If you’d like to maintain the illusion that I am a Mad Scientist who works in a laboratory performing unspeakable experiments on smokers and tailgaters and people who litter, please do not read the rest of this post.
I am struggling with people.

In the real world, I’m a technical writer and trainer. I greatly prefer the writing side; I am one of those freaky people who truly enjoy the fine art of documentation and I like being able to translate a large pile of crud into something of use to the people around me. I’m pretty damn good at it, too. Documentation is awesome. I love technical writing.

I don’t as much enjoy the technical training, although I suppose I’m good at that too. This is where I’m struggling, and I’m not all that sure what to do about it.

In my last (horrible, soul crushing, evil, illegal) job, I was also a technical trainer – but with a difference. I worked at a software company, and part of my job was to train our new clients on how to use the software they just purchased. It was sometimes fun, sometimes frustrating, and mostly mind-numbing (but better than technical support).

In my new job (that I am still enjoying), I am a technical trainer. However, the key difference is that I’m training internal people – co-workers – instead of people who want to learn, and this difference is kicking me in the nuts.

People who want to learn > people who resist change with every fiber of their being and DO NOT WANT to change how they do things

I’m having a very hard time dealing with the bitching. There is so much bitching! I’m training, I’m trying to show people new processes or methods, and I can’t get one sentence out at a time without people complaining and freaking out. “NO ONE TOLD US HOW TO DO THIS!” “THIS ISN’T THE WAY WE NORMALLY DO IT!” “WHY DO WE HAVE TO DO IT THIS WAY?”

People who are paying to be trained do not act like this. I don’t know what to do about it without being really abrupt or just plain bitchy, like I got on my last conference call – no shit no one told you how to do this; do you not understand what a “training session” means – and I need to figure it out, quickly. I’ve proven my mad skillz in documentation. Now they’re looking to me to whip the whole company into shape, and I am daunted.

Other things are bothering me, too. Do not go on if you do not want to hear the gory details.

I am having some serious issues with recurring cysts. For the last few months, I’ve been blessed with an infected Bartholin’s cyst every two days. I’ll get a cyst, it’ll hurt and be horrible, then it will go away – and two days later, another one springs up. I’m scared and in pain and yesterday, everything sort of exploded.

Literally.

My latest cyst ruptured yesterday, while I was at work. Nothing about the word “rupture” is any good at all – the dictionary gives the following examples:

• The process or instance of breaking open or bursting: The state of being broken open.
• A hernia, especially of the groin or intestines.
• A tear in an organ or a tissue: rupture of an appendix; ligament rupture.
• A break in friendly relations.
• Pathology
• A hernia, especially of the groin or intestines.
• A tear in an organ or a tissue: rupture of an appendix; ligament rupture.

None of that is very good at all. And when it’s in your vagina? It’s hell. The cyst ruptured around noon, and it felt like someone was branding me in my girl parts with a white-hot needle. Peeing was an exercise in agony – I almost ripped a hole in my jeans trying not to scream. It was bad. Very, very bad.

This was only the second or third rupture I’ve experienced, and that is 2 or 3 times too many. I need to go to the doctor and have him deal with it, which’ll mean either getting a catheter inserted, or stitches, or having them cut pieces right out of my vagina because I get cysts on BOTH sides, not just one. And best of all? None of this guarantees that I’ll stop getting infected cysts. There isn’t any one thing that causes them, they just happen – and to an unfortunate few, they happen often. I am scared of what this could lead to, scared of it happening again, and scared of going to get it dealt with. I don’t have time to figure this out before we leave, so I’m at risk of getting more infections and cysts while we’re in Edmonton and there’s not a hell of a lot I can do about it.

And because I’m scared and upset and angry, I am not looking forward to going to Edmonton. I’m increasingly upset that I have to spend ANOTHER vacation in Edmonton when everyone else is going to exotic, fun places. There has got to be more to life than just going HOME (and not even MY home, someone else’s home) every spare chance you get – it’s such a big planet. There’s more out there. I’d like to see some of it sometime.

I don’t know if I can keep my scorn and loathing of cheese and trash from bubbling to the surface.

I was horrible to my friends last night because I was in so much pain and Ed was too busy ignoring me to notice.

Not-Steve in Gastown is an asshole.

I would like to have some fun now, please.

No sex, though – penetration would probably rupture a cyst.

I am not happy.