Yesterday was a very stressful day for me at work.  I had to deal with someone who I classified, like a few other people, lacking listening comprehension.  When you tell these people to do something, they either do it the exact opposite way you told them or they don’t do it at all.

This guy would do exactly the opposite.

If you told him go left, he went right. 

If you told him to stop at the red light, he would go through it. 

If you told him to leave the chair where it was, he would move it back against the wall.

He was truly instructionally dyslexic. 

What happens to these people when their job is to provide care for the sick and injured?  What happens when they don’t do as they are told but do what they want without regard for the consequences?  Sometimes they are hailed as heroes.  Other times they are vilified and unfairly persecuted.  This was neither of those times.

In this instance their actions are classifiable as negligent because every single thing they could have done to make it right or better, they did the exact opposite and fail to see the error of their ways.  When that happens, they lose their jobs.  There’s only so much you can do for them before it happens, and it isn’t like it is undeserved.  There comes a time when their bother:worth ratio is just too high on the bother side and trying to keep them just creates more problems with the guys who have a high worth side, and ultimately it is a liability when it comes to patient care.

So this guy lost his job.

He had to go home to his son.

He had to look him in the eye.

He had to figure out how he was going to feed him.

And knowing that is why my job sucked today.