I work in the back office, where I answer questions, sort out problems, and dig until I find the answer. When something urgent comes up, I'm usually the one who stays calm.

For as long as I've been at this job, people who overhear me talking with others have told me, "You're a great communicator." I say thank you, and then, more often than I'd like to admit, I hear another voice.

For years, whenever something went wrong with a bill or an order or an account, I was the one who had to make the call. Not because I was better at it, but because I was made to. I was told I needed to toughen up, that I had to be aggressive and tell people what to do so I'd get what I wanted. And someone sat right there while I dialed, listening and telling me everything I was doing wrong. The words were wrong, the tone was wrong. Most of those problems could have been solved in five minutes by anyone who picked up the phone, but that was never the point.

The hardest part wasn't the call itself. It was that he had already decided how it had to end. Before I dialed, there was an outcome he wanted, and getting it was up to me. Not the company's problem to solve, not something we would work out together. Mine.

So I wasn't only talking to a stranger on the phone. I was carrying the whole weight of what he expected, and I knew what it would mean if I fell short. I was anxious and terrified, and I couldn't let it show, because showing it would only prove what he was already saying about me.

I was told I was hopeless on the phone, that I couldn't talk to people, and that it was probably why I never went further in my career.

What I still turn over is this: I knew it wasn't true. Somewhere deep down, I knew, and I started to question myself anyway. That's how it works. It doesn't have to convince you. It only has to get you to doubt what you already know.

The voice hasn't left completely. It still shows up when I dial a customer service number, and sometimes I hear it at work, in the middle of a call with someone who is perfectly kind. But now the voice and the people who tell me I'm good at this exist in the same room. For a long time, only one of them was allowed to be right.

When I make a call at home, Jaycee is usually in my lap, or on the floor getting restless because I'm not paying attention to her. She isn't grading a thing I say. She just wants me back.

I'm not sure the voice ever goes fully quiet. I am sure it no longer gets to decide how the call ends.

Jane & Jaycee 🐾