to be treated with dignity and respect? This has nothing to do with liking or disliking people. I don't know these people and they don't know me. Like has nothing to do with it. Decency and respect have everything to do with it.

Covert bullying such as this is incredibly hard to prove. I know this so well. It is the speciality of all abusive people. DENY DENY AND DENY. So the abusee is the one who appears to be crazy or the abusive one.

Like when I was a kid and I'd get my dad's fist only to be told it never happened! No wonder I have always had so much trouble with knowing what is real and what is not. I was always told my feelings were wrong, my memory was wrong, that I imagined things. That my perceptions were invalid. My feelings were invalid. I saw the elephant and it was huge and dangerous and I was constantly told it wasn't there. And others in authority colluded with this denial too. It was easier for them.

So I was in perpetual fear. Never sure how real I was or how real my surroundings were. Constantly questioning myself and acquiescing to others' reality. My first attempts at speaking out about the abuse were met with a diagnoses of paranoid schizophrenia and the cruel drugs they give for that. It was effective. It shut me up.

Other attempts at speaking out resulted in me being demonized.
Literally. Prayer meetings were held to 'deliver' me from the demons. Prayers asking that I be forgiven were the result of telling about the abuse.


Shunning of me was the end result of me trying to survive.

I have no wish to harm anyone. No wish for revenge. I wish nothing but good things for those people. It is evil that caused me to suffer and it has always been illogical to me to wish more evil!
How can any good from that?

I wish for peace. For them and for me. For us all. That is what we all want. It is senseless to think we can find it by wishing bad for others, no matter the provocation.

Oh, I get angry and in that anger I think things I would rather not and would not carry out. It is fleeting. I am human and it would be foolish indeed to pretend otherwise. I am not a saint. I sometimes imagine my car as a weapon!

Yet so much suffering has occurred. It is difficult to leave it be. I don't actively seek the memories and the feelings. they just come. I know that recently the feelings that have come up and out have needed to. They were making me ill and the expression of them has certainly made me ill. I had no choice. they erupted. I could not stop it.

This last 6 years we have had a number of foreign travel trips. I am building good memories. I need to. I want to look back and see sunny times and not this gaping black hole, squirming with anguish and slime and fear and pain and sorrow.

I am tired of it. I have often thought how nice it would be to have my memory wiped. I know in reality that would be awful but still....unless of course one could selectively forget.

I have so much good in my life. John. My number one. My dogs. My knitting. My other gift with which I help others. Financial security. Home security. I am not so disabled I can't fend for myself. I have drugs to alleviate pain. I have a brain that is still able to use the childhood trick of disassociating which does help me deal with my body. I have good friends. I can communicate and I have this wonderful thing called the Internet which really has given me so much.

I know what is done is done. I have felt it. I just wish it would f**k off now and leave me be.

Why does it insist on crawling up to the surface, gripping me with fingers of ice? Why can it not melt away? Evaporate on a breeze?

14 comments:

LizzieK8 said...

I have Asperger's Syndrome and didn't know it for 50 of my 55 years. People treated me the same way you describe. And I never knew why.

I believe, just as there are genetic victims there are genetic bullies. They seem to "smell" victims when they walk into a room and make it their life's work to remove them from their own lives.

You either need to remove yourself from them, or start writing letters and making phone calls because they are discriminating against the handicapped as well as not doing their job of keeping the facility clean.

You (nor any power on earth--and obviously not the one in heaven either) will never make them like you or even treat you well. They aren't ignorant, they are malicious.

The bottom line, is it, as my friend says, the hill you want to die on?

Know you have support whichever route you decide.

Anonymous said...

If you could wipe your brain, would you? Would you still be the person you are, and have the compassion for others that you now do? I know how you can be looking at a sunset, thinking how lovely, and WHAM get hit by the past and the pain....but that sunset is still lovely, and maybe I appreciate it more than those who don't have the ugly history.
Not that well said, but deeply felt.

krisleon said...

I hope you take it higher Colin about the staff and the disgusting changing rooms,I wish i was still down that road,we could nip round each others with our knitting,I dont wish anyone any harm either.Take Care.

Anonymous said...

Right I'm gonna have to say this Colin, these Pool incidents and especially the urinated mat of which you speak of... This is a hygene risk, you must report this at once to the environmental health people, then you must take up the issues of this bullying up with the local authorities who run this place I am not at all happy that you are being victimized but even more angry at the health and safety aspects and the high risk factors this place has put you at.. I only got as far as reading the urinated bit and that has me infuriated So please do not take this you like everyone else have rights of a good clean place to go to for swimming, goodness only knows what bugs lurk in this now dangerously filthy place

love as always...Cher

Anonymous said...

We are having very similar feelings. We're doing better, but we're not well. Let's keep plodding along, one foot before the other, together.

We have the rest of our lives to get well. We'll manage to do it. One day at a time.

Anonymous said...

Knitman, my suggestion is for you to try to find another pool Who needs aggravation like that every day???? You are a strong, talented person and should remove yourself from such mean spirited people. They are not worth your angst. It will only "eat" at you and bring you down. Life is too short to be around people who are so selfish and unfriendly.
Just MHO, but I feel for you. Bullies are people who are not worth worrying about! Good luck!

anachronist said...

Like Cher wrote,

it is a health danger that they dont keep the place clean, and best thing is to get the right place involved so this is taken care of, and they keep their place clean, else they will have to close.

It sounds as if those bullies have managed to get staff involved and ganged up against you, and this should end right there.

Is there a way for you to find witnesses of this injust behaviour of them?
one rule for 'mobbing' as it is called here is to get out in the clear and announce the injustice and have people see what those bullies do, and stand behind you.
This is not easy (I had such situations often, and suffered a lot and now just dont go places any more where people were ganging up against me), but you cant just leave this place if I remember right, because there are no other good possibilities for yout o go swimming.

I wish for you that those bullies can stop doing this and leave you alone and the place to get cleaner.
Peed on paddings are no fun and should not happen in this public place and go unnoticed.

Anonymous said...

I dislike that people can not treat each other with the respect and kindness that we all deserve. You are absolutely right to speak to peole the way you would want to be spoken to. As Thumper's mother said (from the movie Bambi)"If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."

much

fairy godmother said...

I think that the women that are treating you like this are sad. What a pathetic way to live your life, bullying others. You keep your dignity by not letting them get the best of you. And do not give up the swimming, it is good for you physically as well as mentally. Know that when you climb into that pool and they start their games, you are not alone. That we are all out there swimming right along with you. I bet those women don't have anyone on their side. :-)

Anonymous said...

You went to another pool in the past, and from your post of that experience you loved it. So, why are you still going to to the one place that treats you like dirt? Some might say that you just want to have something to complain about. Stop going there and start going to the other pool, even if it is further from the house. And if this comment causes anyone a problem here is my e-mail address: cinmar11@hotmail.com.

Tori said...

Wow, I agree with everyone here. It saddens me and still shocks me when I hear or see behaviour like this. I guess the two issues you complained about go hand in hand....The staff sure doesn't seem to care about the physical or emotional well being of their clients. I hope there's another better club you can join! I LOVE your Aran. The color compliments it so well. Also had to laugh about the January One blog. She is pretty funny and tells it how she sees it! Take care!

Tori said...

Wow, I agree with everyone here. It saddens me and still shocks me when I hear or see behaviour like this. I guess the two issues you complained about go hand in hand....The staff sure doesn't seem to care about the physical or emotional well being of their clients. I hope there's another better club you can join! I LOVE your Aran. The color compliments it so well. Also had to laugh about the January One blog. She is pretty funny and tells it how she sees it! Take care!

Unknown said...

Colin,
I agree with others that the health issues must be dealt with by the authorities who have the power to take care of those matters.

All people have a right to be treated with dignity and respect. However, often people refuse to treat others that way. Sometimes it is a natural cruelty; at other times it is a result of fear. I think the 'ladies' are naturally cruel. Ladies is a loose term referring to gender only.

Anonymous said...

I don't understand why people need to be mean to others. I know that sounds simplistic, but I don't get it. I am a school librarian in an inner city school and here in the states we have been celebrating Kindness Week in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King's birthday. We've been talking about people who are mean to other people-especially if someone needs a little extra help or time to do something. If my little kids can get it, why can't adults? Melinda