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Home » The Vine

The Vine: January 12, 2011

Submitted by on January 12, 2011 – 10:42 AM40 Comments

My boss is a lovely human being. He cares about his employees, hosts a kick-ass holiday party every year, and is really a good man. But all his good cheer can’t erase the fact that at least five times a day I am called to his office to help with copy-and-paste functions, inability to print to our copier, changing font colors, and my personal favorite: finding and attaching documents to emails.

Can you and the Vine give me some mantras and coping techniques? I found myself being curt and somewhat rude to him last week as I showed him for (what felt like) the fiftieth time how to complete his electronic timesheet. I realize that he is my boss, and this is my job, and as long as I’m here, these are some of my duties (I became his de-facto assistant after his administrative assistant was laid off). But I do resent how much of my workday is spent showing him (and having him perform with my supervision) very simple computer-processing functions, with no retention of the instructions.

Part of my job is to make sure he works as efficiently as possible, so it is counterproductive for me to decline to assist him. Formal training from our IT department has not been useful to him, either, so there are no professional interventions available. I honestly can’t tell if he has a technological learning impairment (he can otherwise conduct business effectively), or if he is just so dependent on outside help that he won’t try and troubleshoot on his own.

Forehead, meet keyboard

Dear Fore!,

I’ve had the same reaction to proofreading assignments on occasion — it’s not rational, but I’ve gotten to the umpteenth iteration of “two year-old” and grumped out loud, “Hel-lo, you hyphenate the entire phrase, figure it out!” while scrawling a brusque “NO” in the margin.

This is where the issue arises, I believe — expecting a client or a tech-impaired boss to “learn.” Not that your boss can’t learn to fill out his timesheet on his own, or find the reply-all field by himself; if he’s intelligent and competent enough to have become the boss, he could probably figure it out. Your peace of mind, however, depends on assuming that he won’t, and on not taking that personally. He’s not doing it on purpose, but he doesn’t have to learn; he has you.

Work on accepting that. When you start feeling annoyed, try taking a quick break, whatever that entails (going to get a snack; breathing deeply for a count of three), and reminding yourself that he’s not trying to bug you. He’s trying to get his job done too, and it’s a team effort. Repeat “gracious and responsive, gracious and responsive,” roll your eyes at yourself, plaster on a fake smile, and march in there to get it done.

You can try to train up your boss a little bit in certain ways; it sounds like he interrupts you frequently for help on minor tasks, so see if you can’t schedule him on that stuff. For instance, if his timesheet is due every two weeks on Thursday morning, put a ten-minute item in his calendar every other Thursday, during which you just take care of it. You can schedule other things the same way; you might mention to him that it’s more efficient for both of you if you can merge a bunch of these task requests, and see if he wouldn’t mind waiting until he has three admin things on a Post-It instead pulling you off another task to deal with each one individually.

Another strategy that can work is writing every single step of a given task down — on note cards with little arrows, or with colored tape flags, whatever works — under the pretense of preparing him for “when you go on vacation” or “just in case you get sick,” and then, once he has the note cards, sensing when he’s about to ask you to help him forward an email and disappearing to the ladies’ to see if he can’t sort it out himself. I’ve had mixed success with that (a boss once called me at home to demand that I walk him through…the process of getting an outside line) (…seriously), so the real key is to remember that 1) he’s not doing it to irritate you, but 2) he’s not going to stop doing it, either, so 3) look for ways to consolidate the flailing somewhat. Good luck.

I will try to keep this simple. I know I need to see a therapist (or some kind of professional) because I’ve been struggling with depression and social and general anxiety for a long time. I’ve had some success with previous therapists but nothing earth-shattering so once again, I’m on a quest.

But lately especially over the past few months), I’m worried that I’m having obsessive thoughts. It’s like my mind gets stuck on one loop and that loop is: I am gay (I’m a single woman, if that helps with background info). But my mind literally gets stuck on that loop, over and over again. The only way I can really describe it is, I’m sitting here with my brain repeating to itself, “I am gay” over and over again while I’m simultaneously thinking, “Damn, I would go for that new guy at work if I had half a chance!”

I’ve had boyfriends. I’ve had sex with guys although it was only with one guy, two years ago. That was my first time, in my mid-20s, even though I’d had boyfriends before. I had a variety of reasons for waiting so long: the social anxiety/depression (although I didn’t realize how large a role that played in my teenage years); personal comfort (for lack of a better word); emotional maturity; not dating very much; not feeling comfortable around guys; and even to some extent, my religious beliefs. I was raised Roman Catholic and still practice although I privately disagree with the church’s teachings on things like abortion, gay marriage, divorce, etc.

So yes, for a while I just didn’t want to deal with sex while in high school; then I thought I might actually wait until marriage anyway as some kind of “personal pride” thing; then I said “fuck it” (quite literally, as it turned out). I haven’t had sex since that boyfriend and I broke up. I’d like to rectify that but I just seem to be so socially awkward around people, especially guys. I feel like I don’t know how to flirt and wouldn’t recognize flirting if it painted itself purple and danced naked on top of a harpsichord, singing “Flirting is here again!” One-night stands aren’t really my thing, and every potential guy I meet turns out to be not single or otherwise not interested so…no sex or close romantic relationships since spring 2009. Sigh.

I’m also, in general, an introverted person. As much as I like going out to a restaurant or the occasional bar, I also like sitting at home with a good book sometimes, even if it’s on a Saturday night. I’m cool with the theory that human sexuality is a moving spectrum of relationships and preferences and that most people probably aren’t as firmly in one camp as they think (in fact, I think I read something like that on Tomato Nation once). So if I am gay, then fine. That doesn’t make me feel better, though. It doesn’t stop this near-constant loop in my head. But I loved my last boyfriend (and found him attractive in That Way too). There are quite a few guys I know whom I find attractive That Way too. (The one I like the most though, isn’t interested in me, as far as I can tell).

I guess, what my question/problem is: how can I just be happy? I’m worried that I actually do have some kind of OCD/compulsive thought process or something. Because honestly, do people who are gay keep up a running mental monologue of, “I’m gay, I’m gay, I’m gay, hey, I’m gay” all the damn time? Even when they don’t want to? That can’t be normal, right? Replace that with “my hands are dirty” or “I need to count the windows” and you’ve got yourself compulsion disorders, in my opinion.

So I know I need to see a therapist. I’m worried that a therapist will focus on the sexuality part and say, “Ohh, you just need to come out of the closet and then you’ll be all better!” I know that’s not true. There have been other times in my life where I’ve noticed obsessive/compulsive tendencies, even if they’re not as severe. Usually, it’s something more mild like always having to push a chair in, even if I’m just walking through a room. Or if I start watching a new (to me) show in mid-season, I have to then catch up to it, even if it means watching 13 episodes in a day.

Then there’s the whole issue of: well, if I really am gay, then what? Will my family accept me? Will my friends? If the answers to those questions are “no,” then I really don’t know if I can handle that. I know I should just say “to hell with them” if that’s the case but I don’t know if I can.

So I guess it comes down to: I am attracted to guys, I want to be with guys (more specifically, A Guy but he’s not into me so I’d better let that dream go), I just want to be happy in my own skin but I don’t know how.

I’m sorry this letter has been so long. If you can’t help, I totally understand. I suspect I know the answer anyway (“get therapy”) but it’s nice to have an impartial sounding board that isn’t my diary. Thank you and happy New Year,

I want to be happy but I don’t know how

Dear Happy,

Yes, get therapy. You suffer from depression and anxiety — two sides of the same coin, most of the time — and you’ve started having compulsive thoughts as a way of controlling the chaos in your brain. Hundreds of thousands of people have variations on those problems; talking to a professional and getting some medication to pop you out of that rut will really help.

It’s not going to brand you as A Crazy, and it’s not necessarily going to last forever, but you should really do it ASAP. Obsessing about your own obsessing is, I can tell you firsthand, no way to live, and you deserve better than that.

I have no idea whether you’re gay, but frankly, I doubt it. I think your brain has regrooved some neural pathways in a negative way, and seized on an issue that you think is stigmatizing or something you wouldn’t be able to handle — I think it has nothing to do with actually wanting to do it with the ladies, and everything to do with your apprehension about life, sexuality, the approval of your family, and so on and so forth. It’s all coming from that same anxious, uncertain place. If I’m wrong, and you are gay, hey, nobody around here gives a shit. Hang out, maybe meet a nice girl in the comments. We’re here for you — but I really don’t think that’s the deal.

Any half-decent therapist will immediately see the deal, whatever it is, and if you don’t want her to get sidetracked by the I’m Gay script, just lead with the anxiety part, and talk about that for awhile. Then mention that you have repetitive thoughts, and that this know-it-all advice columnist you read doesn’t think it’s relevant to your sexuality (heh), but you’re worried about the inability to untrack the thought once it starts repeating in your head.

Talk therapy will help you feel less isolated, and effective medications exist that can break that cycle of feeling out of control and fixated. Professional counselors totally know what this is, and can get you on the road to feeling more assured and at peace pretty quickly. Start calling around today, because this is completely manageable, and more to the point, you can completely manage it.

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40 Comments »

  • Cara says:

    Forehead – I feel you. I am also my boss’s personal tech support. He’s not technically inclined and he genuinely does not have time to figure out these problems on his own. I totally agree with the strategy of accumulating tasks and making a schedule for assistance. It takes a bit of the pressure off both of you and might help to force him out of his learned helplessness a bit.

    I know that it’s frustrating to take time out of your day to deal with something YOU know is simple but it’s probably frustrating to your boss to require your help all the time. On the plus side, if he’s anything like my boss, he thinks you are some sort of mystical genius for knowing how to do all these things.

  • Karen says:

    There *is* a variant of OCD that involves obsessive thoughts of things that maybe aren’t even true — like fears that you’re going to do something to hurt a child, or drive off the road, or things like that. Even though you know you would never hurt a child, or aren’t suicidal. So, it’s not beyond the pale that obsessive thoughts of “I’m gay” mean that you have obsessive thoughts, not that you’re gay (of course, it would be fine if you were, but it’s just a really different kind of issue). So, you might want to try presenting it that way to a therapist.

  • Esi says:

    Hi Happy–for what it’s worth (which, in a situation like this, is probably a lot), you’re not alone: http://jezebel.com/5671032/homosexuality-ocd-an-obsession-with-orientation

  • cv says:

    Happy – see if you can find a therapist that works with OCD patients (there’s a good list at the OCD foundation website, I think), and also someone who knows something about cognitive behavioral therapy. General talk therapy is great, and might help you with some of the social anxiety and whatever family issues are underlying some of what you wrote, but CBT can be really helpful with OCD. You and your therapist, working together, can find methods and exercises to re-train your brain to short-circuit the loops in your head that are on continuous repeat right now.

    Also, as a gay woman, I spend pretty much zero time thinking “I’m gay,” just like I don’t spend a lot of time thinking “I’m of medium height and have brown hair,” or whatever. It just is. It certainly comes up in conversation and affects my worldview and life choices, but I don’t just sit around thinking about the fact of my sexuality without any other context.

  • Valerie says:

    Happy – I just want to say that you seem cool. Smart, funny, and self-aware. Somebody I’d like to be friends with. I hope that helps, a little.

  • Marie says:

    @ Forehead – As someone who had to take a trip from Boston to NYC to explain how an Excel spreadsheet works (“Where is the data on the rates this was charged at?” “That would be in the column marked ‘Rates’…”), I feel you. Sars offers excellent suggestions as usual, and I would also add that in these unstable economic times you label this “job security” and repeat that mantra when you are asked to perform basic tasks. :)

    @ Happy – I second the recommendation for therapy, and would only add that there also are therapists that specialize in anxiety disorders with a behavioral focus, which is effective when combined with the drugs/talk therapy. These doctors give you “homework”, specific tasks to perform to help combat your compulsions/obsessions. Just a thought, since it seems that you’ve seen some therapists in the past.

  • Rebecca U says:

    Forehead – perhaps screenshots could help as well. The way I learn is to make the screenshot documents (nothing fancy, print the screenshot and write down the instructions for that screen on that printout, then do the next screen, repeat), follow them once or twice and then I have it down. At any rate, you could give them to him under the “mac truck” theory (as in, if I get hit by a mac truck tomorrow the office will fall apart but at least you’ll have these).

  • Grace says:

    I could have written most of both these letters at different times in my life, but I’ll limit my reply to this phrase, “I’m worried the therapist will…”. Then fire the therapist and try another one. I wish someone had told me this years and years ago; doctors are just like any other trained professionals you hire. If you don’t like the services s/he provides, don’t go back. It’s okay. If you tell a hairstylist you just want a trim and he insists you really need a purple buzzcut, you’d walk out, right? There’s nothing magical about medical professionals – you’re still the customer, and you’re still in charge.

  • Profreader says:

    I was an assistant to someone, once upon a time, who was so unused to word processors (vs. typewriters) that he put a carriage return at the end of every line. Editing his documents was a nightmare, as you can imagine; I ended up just taking his longhand copy and typing it myself. (This was mid-90s; I don’t think Word had as good of a find-and-replace function as it does now, or I would have just removed all the carriage returns.)

    The suggestion to gather up a number of tasks to be done together is good, so you aren’t interrupting your flow. I also found some peace in the tactic of not expecting the person to learn — to just know that this is your function. I did find it helpful to do a mini-narration as part of the routine when I was helping someone — not in a “I’m teaching you” way, and definitely not in a condescending way. More like: “And we hit the attachment button, hit the browse button, find the document — what did you say it was called? — click that, and voila.” Saying the same thing every time, like a ritual, actually helped my various tech-challenged bosses grasp it through sheer rote learning. I came to understand that they generally did not have a mental construct about how the computer/email/the internet worked — to them, it was just a “magic box” until they understood it conceptually.

    Short version: you’re bringing daily aid and enlightenment. Try to enjoy that part of it, as much of a grind as I know that can get to be.

  • ferretrick says:

    Forehead-when you go to his office and help him, do you push him out of the way and run the mouse and keyboard yourself? If so, that may be part of the problem. I’ve found in cases like this, when you step in and do it, even if you verbalize what you are doing, the person tunes out or just gets overwhelmed. Next time he asks for help, stand back from the computer and give him verbal instructions, but make him do the keyboard and mouse clicking and he will probably retain it better. And then each time you show him how to do a task, allow longer and longer pauses between each verbal step to see if he’ll come up with the next one by himself. It’s frustrating for you in the short term, because it will take ten minutes to do something that would take you 30 seconds, but hopefully over the long haul he’ll start learning to figure things out for himself. Task training is best done hands on, and by making the person do it themselves rather than doing it for them.

    @Happy-I tend to agree with Sars that you are not gay, and I wonder if the obsessive thinking is some kind of subconscious thing your brain is doing to distract you from dealing with your fear of men. (Same as crushing on the person who’s obviously not interested-that’s a Vine classic I’ve done myself-he’s safe to crush on, because there’s no chance it actually will go somewhere and you’d have to deal with your intimacy issues). But, regardless, yes, even if you are gay, obsessive thoughts about it is not normal (believe me, I know :)

    But hey, we could be wrong and you could be gay. But the obsessive thinking about it is not healthy and it’s keeping you from being happy. Seek a behavioral therapist who specializes in compulsive disorders and ask for techniques to cope with your thoughts. In any case, until you figure it out worrying about family/friends is premature. Completely understandable, but unproductive. When you feel ready for it, start dating-men and women-and see who you click with. You’ll find out.

  • Melissa says:

    Happy – I second (third? fourth?) the suggestion of seeking therapy ASAP. I think a therapist will want to focus on your sexuality, because I think that really is the root of the issue here. I agree with Sars that it sounds like you’re not gay, per se, but maybe uncomfortable with sex in general? Is it possible that you are having these OCD feelings of “I’m gay” as some way of trying to justify your minimal experience with sex? I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with the lack of sexual activity in your life, but it sounds like you think it’s a problem, and it suggests a deeper issue than “Am I gay or not?”. There is a spectrum of sexuality that goes beyond straight or gay – some people, frankly just aren’t into the act of sex itself and prefer to experience intimacy with another person in other ways. Maybe this is the issue – but this is something that you definitely need a therapist to identify and work through.

  • Jen S 1.0 says:

    I’ve gotta sympathise with Boss, because I am a complete and total tech idiot. It’s held me back severely in life–I’m 39 and take pizza orders–because I really, really have no idea how to do most things on a computer. If it involves more than “point” and “click” I’m lost.

    And I bet Boss feels a lot like Happy does about it: the longer you go not understanding, the stupider you feel, and the more useless it seems to even start to try, particularly as the tech revolution moves expodentially faster and faster and FASTER…any class you could take feels like it’s obsolete before you even write the check (see? I write checks! And ride a stegasaurus to work!)

    My money is on Boss feeling the twinge of idiocy and hurt pride every time he realizes he’s got no idea how to do something basic, again, so he has to call in this woman who’s young enough to be his daughter/little sister over and over, and it’s bad enough that she knows how dumb he is so he can’t possibly ask anyone else for help so she gets her workday fragmented because he’s SO STUPID…

    So maybe tell yourself this is hard on Boss, too, as you organize the index cards and such. It really is embarrassing to go through life this way.

  • anonymous just in case... says:

    Happy, I’ll second that Jezebel article as a must-read. & for what it’s worth, my high-school boyfriend had a bunch of obsessive tendencies (that he claimed to have inherited from his mom). a lot of them were strange, but the biggest was that he was obsessed with the possibility that he might be gay, & would create all these OCD “rules” around it–that if X arbitrary thing (like a coin toss or when a bus came or something) did or didn’t happen, it “meant” he was gay.

    …I’m pretty sure he wasn’t actually attracted to men, & that (as Sars suggested) it was more tied up in his self-perception, masculine identity, (possible) sexual insecurity, & worries over how others would accept/treat him–i.e., “if I’m not a ‘good enough’ man, maybe that means I’m actually gay*”.

    as he described them to me, they sounded EXACTLY the same as what you’ve been dealing with. & he never saw a therapist or anything while I knew him (I guess having sex with a girl was enough of a “cure” as far as he was concerned) but he probably should’ve, & I hope you do too, so you stop feeling so tormented. best of luck!

    *it goes without saying, for the record, the idea that homosexuality denotes any kind of personal inferiority or mental imbalance is a belief that I wholeheartedly reject.

  • Bubbles says:

    Forehead, I know exactly where you are coming from. My boss saw me use a keyboard shortcut to minimize all the open windows I had down to the taskbar, and I swear she was about to call me a witch or something. She joked that she thought IT was dodging her calls. Yeah, I was talking to some of them one day, and sure enough one of the guys told me that when they saw her number they wouldn’t always pick up. I agree with Rebecca U., don’t just make the boss flashcards, do up a manual type thing with screenshots. For the time sheets, at least, that has a wider application in that you can point new hires at it as well. Deep breaths and hang in there. There was a definite skill gap in my office, and those of us who could work these newfangled computer machines were continually grumbling that a computer test needed to be made part of the interview process.

  • Soylent says:

    @forehead How are you at writing simple macros for Word? Maybe some of these tasks could just be automated.

    I sit next to someone with really limited computer skills who used to struggle every week to email her column to our editor.

    In the end, I recorded a little macro that automates “go up to file and select send as an attachment”and so now all she has to do is click on the smiley face button I put on her tool bar and enter the boss’ name in the to part of the email. So much easier when we don’t have to waste time finding where she saved a given document.

    I know, I know “give a man a fish etc” but some people get such blocks about computers that it’s impossible to break through and it means she doesn’t have to feel terrible about interrupting me all the time and I don’t interrupted as much. As a plus, she goes around telling everyone how great I am, with my incredible computer skills.

  • Jennifer says:

    When I was in high school (disclaimer: I probably have dyscalculia), I’d have to go in for math tutoring every damn day by the teacher and I forgot everything they said by the next day. So I think I’ve got some sympathy for your boss, especially since there are a few things at my job that I’m like that on too and the other guy I work with just does them.

    I think Sars has the right idea. I don’t know if you can just 100% take over doing those things for him, but if it it at all possible, you should just do them on your own. He’s trying to learn it and he just CAN’T, so pretending that showing him over and over again is going to do the job is serving no one. I realize the awkwardness of “Look, you can’t do it, so just let me” is weird when it’s a boss, but hell, he’d probably be relieved as long as higher management doesn’t figure out what you’re doing.

  • Shannon says:

    Forehead – I’ll second the recommendation of screen shots. I used to work at an office where I was the go-to tech support for a lot of clients. I created documents with step-by-step instructions and a screen shot to go along with each one, including arrows and big red boxes around the important things. It took a while to pull it all together, but it kept people from asking the same questions over and over again. As an added bonus, it impressed my boss because if you can get them printed out in color, it looks pretty nice.

  • Wehaf says:

    Happy – cv is right; you should probably seek out a therapist trained in CBT. CBT will help you root out the underlying causes of your anxieties and address them directly.

    (If you’re not familiar with CBT, a good article about it is here: http://www.theamericanscholar.org/the-doctor-is-in/#more-5299 )

  • amacampbell says:

    Forehead: my mom is one of those people. I think she wants to learn but she gets frustrated and just starts muttering “these stupid things.” What has worked is that she now has a notebook for her computer questions and we’ll write down very specific directions. Very specific. Very detailed.

    To write them, I’ll sit at her computer without her (even though we both have MacBooks, she has things set up differently, etc.) and go through the process step by step. I write down everything I do. If I assume *anything*, then she’ll not do a step, etc. Also, along the way, I look for things that might go wrong (what if a different button is selected, that kind of thing.) It always shocks me how many steps there are to “simple” tasks, but when you’re used to doing something, you might think it’s obvious but then you’ll get the “I didn’t know you had to highlight it first!” call.

    I will then hand over the notebook and say, “Now you do it. I’ll be right here if you have any questions, but I won’t say anything to help.” If there are any questions, then you have to add to the instructions.

    With my mom, she’s actually thrilled when she’s finally figured it out. That said, I still get the calls and I’m sure you will as well.

  • Holly says:

    Happy, may I suggest getting a book on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)? I’ve found it a very helpful way to break damaging thought cycles. This is, of course, until you can get a therapist.

  • Forehead says:

    Hi everyone, original poster here.

    Thank you all for the support and advice for making the situation work with my technophobe boss! Those of you who pointed out that he is probably embarassed by his neediness are spot on. I have tried some variation of suggestions provided here, but haven’t been consistent with any one approach, which may be part of the problem.

    And yes, my role as his personal tech support has raised his opinion of me–he will introduce me to colleagues in our field with the reverential whisper, “…and she knows how to use Powerpoint!”

    The irony of it all is that I’m not particularly tech-savvy myself. I don’t own a smartphone, still pay my bills with checks, and cannot figure out how to operate the Calendar function on my Gmail account.

    And finally, I really appreciate that no one felt the need to tell me, “be grateful you even have a job!” Someone in my department was unexpectedly laid off yesterday, so trust me, I know and count my blessings!

  • heatherkay says:

    I end up doing this quasi-tech-support for Microsoft Office for a lot of people in my office. Half the time, I just look it up in Help, then cut and paste the answer out of Help. I blame Microsoft for turning off all the menus. People don’t see that something is an option because they’ve never done it before, so it doesn’t show up on their menus. They don’t even know what to call tasks to look it up in Help because they’ve never seen it on a menu.

    Also, some people are just not curious. If they don’t need to look it up (because they can just ask you), they don’t care if they know how to do it or not.

  • rab01 says:

    Happy – Therapists aren’t perfect but I doubt any decent ones will fixate on any single issue – certainly mine didn’t. I have no opinion on whether or not you are gay but … your letter didn’t mention being attracted to any women in your life.

    Dating can be difficult when you’re depressed and it can remain difficult even when you are largely on the other side of it (speaking from experience here). I made excuses to not date. In my case, my biggest was that my divorce wasn’t final yet (even though my ex did not feel any similar impediment). Your mind may be “helping” you out by giving you an alternate reason for not dating so that you don’t have to think about the real root cause – which might be that you just don’t feel like it.

    I agree with you and everyone here that you should talk to a therapist. That said, please don’t go into it expecting the therapist or some pill to immediately make you happy. It might work that way but becoming happy will probably still be on you.

    For me, the pills and initial therapy basically helped me go from “depressed” to actively “sad.” If depression is a gray cloud dulling one’s enjoyment of and participation in life, the treatment helped me see through that cloud but didn’t make me happy about what I saw. For me, going from “no longer depressed” to “happier” required not just therapy but also re-knitting friendships that I’d allowed to fray, becoming much more physically active, making some new friends and changing jobs.

  • CJ says:

    Forehead – I had this thought before reading your reply, but you have excellent job security if your boss literally cannot function without you. I once worked in an office where one department started subversively taking on a task my department could cover because it meant they could log more hours. Pretty soon, my department wasn’t allowed to do that task anymore. It had been a trojan horse kind of thing all along! So, if he values your technical skill that much, and it doesn’t devastate your productivity (especially if he can condense these sessions or schedule them, like Sars suggested), you have a bit of a silver lining…

  • meara says:

    Happy, I was very similar to how you describe your dating situation when I hit my early 20s (Catholic, not much opportunity in high school, more in college), and at some point I did sorta start thinking “I’m gay I’m gay I’m gay”…because I was (am). But I also wasn’t super into guys (they’re OK for kissing, but anything more? Meh…whereas once I tried girls I knew I was in the right place, as it were!) You, OTOH, seem convinced you like the boys, so, probably not the same. :)

    And if you want to try the gay? Just try it! Really, if you don’t like it, you don’t have to stick with it. It’s not like you try it (be that a date or kissing or more) once and can’t ever go back to boys! (But as everyone else said, probably sounds like therapy more than opening a new OKCupid profile or something!)

  • Daisie says:

    Happy, I can tell you that as someone who has OCD and knows a few others who do as well, your thought groove sounds completely an obsessive funk. I know that when I’m fulminating about some underlying anxiety in my life, my brain will often translate it into an obsessive thought about something either completely unrelated or only tangentially so, as if ruminating on that thought will somehow channel the general anxiety into that one direction.

    I can also tell you that it doesn’t work. The obsessive thoughts do nothing except to feed back into the same obsession and deepening the mental rut you’re in. I agree that you should be able to find a CBT therapist who can help you deal with these issues, and it seems to me that any good therapist will be able to help you deal with *both* of these things (anxiety/OCD and sexuality) as separate issues and help you see how they fit together, if at all.

    I also want to put in a plug for drugs like Zoloft. I’ve been on Zoloft for nearly 10 years now for my OCD, and it really is a marvel. It’s good for generalized anxiety and social anxiety as well. It doesn’t change anything fundamental about me, but it basically allows me to put aside the obsessive thoughts when they start up, like “okay, let me stop thinking about that for ten minutes and if it’s still bothering me, I’ll come back to it,” and more often than not, the thought doesn’t come back. Amazing.

  • Emma says:

    ~There *is* a variant of OCD that involves obsessive thoughts of things that maybe aren’t even true — like fears that you’re going to do something to hurt a child, or drive off the road, or things like that.~

    That one happens to me now and again, and I actually had a nasty episode with it a couple of years back wherein something I’d really been looking forward to was about to happen, but I got a notion stuck in my head of doing something very specific and horrible to fuck it up.

    I spent the better part of two hours in absolute misery, thinking what an awful person I was to have even thought of this thing in the first place, what an awful person I was that I couldn’t *stop* thinking about it, and furious that all of this was making me so unhappy that it was going to spoil the much-anticipated event, not to mention that I’d still be thinking this terrible thing DURING said event, and the more guilty and angry I felt, the more my mind kept going back to the same place.

    Then (and to this day I don’t even know what made me think of it, but damn I’m grateful) I happened to think about a scene in a book by my favorite author wherin the guilty party does something similar but vastly worse than what I was thinking about.

    And I realized that for this author to write this scene, the thing had to occur to her – this horrible, cruel notion had to float into her brain as an idea for what the villain should do. Would I consider her a bad person because it did? Of course not. So that meant I wasn’t a bad person either.

    And…that was it. I stopped caring, the idea faded in importance, and by the time what I was looking forward to happened, it was just a stray thought that I paid no attention to.

    It’s been a non-issue since. Somehow, making a command decision that I flatly refuse to feel guilty for random thoughts that pop into my head stopped those thoughts from getting stuck on the ‘don’t think about an elephant’ loop.

    LW#2, try pretending your brain is the technophobic boss in Letter#1. As in, there’s no way you can *force* it to stop doing things that annoy you, so the less you care about its antics, the happier you’ll be.

    Disclaimer: I have no psychological training, and the above situation may have been just me being weird instead of an actual, valid problem, so the ‘solution’ may not work for someone who DOES have a valid problem, but then again, worth a shot.

  • exilednzer says:

    I also have sympathy with Forehead’s boss, because I am fairly bad at remembering how to do techy things until I’ve done them quite a few times. So I totally second the suggestions to write step-by-step instructions, with screen grabs. It really works for me.

  • Leia says:

    I work in a tech-y field and some of the things we do are more complex, but there’s a big difference between “driving” or not when you’re doing something new. And sometimes the attitude of the people with you. Someone looming over you barking out commands? Not so good. Someone sitting next to you, typing it for you, not so good for remembering (although it takes the pressure off). Someone sitting next to you, relaxed, offering some extra explanation as you go (okay, let’s click the My attachments button, the one that looks like stacked folders–sort of bumpy rectangles), usually the best.

    Of course, as Sars pointed out, it helps when the person is willing to learn it and willing to make some mistakes on their own (that “enough to be dangerous” point). You can lead a horse to water…

  • April says:

    If the Boss is willing to learn to do things on her own, something we did for my mom was sit down when we had some time and let her “drive” the computer AND write down directions in her own words as she went, in a physical notebook. She wanted to learn how to send an email. So we had to open up Outlook. But instead of me writing down something like “double click the Outlook icon,” she would write down things like “click the yellow envelope picture twice really fast.” Then she had a guide that she actually understood and didn’t need to call us for every little thing.

  • exilednzer says:

    Actually, the stories of Boss and other technically-challenging people are bringing back memories of my mother calling me when she first bought a computer, asking me how to ‘highlight’ something with the mouse. However, as I was in London and she was in New Zealand, I suggested that she might want to ask one of my sisters to actually sit with her and demonstrate – it was fairly hard to describe over the phone…

  • funtime42 says:

    Not certain what motion we’re on for the screenshots, so I’ll just add my voice to the chorus. I make these kind of handouts as part of my job. Use the drawing tool and add red circles to the selection he needs to pick (odd, but after years of doing this, I’ve discovered red circles work best). I write the steps in one column and add the screen shots on the right side. If that isn’t an option, put the steps first, then the pictures – it will let him read those then see the picture and help drive it home.

    If you need to brush up on your own skills, Microsoft’s training videos have improved dramatically with each updated version of Office. Most other software has training online as well.

    Finally, for those times when you think “Oh dear gods, how does he not remember this?!”, pretend you work for Nordstrom’s. Those people can glide through anything and always seem so calm when confronted with anything.

  • Happy (trying to be) says:

    Hi everyone! Letter Writer #2 here. Thank you so much for all of your advice and comments. Since I sent my letter in, there have been some improvements. I’d already talked to my primary doctor about going back on an anti-depressant so I’ve been on Zoloft for almost a month. I’ve found a new therapist and my first appointment with her is next Monday. (I was seeing a different therapist in the fall but the logistics of trying to get from my office to hers after work via mass transit was crazy). The new therapist does seem to handle OCD and anxiety issues; I’m not sure about cognitive behavioral therapy so I’ll look into that. I already feel better; I don’t know if that’s from the Zoloft or just the knowledge that I’m working on the problem.

    @Melissa: I think you may be onto something there. Before I had sex, I was getting to the point where I felt like a huuuuuuge freak because here I was, mid-twenties and still a virgin. What the hell was wrong with me, right? Then I had sex—and began obsessing about how I’d only slept with one guy so far so what the hell was wrong with me? (Yes, I’m picking up a pattern here). The “crushing on a guy who’s not interested” could be a separate Vine letter because for a while I thought he might be interested too. But now I think he’s not so…back to the drawing board, I guess. (Maybe it’s for the best. We’re co-workers and while coworker romances aren’t banned here, it definitely could get messy and then I’d be seriously cheesed off at myself).

    Thanks again, Sarah and everyone else!

  • exilednzer says:

    Yay Happy! It sounds like you have made huge strides forward already. Best of luck with everything.

  • meltina says:

    *seconds the yay! for Happy*

    It probably is the Zoloft, as it’s the stripe of antidepressants that’s usually the go-to in cases of anxiety and/or OCD comorbidity (i.e., when depression and anxiety and/or OCDs are all bundled up together). When Zoloft works, it helps you be more comfortable in your own skin, instead of trapped in your own mind, as my therapist aptly puts it.

    That said, I’m glad you’re also doing talk therapy and considering CBT, because learning non-medication coping techniques is always useful, even though some people opt out of it once they go on medication, not understanding that it’s not really an either/or situation, and that your needs over time can change. I had to go off my meds while pregnant, and without ongoing talk therapy I would have probably slid completely back into anxiety/depression, instead of being able to hang in there long enough to get through my unmedicated period.

    Hope things keep getting better for you!

  • autiger23 says:

    So, Forehead’s easiest options have pretty much been covered here, but as an IT geek of thirteen years, I like to offer software suggestions as well. Adobe has software called Captivate that you can actually record each process you go through for the boss and have it where he can click it, watch it run him through the task, pause where he need to, and then move on. It can also be pretty handy for teaching a whole group of people in your office how to to something new, for certain tasks that all newbies must be trained on, etc. It’s $800 so not real cheap, but if you have enough times you need it, it’s handy.

    http://www.adobe.com/products/captivate/

    PS- I don’t work for Adobe and there could be something similar/cheaper out there. That’s just what we use.

  • Nikki says:

    @Forehead:

    I’m a college teacher in technology subjects, and when I first started out, I had to teach what is basically a “computer 101” course. Some people were not capable of putting files into folders and had to leave the class knowing quite a bit of Excel. I realized that if I didn’t find a place of unconditional patience, I was probably not going to have a future at that university.

    So, for you, that’s step 1: unconditional patience. This is more about not wanting to kill yourself out of undying frustration than it is to preserve your job, though. After a while, you might even start enjoying helping him, especially if you can teach him and slowly see some improvements.

    I would ask him and see if he wants to learn. Have that conversation. I know Sars said he doesn’t need to learn, but if he tells you he wants to learn, he’ll start paying attention and possibly retaining what you do for him, especially if you enforce him practicing. My favorite methods of teaching for this kind of stuff is to lead people to the answer. Ask him, “what do we do first?” or “what’s next?” and if he can’t come up with the answer, try to remind him without directly telling him. This way, his brain will be active while you’re showing him this stuff, and he’ll have incentive to remember it next time. You can also ask him to practice it an hour after you’ve done it with him, because that’s really the best time for retention purposes. If he gets stuck, help him, but after a while he’ll be relatively independent.

    Right now, probably what is happening is you’re just doing this stuff for him, or walking him through it step by step… and that’s going to make it very difficult for him to retain.

    I used this process to teach my 58 year old mother to be independent with a smart phone – she can text, read email, use the internet, add contacts, call people… and this is all with an android phone. It didn’t even take long, because she genuinely wanted to learn and practiced what I suggested. She is unquestionably the person I am least patient with, too. The trick is to endure their “stupid” questions and be willing to re-teach them the same stuff eight times until it sticks.

    And hey, if all else fails, make PDFs with detailed instructions on how to complete the tasks. It won’t be the perfect solution, but it will probably help, so it’s better than nothing.

    Good luck.

    @Happy: great to hear! I know how that feels; I have GAD and a chronic low-level depression, both of which responded exceptionally well to meds. In fact, I felt so dramatically better that I would encourage you to be sure you’re on an anti-depressant which effectively treats GAD. It really, really sounds like you suffer more from anxiety than depression. I’ve tried a few different things, and what worked best was Lexapro (the generic Celexa, “basically” the same thing, doesn’t work as well… at least for me). Cognitive behavioral therapy should be a huge help also… and if you want to look into it right now, get the book (lamest title ever, but it’s THE workbook on the subject).

  • eeee says:

    Didn’t read the other comments yet, but to Happy: If I’m understanding you right, it’s not so much you really questioning your sexuality, but just that the phrase pops into your head, won’t get out, and THAT makes you wonder if your subconscious is trying to tell you something?

    Because if that’s the case, I wouldn’t worry about it (from the sexuality standpoint – definitely get the anxiety addressed). I notice that when I am anxious, I frequently find myself muttering, “Hey now okay yeah, hey now okay yeah, hey now okay yeah,” for no reason whatsoever other than apparently I derive some comfort from the rhythmic and repetitive nature of it. (Like rocking, I guess.) As soon as I realize that I’m doing it, it starts to irritate me, and of course then all I can think about are the words “hey now okay yeah” and the cycle continues until, like hiccups, it just goes away.

    Sometimes talking to someone else helps, or listening to music, or doing something physical – but sometimes I just have to wait it out until my brain gets distracted by something shiny and stops. (Anti-anxiety drugs also help, but since it’s a sporadic thing, I only take them when it flares up, which means I usually get a few days of obsessive thoughts before I realize what’s going on, and then a few days more while I decide if I need to take the meds or if it’ll pass.)

    I’ve been doing this since I was three or four, according to my mother – I go through phases with different sets of words (I remember clearly being about 14 and stuck on “hey baby ‘kay now bam” for MONTHS; the “bam” really irritated the shit out of me), but it’s all the same pattern. If I were you, I wouldn’t put much stock in the particular words your brain fixes on – and if you don’t want to potentially derail your therapy with sexuality issues, then you don’t even have to mention the specific words to the therapist. If you can get the anxiety cleared up and stop the brain-talk loop and *still* have questions or concerns about being gay, then deal with that, but I’m willing to bet that it’s just the brain equivalent of a nervous tic, and that some of anxiety coping skills (and/or meds) will help.

  • Kristina says:

    Forehead,

    I work with people with advanced degrees – MDs, PhDs, MSNs (some with two of the three!) – and many of them can just about get the computer on and do their “regular” work tasks. This will be the fun part of the implementation of electronic health records, we have them here and getting the tech part down for the clinical staff was the hardest part! When they need to put together power points to do presentations for conferences or meetings it can be a very ugly thing indeed. They are very bright, enthusiastic individuals that just cannot deal with all things Microsoft. I have the pleasure of spending much of my time teaching them, and many exclaim how clever I am when I cut and paste an image into a PPT slide – these are people that treat cancer and perform brain surgery. I am fortunate that they want to learn and have found that experential learning (“show one, do one” in our parlance) is much more effective than anything that is passive or didactic.

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