My colleagues swear quite a lot at work and as a principle I don’t like to use profanities but have found myself starting to mutter things under my breath by the end of the day. They also tend to take their frustration out on the horses at times by hitting or punching them which I feel is unacceptable.

It is all very upsetting and as I have no friends and don’t get a lot of support on my situation at work from my family any advice would be really helpful.

DeepThinker – thank you for your reply and the compliment. I went to university when I was 20 to study architecture but as you can probably guess it didn’t work out and things have been pretty tough ever since.

I was an intern in the sailing industry a few years ago and tried so hard, making good contacts and speaking to the right people but eventually my contract wasn’t renewed due to the high amount of younger candidates. At the same time split up with a girl who meant very much to me. The result was that I became seriously depressed and ended up in hospital for a month. I was signed off work for two years and eventually started volunteering at my current workplace, which turned into a 6 month EU sponsored part-time employment which has been phased into a full time apprenticeship.

My confidence is now extremely low, I feel guilty about my past all the time and have the opinion that I deserve any abuse I get and must learn to accept it. Since beginning full time 2 new teenage employees have joined and are already way ahead of me, trained to earn more and generally boss me around, they are also good friends with the senior staff.

As my next position I don’t really know. I really just fell into my current role as I grew up on a farm and wanted to get back into nature. Unfortunately our farm was lost due to BSE and my parents separated soon after. The centre where I work is really focused on schooling youngsters and training up dressage horses to sell but I have no real interest in dressage or any ambition to be an instructor and play catch up with my colleagues. When work is over I usually feel to tired and depressed to think any more about it, and if there are any important people within the industry who come to work, I am generally kept away with the idea that I should keep my mouth shut while the seniors discuss their knowledge with the professionals.

Sorry to go on, I’m really not sure what to do.

I think I messed up big time and everyone knows it which is why I’m treated like the dunce and have no choice but to accept it. As the day goes on I feel more and more miserable. Sometimes I just want to cry but I just grit my teeth and let the sorrow become my countenance while my colleagues laugh away. My doctor suggested anti-depressants on top of my anti-psychotics so is probably my only option. Other than that, I guess I’ll just have to keep my head down for another year to get my qualification, travel places in my holidays and pay my bills and debts. I really expect a lot better from myself so maybe when I have some savings I can look at doing something else.

Unfortunately my ‘manager’ is the 26 y/o ‘head girl’ who pretends to care but seems to take no interest in my life only tell me what to do next, which is never anything interesting only connected with cleaning the yard. She doesn’t guide me, only tell me to work quicker which puts me under constant pressure and probably makes me go slower! I am made to feel guilty about taking a tea break when the senior staff are constantly slipping off for cigarettes and coffee. I am supposed to receive training from her which amounts to a maximum of 30 mins a week but during this time she just tells me what I need to do then disappears off. During the training she will just be chatting to her friend about her new boyfriend etc. Incidentally when my assessor last visited I simply had not been taught enough for what I needed to pass the module so was not even assessed. My manager now wants me to start earlier each day because she is doing 12 hour days. She tells me to think of the miney but I am being paid peanuts and she is on a salary over double my annual wage. When I am not working I am so tired all I can do is rest and am falling behind with my coursework. I am never allowed to put the interesting aspects of my training into practice as these kind of jobs are saved for the other staff so the things I do learn end up being forgotten.

My 30 min 1-to-1 lessons got cancelled so I could join a 1 hour group and get more time in the saddle but in my last lesson I was the only one so it got reduced to 30 mins again which was a real disappointment.

On a couple of occasions the founder of the centre has called me up to her house to clear up after her dog. When I sighed she said ‘don’t say you want to do it, we all do – welcome to the real world.’ and I don’t have the strength to oppose her. I used to find listening to the radio took some of the boredom out of skipping out the many paddocks we have. The paddocks are seriously muddy and extremely hard work but now I am not even allowed to listen to the radio as ‘it could be dangerous as I cant hear the horses’ but there are only 1 or two, usually no horses in the fields and 2 hours alone picking up horse poo in deep mud only sends my mind into deeper despair.

The only ‘mature’ girl on the yard says it is the worst yard she has ever worked on and could never work there full time. She complained to me that while we work on the founder and her partner just lie in bed all morning and never help out and that the field are so bad the horses are getting infections.

I really don’t have the energy to be any stronger. I get home at seven and only have the energy to eat then go to bed before it all starts again and to be honest I can’t see things improving. You cannot get blood out of a stone and enough is enough.