update: my boyfriend/manager yells at me when we work together

I went into work that day, the day we were set to be working together all day, and I was surprised to find that he had listened to all the little things that I thought had gone unnoticed and unheard the couple of days prior to project day. I had kept telling him that I really want us to be able to get along and work productively and easily together and would mention the things that I needed from him in order to avoid him getting frustrated. For example, one of the things I told him I needed was for him to explain to me exactly what he wanted me to do, like what my role/job was that day so I wasn’t getting in his way or not doing my part correctly, and so he wasn’t sitting there frustrated waiting for me to help him with something while I was wrapped up in doing something else that he didn’t need help with right at that moment … because our biggest issue, in my opinion, has always been his lack of communicating and instead just expecting me to read his mind and know what he wants or needs me to do.

At the time I was telling him those things, it seemed as though he wasn’t listening to what I was saying. So I was feeling hopeless and anxiety-ridden and I was stressed out about it and thought that it was going to be like every other time that we have tried to work together.

I went into work that morning dreading what was to come. But to my surprise, he was acting differently than he usually does when we have to work together. First thing when I got there, he told me that he wanted to take me over to the cabin that we were going to be working on so he could show me what we were going to be doing. So we drove over there and he showed me how he had set everything up and what lumber pile was what, and explained the process of how he wanted us to get it done and showed me how he wanted me to do it.

Because he took the time to explain everything to me in depth, I knew what my role was and what I needed to do and we worked great together! He didn’t get frustrated, I wasn’t walking on eggshells, everything just flowed, and we had a very productive day where we got along well and were able to finish everything so that he could paint that cabin and be done with it.

And since that day, we have had fewer issues when we have had to work together. There are still times where he doesn’t communicate with me and gets frustrated, but it’s happening less and less. He obviously had been listening to the things I had been telling him I needed. Maybe my sharing with him that I was stressed and anxious about having to work with him helped him to be open to trying what I was asking of him? I’m not really sure what caused him to approach things differently that day, but I’m really glad that we did that project together. It seemed to bring about a much needed shift in the way we work together.

We recently had a big project where we had three more cabins added to the 40 we have on the property. The higher-ups thought it would be a great opportunity to re-number all the cabins and move all the cabin names around so that they would be in alphabetical order from the entrance to the exit, because apparently that is how all our other outposts are set up. Well, that moving of the names around was a total nightmare! Not only did it cause mass confusion among all of our employees when trying to locate the cabins they are assigned to or need to deliver stuff to, but it was a nightmare of a project. We didn’t just have to move the signs for the cabins around, we had to also move their wifi equipment and their door locks because our tech guy said it was too much for him to rename all the wifi equipment and locks.

So the guy in charge of the project flew out to help my boyfriend and me for the two days they gave us to do the work.  Well, after the first few cabins they did together, my boyfriend was so frustrated! Go figure … they weren’t working well together … it wasn’t just me. You could tell the other guy was feeling just totally down and was worried that the project wouldn’t get done on time.

Towards the end of the day, they still hadn’t gotten all the cabins done that they needed to that day to stay on schedule and so the guy who flew out to help asked if I could go around with him and help him get some more done since I don’t leave work until two hours after my boyfriend does. We worked together just fine. The next day he decided that he was going to send my boyfriend around on his own and he and I would work together. We were able to get it all done and neither of us had to deal with my difficult-to-work-with boyfriend. I felt so bad for this other person because of what happened the first day and I knew how he felt. And I’m glad that I was able to step in and help so he didn’t have to deal with all that again the next day.

So my boyfriend has been working on the way he goes about working with me, but he obviously isn’t putting that same effort into trying to work with anyone else better. Which sucks. But it’s a start, I guess.

He does treat me differently at work vs. at home and isn’t like that towards me outside of work. It’s like this weird work persona he puts on and attitude he has at work. I don’t understand it or why he does it. He’s used to working construction type jobs where the guys all talk smack to each other … maybe that is part of it? But I’m not some dude that he works with. And when I got my position, he was aware that he was going to have to teach me stuff, .that I didn’t know how to do everything that the job required of me. So I’m not sure why he just expected me to know.

Thank you for verifying to me that it wasn’t just a me thing. Deep down, I knew it wasn’t me but I’ve gone through some abuse and stuff in my past that probably contributes to my questioning myself. I’ve had counseling and even volunteered at a domestic violence agency for a while (which was so unexpectedly healing!) but I’m still working on learning and growing from that whole experience.

I was not at all expecting him to handle us working together the way that he did that day. But I believe that by him trying it differently, he was able to see things could flow and go well. And I think that has inspired him to work on taking that approach and allowed him to see the value in taking a little time to communicate and explain it all to me first when we have to work together. We have had our ups and downs and sometimes he doesn’t communicate, but those instances are happening less and less as time goes on.