Stated Expectations - the Sequel

Please see previous post here for the background. Caveat: I'm not one for word-for-word as I can't remember dialogue well.

After being told to sort it out, a meeting between me and Merida was scheduled for Tuesday. I prepared as best I could. Above all I wished to avoid making her feel defensive while expressing my point of view. Which sounds achievable.

We started the session on an optimistic but slightly weird note - she apologised for mentioning to our boss once removed that I seemed to be angry at her, and she didn't know why. She thought that might have prompted Mr Peacock to get us to "sort it out". I agreed that she was probably right that it forced the issue, but it still needed to be discussed. She also said that she thought she needed to harden up - to accept the anger and ignore it. Which perplexed me because that wasn't the point.

So I wanted firstly to explore what her issues were with me. I tried to create a safe space - its just you and me, you can say whatever you want. And her main issue seemed to be with my "angry outburst". No one else gets angry at her and she doesn't understand it nor does she ever wish to experience it again. I found this weird because my version of an angry outburst involves swearing and name calling, raised voices, ranting, and arm waving. I did none of those things. I was angry. But I didnt swear, raise my voice or arm wave. I said "Ok, now stop. Now go away." With admittedly a very cold tone. Its so confusing if you live a life with my set of benchmarks anyway!

So I had written myself a list of questions, hoping to lead Merida along the path of how I think of things. It was intended to start from a viewpoint - are we equal? Should we be? Can we be? To - what is my job, with respect to you? And onwards to was there another way she could sort out her IT problems. But I didn't get a chance. At the first question - are we equal? "what do you mean?. When I got to what is my job, with respect to her she shut me down "Where are you going with this, what do you mean?" and straight into defensive posturing about her knowledge being like swiss cheese and that she was working through filling the holes where she could.

I got a sense of bitterness about doing this work which isn't what she wants to be doing. It was very much rammed down my throat that she thought I should be relieved of any responsibility for things she did or didn't do. In fact she proclaimed it loudly. And if I didn't like her requests I should just say no to them.

To be honest, that's not how I roll. If I can, I do try to help people. Not to mention Mr Peacock wants us all to help each other when we can. I don't say no to people. But that is part of the curiousness isn't it - I did tell her no more for the SQL stuff. But it didn't register. How can I say that so that people understand it?

I walked out of the meeting perplexed. I did not get to have my say at all without getting shut down with "just say no!" or "you don't have to fix my problems for me".  And I didn't manage to get any words at all out without triggering her defensiveness. But I could live with her proposed solution though it would mean feeling like I was sitting on my hands.

On reflection Merida's angry during the meeting was far higher on the angry scale for me than mine was.

The perplexed feeling lasted about 15 minutes. Until Merida emailed a bullet-pointed "summary" of what we talked about very much from her perspective. Then I was outraged and there was much ranting and tears. Fortunately not at her.  So it could've been worse. I chose not to reply to that email as I felt it would turn into an ongoing rebuttal which would not help improve the constructiveness of our relationship.

So again, I'm stuck. I want to be open with what I'm thinking and feeling. I want to help Merida to learn this stuff. But I don't want to become resentful about it. Again I find myself feeling like I'm sulking, holding back from her, which is not what I want at all.

The road to being a good human being is a long and windy one.