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Stay at Home Moms
What do you do when... VENT
You're assigned to work with someone who doesn't like you?
Our church assigns different people to work over different organizations. I'm assigned to work with 3 other ladies to run the women's organization. And I'm certain now (after working with her for about 3 months) that the leader of the group doesn't like me. At all. I will text her info. She never responds. Never even acknowledges that I sent her the info. I text her questions. She either never answers or takes forever to do so. I sent her a message on Facebook on Monday asking her to do something for Wednesday (something I can't do myself), and she never did it. I texted her again on Tuesday night asking her to do the same thing for Wednesday, she never texted back. She's supposed to come visit me once a month with another lady, and in the 6ish months I've been here, she's visited ONCE and it was a total disaster. She gives me assignments to take care of things and offers me NO help whatsoever. For example, next month, all 3 of the other ladies are going to be gone on vacation at the same time, so she basically said "good luck" and is leaving me to teach the lesson, play the piano, and run the whole organization by myself. Quite often during our meetings, she'll just speak in Spanish to another of the woman who's a native Spanish speaker, but then won't translate into English so I know what's going on.
I'm so tired of it. I've tried really hard to be her friend, doing anything she asks me to do. I friended her on Facebook and comment on her statuses and say how cute her kids are. I don't know what else to do. Technically, I could "resign" from my assignment, but it's really not looked on positively. I just want to cry, and I'm at the point that I just don't even want to go to church because I don't want to interact with this woman.
What would you do?
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Re: What do you do when... VENT
That stinks. I am involved in church too and it is hard to get stuff together even when people are nice and helpful with each other.
Do you know if she's dealing with issues? Like a sick relative? Is it possible she doesn't take it as seriously as you?
Is there someone you can talk to about it? Maybe the church secretary or even the pastor? That's how things tend to get resolved in our church.
Tell her you'll pray for her? Ask her what Jesus would do? I'm half joking and half serious here...
Have you asked the other ladies if they've had any issues with her? Maybe it just takes her a long time to warm up? Maybe you did something to offend her without meaning/realizing it? (I'm not saying this is your fault at all, but some people get all butt hurt over the most innocent of things.) Perhaps ask her outright if you've done something wrong; if you call her out on it directly she'll likely say 'no' but probably amend her behavior.
I will say, though, that if I couldn't figure out what her problem with me is, I'd "resign". Life is too short for that kind of crap. And if anyone gives you crap about it, find another church. Easier said than done, I know, but perhaps if the pastor and members of the congregation realize that this woman is causing you (and likely others) this amount of distress maybe they'll do something about it.
I work on my neighborhood committee. It is a big neighborhood, about 3,000 people. There are lots of different personalities and interest (think people who want us to be declared historical vs. people who want new development). I try to just let it roll off me. I do my job and put forth what I think is best for the neighborhood.
Some people don't like me. I put myself out there, it comes with the territory, but I feel strongly that the few people in power do not have the same agenda as the majority of people in our community, so I have become involved and actively seek to get others involved, since the group strongly influences the government support our community gets.
It sounds like in your situation, the polite behavior one would expect is not being reciprocated. Since this sounds like a children's program or the like, I would ask the person directly if she would prefer someone else was on the committee with her, or if she has too much going on and can't keep up and would like you to take over the committee? If she would prefer someone else, then offer to trade places with that person. If she is just overwhelmed, then offer to take over an entire specific areas, so you have less interaction and more autonomy. If she says everything is fine, then ask her for more communication because you are struggling to do a good job with the limited communication. I wouldn't be rude about it, just matter of fact. I would do it face to face. You may be surprised that she is just sick of doing the job and doesn't really want to put in the effort anymore.
DD#1~8/17/96------DS~10/24/05
I would unfriend her on FB or definitely stop commenting. Then I would communicate only through e-mail, cc'ing the other people in the women's organization. Be specific - if you have a question you need answered say "please let me know by Friday if you want me to be the one to handle this" and always 'reply to all". Make it clear in a non confrontational way that if she does not provide you with the information you need that you will assume that she will be the one taking care of it.
And I would learn some key spanish phrases so I could tell whether or not she was talking about me.
This sounds good. Another thought is to just straight up ask her in a polite way if you have every done anything to offend her. If that doesn't help, find a way out of that position. Life's too short to put up with that in a volunteer position.
This is totally me. I HATE confrontation. I think I'll talk to the Bishop (like a Pastor) on Sunday and see what we can work out. She can't seriously be tired of it, because she's only been in charge for about 6 months.
We had a meeting this morning that went pretty smoothly, because we were just setting up for a dinner tomorrow night... but it still feels so uncomfortable and I'm really tired of it.
Thanks for all your advice. Makes me feel like I'm not being super paranoid about the whole thing.
Does she text?
I'm amazed to find people who don't. The mom I'm a room parent with doesn't. She's got tons of stuff on her phone, but apparently doesn't get/send texts? IDK. She calls. I found out the hard way after a few rounds of frustration over how our communication seemed to be falling through.
Call her.
I don't have unlimited texting on my phone, but I do have enough to go back and forth with people. If it was my only form of communication, though I would go over. And long messages are split up so they are annoying. For anything work related I would not want to receive texts.
Yes, she does text. She will text me when she wants to, but doesn't respond to my texts.