Building Relationships - Love is...hard?

I'm not the easiest of people to get along with, all the time. Don't tell anyone I admitted to that! Last Sunday I blogged my need for the 'Samaritans' around me, not to leave me. My friends have been great and the week in the build up to the writing of that blog, was hard work. I pleaded for that love, support and kindness to carry on, even in the face of me not being able to return it in the way that I should, at the moment.

A week later, I still find myself with niggles that I find it hard to let go off. Yet I know that it's hard to constantly be picking up and encouraging the same person. It's hard to justify why I can't just snap out of it. Day 6, last week, told us that love is a choice. I did dispute that. But I also challenge the idea that lots of feelings are a choice. Sometimes it's hard to be the person, express the emotions that other people expect in a situation, in the face of adversity - you can't always help how you feel and the kind of person that moulds you into.

It's odd, that whilst on one hand there are a complexity of emotions going on, aspects of school this week have involved 'relationship building' and 'loving' in a more unusual sense than normal.

We were all given 10 red noses to sell to our children and although this sounds like it could be a very simple task, things never go smoothly! One class, not having had their noses delivered went on the hunt. I hadn't sold any of my noses at that point, so gave away my ten, in preparation for collecting the undelivered ten to sell to my children. It turned out that the missing 10 didn't actually exist, so I felt incredibly guilty, the next day, holding 5 £1 coins, from expectant comic relief children, searching the school for stray noses. In my frustration I ended up blurting out, to a number of staff (including the teacher of the class I gave the noses to) that whilst being 'nice' to one group of people, I had seriously let my own children down and it would be helpful if people could check if they had any spares. The comment I made wasn't particularly helpful, but made me feel better, as I was annoyed that the gestured hadn't been acknowledged.

The next morning, I was greeted by an unrelated member of staff and handed a £20 note. She explained that she had been in the staffroom and watched the events unfolding, feeling my frustrations that I had let my own children lose out, and receiving a flippant response. She went on to explain that if I could get hold of 20 noses, I should, using the cash and give them out to my children, alternatively, donate it to the Salvation Army. Normally, I would have argued the point and I don't know why I didn't, I simply hugged her! She was cross that people do 'nice' things and are taken for granted - "We can't all keep giving", she explained.

Later that week, a member of staff was taking a long time on the photocopier! I was trying to stay calm, and didn't really want to engage in conversation because I knew it would slow her down. However.....! Conversation did start up and I began asking more probing questions than normal. It turns out that on the days she does not work, being only part time, she cares for her Mum who has alzheimers disease. This, being close to my heart, broke down huge barriers between us. Our paths don't really cross and so I was glad that she was happy to tell me about her live 'outside' and was glad that I waited in the queue a little more calmly.

Finally, I also discovered, this week, that the partner of a member of staff is off work with pretty extreme depression and the teacher in question is having to deal with all the worry and concern that comes along with that as well as the (almost) weekly challenge of suicide attempts. It wasn't a time for giving advice, which I would have been completely unqualified to do, all I could do was listen. And that's what I did.

Building relationships is hard.....from whichever angle you are involved.