Being Wrong

No one likes to be wrong. I HATE being wrong. I'm a perfectionist, I'm OCD, I have an anxiety disorder, I am rarely wrong. Due to the events in my life, I've convinced myself that if I stay 3 steps ahead of the rest of the world that everything will be ok. It worked for the majority of my life, until I became an RA.

When applying to be an RA, they tell you you'll be overworked and underpaid, they tell you you now live in a fish bowl, and they tell you it'll be hard because you work where you live. Heck, they even tell you to expect to be called in the middle of the night. They don't tell you that you'll be called a bitch, or mean, or rude every time you document an incident. They don't tell you that residents will get you out of the shower for a trivial issue. They don't tell you that you have to be empathetic towards little situations like someone's light bulb burnt out or they dropped a toothbrush on the floor. They don't tell you that for every step forward there will be 4 steps backward. They don't tell you that you'll constantly be corrected, and that you'll rarely ever be right. They don't tell you a lot of things.

As an RA you have to humanize and de-humanize yourself at the same time. You have to develop a thick skin while at the same time be so invested in your residents that you're up when they're up and you're down when they're down. You have to put every personal issue aside if a resident needs you. Residents expect you to be a robot, because they majority of your job happens behind the scenes. They tell me I make it "look so easy." Well, you should have seen me 15 minutes ago when I had an emotional breakdown in my room. When you live where you work, you're not allowed to have a bad day, you have to be "on" 24/7. If a resident sees that your face is puffy because you've just been crying and you say you don't want to talk about it, the entire hall knows that you've been crying within 5 minutes. They ask if you're ok, but if you said why you're really upset the entire hall would know that in another 5 minutes. They don't tell you any of this in the many hours of RA training.

Now, I am grateful for my job. I've made friends I know I will have for a lifetime. I really, truly care for my residents. I started praying for them when I found out I was an RA. I pray for them daily. I do want to listen to their problems and I do want to know about their days. There are good times, like last week when I sat in the hall with 5 residents for an hour just talking about our lives, or when a resident makes a great grade on a paper you helped them with. I know I'm supposed to be a servant to God, and I should not complain, but I'm human. I worked so hard to get this position and now I'm questioning all of it. But I know I'm where God wants me to be, and I was so sure of it in August, but right now I'm asking God "why?"

For now, I guess I'll just have to get used to being wrong.