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I feel so sad for my uBPDH right now. This morning, his boss asked him to work on something that involved electric work with high voltage stuff. He has 0 experience and no training with anything electric. He works in IT. He actually expressed himself well and told his boss he was not comfortable working with electric and his boss made fun of him, told him he would find someone else to do it, and hung up on him.

My H is genuinely upset and hurt. He sounds dejected. This isn't his usual I feel bad so I'm going to take it out on everyone type of response. He texted me asking what to do and resisted the urge to call his boss back and yell at him. I helped him work through some problem solving and he decided to look at what jobs are out there. I told him I was proud of him for expressing his concerns to his boss, even if he didn't get a good response.

He just texted me and said he is worried about our finances if he loses his job over this. He is also worried that he may go off on his boss in the future now that this has happened. He is at home beating himself up over it.

I hate it when this happens to him. He actually did the right thing and responded the right way and it didn't work out for him. He so rarely responds appropriately that I wish just once he could get the positive reinforcement when it does happen. I can reinforce it, but the voice that matters to him is his boss's, not mine.

Hi there Tattered Heart,

I'm sorry to hear in the other thread that you had a tough day a couple of days ago.  It sounded like you did just the right thing.  It's nice when ice cream is the outcome rather than a fight   

I agree that your H did the right thing.  I work with high voltage, and it is not something one should take on lightly, or without training.  :)id your H's boss say he would be trained?  If so, perhaps that could be a career opportunity, but it sounds like his boss might have just been throwing him into it.  Making fun of an employee for any reason, especially a safety related one, is ridiculously inappropriate.  Your intuition to help him think about possibilities for a new job may be on target.  Is there a chance that your husband's fears or emotions colored his impression of his boss' behavior?  :)o you know the boss?  It sounds like you feel like he made a pretty good assessment, though.  He is lucky to have you by his side; dealing with work situations like that is miserable and scary.  Even if he's not able to express it, I'm sure it means a lot to him.

It IS very sad to see them follow the less volatile path and then not be able to feel any reward for it. 

And I hate it when H gets worried about losing his job or beats himself up for things. 

Without knowing the boss, I will maybe temper the relation of the call from your husband to include that he may have felt some shame at having to back down from the offer, which could have translated ANYTHING said by the boss as 'laughing' at him.  H feels any questions for clarification to emails he sends are insulting or laughing at him for being bad at writing (he's not, but people hate reading), so something not meant to be mean at all can make him feel they were ridiculing him, mad at him, or unhappy with his overall work performance all because he can't fix systems 5 hours away and has to put that in writing.

Or the boss can just be an asshat and if your husband can find work elsewhere, it may be good to make a quick call to HR to report the boss wanted to make an untrained person work in a highly skilled area and was disparaging when told no.  I hate bullies and especially bully bosses.

I try to tell my H as best as possible that he can't let himself worry so much about things that have not and may not happen - it's a waste of energy.  Yes, we will need adjustments if one of us loses our jobs or gets really sick, but that can be taken care of AS NEEDED.  Today is not the day to worry about it, there's plenty of time to spend energy worrying later, when something HAS happened.  And hugs, if he will let you.  Lots of hugs.

After talking to my H a little further it sounds like his boss may not have necessarily made fun of him, but he did threaten his job (which he has done in the past too). His boss tends to react in an emotional way when he doesn't get what he wants and that combo with my H triggers rejection in my H. His boss did call him yesterday afternoon and did not apologize, but I think he was trying to make sure things were ok and then began discussing business as usual.

My H processed through a lot of emotions yesterday though. He cried a lot because of how he was treated. He kept expecting me to be mad at him and he absolutely could not wrap his head around why I was being so supportive and understanding. He said he didn't deserve me to treat him so well. He said he realized that his job is not as secure as he thought it was and he really wants to begin focusing on making our farm profitable so he can be his own boss.

I don't often get to say that I'm proud of him. But yesterday I was and let him know it.

Sounds like the boss may have some BPD fleas or PD issues himself.  I really hated it when H was working with a woman who was pretty much just as crazy and manipulative as my mom.  She conned her way into a position for 116K a year and all she ever did was go to lunch with big wigs, but never did anything she said she would do.  She'd tell H to do it, but then would unofficially comp his time, and when she got in trouble for her fast and loose ways, she threw him under the bus.

Yes, they can't understand how we find value in them when they feel valueless.

Hi Tattered Heart,

It's great to hear news of relationship interactions going well on this board.  Thank you for sharing!  I am sure your pride in him is huge validation, or at least I hope it is.  You said he didn't quite believe you, and I see the same thing with my wife.  I'll give her big, genuine compliments, and she doesn't believe me!