I get shit on all the time and I don’t know why.
I have volunteered with my son’s youth group for 5 years now. First as the fundraising chairperson. Things went bad with that unit and last summer, the man who was second in command, started another unit. Me and many other parents were very happy that our children would still be able to be in the program without having to deal with the old leaders.
The new CO asked me to join his staff as an instructor. This is also a volunteer position. I was happy to do it. At our first staff meeting, he explained the roles of everyone in the staff. He also explained the rules that the staff was supposed to follow and that the children were supposed to follow. No problem. He also asked me to built a website for the unit. I did and he was very pleased with it.
At this time, our unit had no funds. Until the unit began fundraising, I purchased all of the teaching materials myself. I never asked to be reimbursed. The kids went rock climbing, and to Washington D.C. all of this cost money, so we really didn’t have any left to reimburse me. That was OK with me, all the kids were learning and I enjoyed teaching them.
Over the past few months, things in the unit were declining. The kids would come to me with ideas they had and I told them that I would discuss in with our CO. As this was happening the CO became more and more difficult to work with. He would tell me to plan classes and keep him informed as to what dates and subjects we would be teaching. I did this, I printed a calendar and gave him and all the parents and staff copies of it.
He would then go around and complain to the staff that I was not keeping him informed. Every week, I gave him another copy of the calendar and asked his approval on it. He would say OK, then repeat the cycle all over again the next week. I asked him if there was anything else I could do to keep him informed and he told me to put it all down on paper, which I was doing !
Additionally, there were a good number of parents coming to me because they felt favoritisim was going on. There was. Certain kids would be punished for not being in uniform while others were not. Some of the kids were being allowed to goof off in ranks other were not. The parents came to me, because that was one of my duties, to act as a liasion between the parents and the staff.
The staff was not happy with our CO either. While he wasn’t listening, they would complain about a lack of communication that would result in a lot of confusion, with everyone else taking the blame.
At the next staff meeting, CO asked if we had anything that we wanted to dicuss. I said that I would like to discuss some things that the parents and children had brought to me. As respectfully as I could, I explained some of the ideas the kids had and how some of the parents were seeing favoritism and I suggested a few possible ideas to fix some of the things going on.
It was right after that, that the CO started telling me that I had no idea what was going on, because I had missed 2 staff meetings. I had made it to the meetings with the kids, but since my car had broken down, I did indeed miss 2 of the staff meetings. However, I always called the CO the next morning to find out what I missed. He said that wasn’t good enough, it would be different if my husband were there to tell me what I missed. I don’t know why that is, my husband is not a staff member and he never was. Before I could ask what my husband had to do with anything, CO said that I was not following orders and I was being disrespectful. I began to ask what I did, because I was really confused. He cut me off and demanded that I resign from staff. I told him that I would not resign becasue I don’t know what I did wrong. He said “Fine, you are relieved from duty. The staff serves at the will of the CO and you are no longer wanted.”
I just left, very confused. I was not alone, two of the other staff members walked out with me and told the CO that what he did was bullshit. They have been told to leave too.
Last week, the CO sents me an email telling me to remove the website. I replied that I would remove the pages that needed to be updated, but my sons wanted the other pages kept there. Those pages had pictures of some of the trips and events the kids had participated in on them. Or I offered to turn the website over to him, so that he could keep it updated if he prefered.
He replied in big capital letters that I must remove the website and he wanted the date and time that I did so. I removed the whole thing and told him the date and time I did it.
This morning, I got a very nasty email from him. He said, THIS IS THE LAST, TAKE THE WEBSITE DOWN. YOU WILL NOT BE TOLD AGAIN. AND YOU WILL BE SORRY IF YOU DON’T.
I have no clue what the hell he’s talking about. I deleted the enitre thing. If you go to that web address you get a page telling you that it does not exist.
I replied to him telling him that I did remove it, I sent him a link to the page so he can check himself and I told him not to speak to me in that manner any longer, I am no longer staff and I do not have to follow orders and don’t threaten me again.
Jerk!
I worked my ass off for five years with this organization, many time doing most of the work along because no one else wanted to do it. I made myself sick, I lost 18 lbs due to the stress of this. Why am I being treated like shit?
I feel so low right now. I don’t understand what I did so wrong. I feel like I can never do anything right.
