Anger

I try really hard NOT to get angry about things. I am surrounded by clients who live in anger for all sorts of reasons, and I have rarely found that responding to their anger with my own to be productive. So, I do lots of anger stuffing during the course of my work.

At the moment, though, I am angry. Not at clients, but at the administration of my facility that has ignored my requests for things like a scent policy and WORKING AIR CONDITIONING in my music therapy room. I have been asking for both of these things to happen for years and years.

Yesterday, I sent a polite and firm email refusing to work in the music therapy room until there was some sort of air circulation and temperature management in the room. I am currently under doctor's orders to stay in the air conditioning due to the illness that I have had since May 20th. My doctor wanted me to stay home and not work because of my illness, but I have a new intern. This is not the first time I have been sick since starting to ask for the air conditioning to be fixed, but it is the worst that I have been sick. I cannot seem to get better, and I suspect that the fact that my room is consistently 10 degrees hotter than any other space in the facility has something to do with my pulmonary challenges. 

My anger comes from the fact that this is something that I have asked to be fixed over and over and over again. I feel like I have been ignored and that makes me furious!

Today, I will be making a decision about whether I can be in the music therapy room for the five sessions that I have scheduled. I may not be able to do it. We will see.

Yesterday, when I left the music therapy space, the temperature had gone down two degrees (still not comparable to other spaces in the facility, but going the right way), but the system that had not been on for two+ years was cranking away. It is the first time that the co-workers in my room area have actually heard the sound of the air conditioning (they've been with us for 2.5 and 2 years respectively). Interesting, isn't it? They didn't know that the air conditioning wasn't on because they didn't know what the air conditioning sounded like.

I am angry. I am angry that I put in 9 requests for the air conditioning to be fixed that were ignored. Sure, someone from maintenance would come in and look at the broken thermometer and then say, "well, we can't find a replacement part." My attitude? "Well, then call someone else to FIX this system!" Yesterday, the maintenance guy had the audacity to tell me that he was going to rig the system so I would the coldest I have ever been in the room. I laughed because that hasn't happened in over 2 years.

I am angry that I am sick. I am angry that I have been ignored. I am angry that the air conditioning didn't get fixed when I first asked for it to be fixed. I am angry that I am now having to go to lung specialists because of all of this. I am angry that I cannot take sick time for illnesses that are exacerbated by the work environment that I have endure.

Anger.