| The doorbell rang this afternoon. There stood the Nanny. I was annoyed, even angry that she had ignored my hints at not coming over. I begrudgingly let her in, Moons got excited straight away and I knew that this situation would not end well. She told me I should know why I was here. I didn't. She told me she read my blog. She was hurt and wanted to confront me. Instantly, I felt dreadful. Not a 'I've been caught out' kind of dreadful but more of a, christ, how awful for her to have lived in this house, while reading all of these entries about her. I felt like crying. I felt like hugging her, but I felt angry as well. Why hadn't she discussed this with me? I could have explained. Its such an unusual situation to be in. How many people would be privvy to their employers thoughts and feelings? Of course somethings I said to her ,only to rant in my blog, the full force of my annoyance, all of my untamed, raw emotions. Caught in the emotion, not thinking rationally. Of course, when one uses a diary or a friend to offload on, you don't expect anyone to ever hear the things said. You don't expect anyone to question what you meant and you don't expect to have to justify your feelings. I feel responsible though, in this instance. I wasn't happy and I didn't address it, but I did write on a blog all of it down. If I had known for a second that she was reading it, I would have certainly addressed it. I didn't say anything that was untrue and I stand by that, but I did misread actions which I have later come to learn. Unfortunately, it hasn't come to light until she came to confront me. I cannot express my admiration for her enough. To have the balls to come and confront me. Who would do that after the fact? She said she didn't want to leave knowing all that she knew. I said if I had known, I would have sat and talked with her. But the reality is that, not only didn't I know ,but once a blog is written, I don't think about it again. I write it, I unload and I forget about it. Its been a great source of offloading for me. I don't expect people to read and I don't expect anyone to feel sorry for me or anything like that. Its just the best friend that I don't have always have to hand, a break for Steve's ear! Its a place to storm, to release and to forget. Although as is the purpose of any blog, its to reflect on later. This entry will serve as yet another lesson for me. No matter what you say, or where you say it, someone will always get hurt. I have always considered myself the sort of person never to say anything behind a persons back, I'm more of an upfront person and I pride myself on this. For some reason, this blog felt different. It didn't matter what I said. And I was wrong. I should have presented my feelings, I should have known that something wasn't quite right. I should have given her a chance. I didn't. And I regret that. We addressed it all piece by piece, things I said and why I was angry. Some things she understood, some she didn't. I laid it all out there for her, because I wanted to know how I felt without the meanness of my emotional blog entries. I didn't want to justify myself, its a diary, I don't have to. But I wanted to explain that sometimes, when you write things down, you focus purely on the negative, you're angry and frustrated and it helps. But I hate that she lived here, knowing all of these moans. No matter how petty, its clear that she was confused and we contributed to her isolation. I confessed that we started off wrong and it was us to blame for that. Having not done this before, we should have been clearer and explained things along the way. We didn't. Things escalated and then she was leaving anyway. I didn't want her to leave this house without feeling something came from our chat. The most important thing I wanted her to take with her was that I was truly sorry for the situation. That I admired her courage to come to us and allow this conversation to take place. Hurting someone is just the worse thing in the world. We've all made off hand comments, not thought much about it, but to learn that someone has been so affected by it really sickens me to the soul. I was experiencing a dreadful work environment, my boss was nothing short of a bully. It affected my confidence and my self belief and even now I still second guess my ability. The whole time, I was doing the same to our Nanny. The reality is that she was employed to do one thing. Take care of our girls. Keep them safe and form a close bond with them. She did that and even more. They adored her and we trusted her with them. Frankly, this is a dreadful situation and I can't quite get my head around it. To be privvy to raw, irrational rants for quite some time must be desperately hard to deal with on a daily basis. I asked her, why didn't you confront me? She didn't know how to handle the situation and didn't know what I would say. I would have discussed with her like we did this evening. I wouldn't want to know that she was feeling so much sadness and isolation. I find myself, wordless. |