I know we're lucky but...

You've worked your arse off for a year, and delivered some great pieces of work. The company reports record profits and thanks you all verbally profusely for your part in that.

You've been stressed, over tired, over worked and your health has suffered, as has your work/life balance. But you feel it's all worth it, because the company did great and you feel like you made a difference.

Then it comes to appraisal time, and you walk in feeling really proud, and come out feeling like shit. What you thought you had done really well wasn't quite as good as you thought. You feel cheated and angry.

Then, a few weeks later, your boss takes you aside to give you the news on your bonus and your payrise for the year. You know that the company's done well, but you know that your appraisal wasn't as good as you hoped, so you prepare yourself for the worst.

And then what you are given is even worse than you imagined. You are angry, upset and it's hard not to let it show. I didn't manage to keep mine hidden. My husband did. He laughed.

His letter told him that the company were really appreciative of all his hard work and that they were pleased to tell him that he had been awarded a payrise of, wait for it.... 0.51%. Yup, even worse than my 1.2%.

Now, we know we're in a recession, we know that the company needs to make the business model work. That's fine, we accept that we are going to have to work smarter and harder. But if the company are making billions of pounds profit, and have grown turnover and profit by 7-10%, it's a bit of a kick in the teeth to be told that your value to the company is only worth a 0.51% increase.

It's a good job he's leaving for a company where all employees are partners, where your efforts are truly recognised and rewarded.

I started writing this post, and then had to leave for a one to one with my boss. In which I had a rather spectacular meltdown and just said that it wasn't my work that was stressing me out, but more the constant monitoring of my behaviour. The fact that I was having to think so hard about HOW I was doing things, rather than feeling proud of the work I was producing. Having to worry about whether or not what I was doing was being noted down to be wheeled out as criticism at my next appraisal.

I've always been a perfectionist (although this is waning), I've always set high standards for myself. I had a flash of realisation today - my best simply isn't good enough at this company. It's like when I was a kid and I used to score lead parts in school plays and then I moved schools and suddenly all I could get was the non speaking background scene parts.

This company works at a whole different level, and while that's great, I'm just not sure that I've got what it takes to be as good as everyone else, or even be better. And I'm not even sure I can be bothered to try.

And that is why I am so stressed and miserable and feeling like I'm falling apart at the moment. True, that's exacerbated somewhat at the moment because of PMT, but I just don't think I can go on like this.

Luckily I have a very understanding boss who is going to do her best to coach me through what I need to do to be better. Again, I'm not sure I've got the energy or enthusiasm to even try, but hopefully that will come back, after all I used to be ambitious once upon a time ago.

In other news, and on a much brighter note, and where I had intended to start this post... I ran another 13k last night. It seems that running that distance outdoors has helped me break the mental barrier to run it on a treadmill. Even if I did get a few dirty looks from people waiting for a free machine... I seem to be getting back to the kind of fitness levels I had when I was running half marathons, and I'm liking it. I still hate running, but I'm starting to feel good about it again.

Shame that it's only translating to body shape changes and no genuine weight loss, but ho hum. Them's the breaks.