I’ve had transcription to do for, man, ages now. Weeks. Which I’ve been trying and trying and trying to make myself do. Now, to understand how weird this is, you need to know that transcription, typing stuff straight from dictation while using a foot pedal to control play-rewind-FF, is something that I’ve enjoyed ever since college, was one of my favourite parts of my 3-year psychiatry job, and was (in theory) the main part of the job I was in when I got depressed. I’ve done it from home before. I even recently bought myself a digital foot pedal, which came with some of the crappiest transcription software I’ve ever seen.
I’m running rapidly out of time. I promised an ex-co-worker that I respect highly that I would have it done. I’m getting paid for this, and I need the money. I’ve been planning to do it. I’ve been meaning to do it. But somehow, I keep getting distracted. The cats need me. Sean needs me. I need to go to the store. I’m too tired to do a good job right now. I have a headache right now. I really need some social time and I’ll do it right after things slow down.
Today? I was determined to do it. No matter what. Got myself all psyched up for it.
Since then, and I’ve been awake for just about twelve hours at this point, I have consumed: enough peppermint chocolate for two to three days normally, some potato chips, a substantial handful of peanuts (the kind you have to shell first), at least 8 mini-croissants, and almost two liters of Pepsi. And nothing else. And my anxiety level is elevated. How do I know this? Well, I’m feeling pressured, feeling like getting this done is a wall between me and everything else I need to do. I NEED to do housework. I have an asthmatic cat I love like he’s my own child-of-my-body, for the love of Bast, and my apartment is so far behind on the housework it can’t be good for him even if dust isn’t a major trigger for him. I’m hoping to foster kittens for the Humane Society, really looking forward to it, but where would I put them? I can’t make myself do the housework until the transcription is done. And my other major sign of something making me anxious: my mind refuses to actually focus on it for any length of time. Ten minutes, fifteen, and my mind is wandering everywhere.
Great. So, now one of my best skills triggers anxiety. Isn’t that just what I needed in my life?
And why does it do that? I dunno, maybe the job I was told was largely transcription (and wasn’t), where the others in the office were more interested in blame (only if it was the vulnerable, i.e., newer members of the office, though) than teamwork and more interested in policing each other than efficiency, where I couldn’t win no matter what I did and didn’t dare tell the supervisor… maybe that had something to do with creating associations between transcription and anxiety. Just a wild guess, of course.
So, either I have to somehow finish this work, by Saturday at the outside, or tell her I can’t do all of it and sacrifice $100 to get out of typing one of the interviews. Oh, and sacrifice some of my already fragile self-esteem at the same time, by admitting I couldn’t do it.
Excuse me while I bang my head against the desk now. Repeatedly. Maybe it will feel better when I stop.