TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:
CLIENT: I guess [pause] I guess yesterday I was thinking about so at work Ray was asking for some data that I worked on a long time ago and all right, that’s fine. But I guess I was kind of going back through the folders and try to remember exactly what I did and what was the right one to use or the right format, whatever. And sort of thinking it’s about being organized or kind of what are some, I don’t know, if I can go to grad school, and kind of being bombarded with a lot of things. And I don’t know, the way to better stay organized are kind of easier on myself. And that kind of looked like what are some other things that I can do to kind of be on top of my, on top of things. It seemed like a really good question or something. [00:02:50]
[Pause]
But I guess, I don’t know. Then also work. So my other boss, Pamela, she’s very she only works on a few post-docs. She’s not Ray (ph) is more office manager, kind of talks to everyone; she kind of monitors a few people, writes grants and travels a lot. So I very rarely speak to her. The only time I speak to her is about budget or breaking things down. [00:04:07]
Anyway, so there’s always talk about who’s better to work with or Ray talks more, he’s forward. He always wants to do more, spends a lot of money, very ambitious and kind of anything’s possible. Pamela’s much more practical and always talking about budget, things like that. But anyway so I always have these weird run-ins with her where she comes to me because I help keep the funds for the staff pools that we submit and which grant they should be charged to. [00:05:12]
But the thing is all I really do is I hand her a piece of paper with all the staff pool needs and she’s, and [inaudible at 00:05:19] who did them, and she writes the grant. Then I actually put it in Excel and send it to our grant manager. And so I’m not really, all I’m kind of doing is just taking what she writes on these papers, writing it in Excel and sending it. So it’s not like I’m making a decision or I really have a -
THERAPIST: I see. You’re just sort of like a small step in a chain of processing.
CLIENT: Right, the shipment of time [inaudible at 00:05:48], which is mine. And she always comes to me and says why was this amount of money charged to this amount of grant? And then I show her the piece of paper with it and it’s always well why is it she always blames me for and I just think whatever. And then it’s always left unopened. I say well can we get together with because I talk to the grant manager as well and we’re always confused because we’re just doing what she says and it’s not very clear. I think why can’t we all get together and discuss this because basically in the end me and the other grant manager kind of say well if she said this and I said that and, I don’t know. [00:06:36]
And so again it’s just kind of an uneasy feeling of this is so much money; it’s not like a little bit of money. She gets angry but then she doesn’t want to make it right or kind of follow through with it. I don’t know. We need her input because it’s coming from her. It’s not like we can do everything and I don’t know how the funds work; that’s not really my job or whatever. But I don’t know. But I think she assumes that I do or something, that I know what all the grants are and I don’t know. [00:07:23]
So [inaudible at 00:07:26], I don’t know. So it made me think, I don’ t know a lot about who, what you guys are instead of her style and what I want. Perhaps still grad school and what kind of, or what I can do to, I don’t know, get more organized or get better or something.
THERAPIST: So, to get this straight, so usually essentially you would get the information from her about what was being spent on what, you would put it in a spreadsheet, which is really the extent of what you do with it, and then send it to the branch manager.
CLIENT: Right. [00:08:21]
THERAPIST: And she comes to you as though you are sort of more involved or have more responsibility for how the money got spent.
CLIENT: Right. Well I guess the thing is for the sample processing, there’s three things that go into how much a sample costs. There’s just three invoices from different companies and since I’m a science person I know which invoices should be charged to the grants. So basically I just get the invoice and assignments, like this is Micro Ray (ph), should be charged, and basically all that adds up. And then based on how Diana signs each sample, those three charges kind of, those then get allocated to the different grants. [00:09:24]
So I’m just I mean basically I’m just making sure that one of those invoices that come in isn’t charged to, as [inaudible at 00:09:34] as my grade, isn’t charged to something else because we have all these different projects. But that’s the only thing where we’re able to do a little more than just, I don’t know, just putting [inaudible at 00:09:49] all together and saying oh this invoice goes to Micro Ray (ph). Again it’s just me.
THERAPIST: You’re actually figuring out whose tab it’s on.
CLIENT: Right. So I’m the catcher.
THERAPIST: And then she does two strange things. One of which is to treat you like you have more responsibility for or over some things, and the other is to not actually seem to want to clear it up or follow through, which is especially weird because it’s real money. [00:10:20]
CLIENT: Right. Well she’ll say why is this $45,000 charged, which is things that everyone in the office shares instead of being charged to Micro Ray (ph), and I’ll say I don’t know. I’ll talk to the grant manager. And I’ll talk to her and she says that’s not the case. And I say well, I don’t know. [Laughs] And then I don’t know if it ever gets cleared up. I don’t want to, I mean things aren’t very I go in there and say well I talked to [inaudible at 00:11:01] and she said everything’s fine. And then she’ll just go like this, ignore me or something; she’s kind of like that. But I don’t know. [00:11:13]
I don’t know if I mean I guess this stuff is kind of stressful and, I don’t know. But it always seemed like a black box in terms of how things get charged because I have no idea. But I guess Pamela’s got it, handled it and she’s been doing it for years so whatever. I don’t worry; I try not to worry about it too much only when she comes to me saying how is this system basically work?
But, yes, and then, I don’t know. Talking to Tamala and just like are all hours calm like this. I don’t know. And I say no, and, I don’t know. Or it’s kind of like a weird and uneasy feeling of I don’t know if I’m doing something wrong or I could be doing something else or better or something like that. [00:12:28]
I guess but there’s also an upside to [inaudible at 00:12:34] because if you need something, you need to do an experiment or you need feedback on paper or something, they’re on top of it and always working and, not usually money, but all their offices are good. The guy’s always gone or does not have money to [inaudible at 00:12:57] this experiment so, I don’t know. It’s just payoffs (ph) I guess. [00:13:07]
THERAPIST: And you don’t think that in terms of you being in grad school I guess partly in relation to anticipating that the office where you work in grad school might be quite different and also in terms of how you would want to sort of done things as you had a little more responsibility to do that. [00:14:04]
CLIENT: Current in some way responsibility. Unless what do I want out of the office because this is kind of, this kind of environment is kind of all I know. And it’s, I think it might be I mean it’s going to be hard for me to have, figure out what I want or, yes, come to grips with it. We’ll see because I mean I can imagine when I first came to the office I was kind of unaware of, I don’t know. I guess they were kind of, my bosses were very kind of, they’re kind of hard to describe I guess.
They’re not unfriendly, they’re just, I don’t know, very yes, they’re demanding but things actually get done. Like things get published, we get money for that but it’s not like the most welcoming environment or whatever. There’s a lot of stress and things get done and things get out quickly. But I can imagine other offices it’s not like that at all. [00:15:57]
THERAPIST: You like the way that your office is sort of like the big leagues. You sort of put that much into it and do it well [inaudible at 00:16:30] chance being a process that’s productive and successful and well-funded. [00:16:36]
[Pause]
CLIENT: I guess it was more of kind of, I don’t know. I’m kind of preparing myself I guess in terms of how to be an undergrad student in terms of figuring out what I want or kind of being able to talk to other researchers and things like that and kind of figuring out what I want instead of kind of keeping my head down. [00:17:48]
THERAPIST: Yes, that’s I think a little different from the way I usually hear you talk about stuff at work. I understand it’s because your role will be changing, you’ll be in grad school but overall I’m feeling like someone’s going to beat (ph) your show. [00:18:25]
CLIENT: Right. I guess, I mean there’s always talk of the environment in the office but whatever. I mean, I don’t know, we have more grad students. When I first started there was only one grad student; now we have seven, so there’s a lot of them in the office. And I think one of the reasons why is you get more funding if you have more grad students and I think because of cutting further we need them. I don’t know, it’s more of a, I don’t know. But because I don’t think our, just the nature of our bosses, they don’t like having grad students because you have to be around more, mentally more. [00:19:24]
But yes, I mean, I’m just kind of not talking to them but noticing their interactions with them and some of the [inaudible at 00:19:37] because we definitely, or after the researchers’ assistant stuff I get treated differently. It’s definitely because one day Pamela, we get treated she treats the grad students a lot better and is more interested in them. And Ray (ph) is actually nicer to us than the grad students so, I don’t know. But it’s probably because we work on call researches and work on his larger projects. So yes we’re yes. [00:20:17]
[Pause]
I guess I was going to just, yes I have an uneasy feeling of one because I didn’t, because the whole thing was Pamela, I didn’t know. Or it always makes me kind of worried that something’s going to pop up down the road and why was this money spent. And then I was kind of worried about how I’m going to handle it if Philippa (ph) could evidently now choose a boss and they rotate through or whatever. It’s kind of high pressure. In the end you can talk to people and they can give you their opinions of everyone else. [00:21:31]
THERAPIST: Can they do it sort of the same way they do at Yale where you do rotations every couple of months or something and then after a year or so you figure out what side you want?
CLIENT: Exactly. But I guess if we’ll do four rotations and then but there’s so many offices to choose from and yes, you can talk to other grad students. There’s popular ones but this is kind of what you want. [00:22:06]
THERAPIST: It’s kind of what you want?
CLIENT: In terms of choosing which exact topics he wants to let me know and do you want to be in on a office that the [inaudible at 00:22:24] is there or not there or there’s a lot of people to review or, I don’t know. I guess I’m just kind of feeling it out. Then some grad students work really closely with post-docs and the same thing with the [inaudible at 00:22:58]. There’s a few grad students that are sidelined. Post-docs being one aspect of the project and the grad students there all work together mostly so the offices there are mentoring and positioning [inaudible at 00:23:20].
I guess it feels just like more decisions I guess I have to make and being very sort of wanting to kind of train or prepare myself for it and I don’t know.
THERAPIST: First thing it feels mixed on one hand because it’s sort of exciting to think that you’d be able to make decisions and pick something that you want that works for you but at the same time it’s kind of anxious because you’ve got to figure all that out. I kind of imagine you sort of feel some pressure or uncertain you don’t know what would be best. [00:24:59]
[Pause]
CLIENT: I’m just going to in the end it’s about all those decisions that will come and, I don’t know. People keep asking me about when I get home or will I find a place or, I don’t know. [Pause] I guess yes I feel like, yes, preparation I’m losing probably for training mode.
THERAPIST: You said training mode? [00:27:21]
CLIENT: Yes. I feel like I need to prepare, do all these things before I leave.
THERAPIST: Do you know when you’ll leave?
CLIENT: August. So yes, I have lots of, or I have some time. [00:28:33]
[Pause]
THERAPIST: I mean you seem a little freer talking about it a little less sort of caught as you talk about the grad school stuff. And maybe as you were thinking about it yesterday, less caught in that sort of strobe light (ph) between feeling like you need to stay focused on sort of the most immediate work or the things you have to do and being occupied with things that could pull you away from that. You don’t seem as caught in that sort of struggle as you’re talking about the stuff of grad school. [00:31:30]
CLIENT: I guess, I don’t know. I’m thinking about grad school’s not as, I mean yes I’m worried a little bit but I can be more I don’t know rational about it or something in terms of oh I can’t sit here and worry about [inaudible at 00:32:18] offices and stuff like that. I don’t know it just kind of seems like I don’t want to get bared (ph) out or weirded out or something. [00:32:25]
It’s not as heavy or something or thinking about, or I’m not I’m sort of thinking about Devin or my family or what we’ll do about I don’t know, about things. I don’t know.
THERAPIST: I wonder if those are the feelings when you guys are not being subject to somebody else in the same way. [00:33:49]
CLIENT: Right, I mean, I don’t know. [Pause] I guess, I don’t know if there’s right now there’s a little doubt causing it or something. I’m sort of just selecting (ph) what other people say about it. [Pause] I’m just thinking, yes, I just sort of want to get there. Other students are getting rated (ph) down or coming back and I thought [inaudible at 00:36:06] thought of something but that’s okay. [Pause] So I’m not really sure why it’s easier to talk about my other things. [00:37:30]
[Pause]
THERAPIST: You have some sense of light contrast to what you’re struggling with Pamela and also I imagine how it’s sometimes going to feel with me. And that school stuff is kind of it’s your own thing; you can do what you want, at least as far as you know now, and how much you can be doing really yet. Pamela is kind of like your part of this bigger system that you’re not entirely clear about and so she comes to make these kind of strange seeming [inaudible at 00:39:54] that doesn’t make sense entirely. And you sort of know your piece of it but kind of not in a way because it fits in with the other things that aren’t as clear. [00:40:13]
I guess I hear too is one of the things we talk about is I bring up things like confusing or uncertain. [Pause] I don’t know, it may be true but I guess when I think about it -
CLIENT: [inaudible at 00:40:59] help for it. [Pause] I don’t know. I guess I do kind of feel a shift or kind of what I think about when my mind relaxes a little bit and I focus, I don’t know. [00:42:37]
[Pause]
THERAPIST: Well we’ve talked for now. [00:43:47]
END TRANSCRIPT
