How to stop being so sensitive?

[1995to1996]

Hi! I know I’m absolutely being unreasonable to still be upset by this, but unfortunately I am still anyway and I can’t seem to move past it.

I’m a trainee (started 3 weeks ago!) and my supervisor checks my work to ensure it’s ok before my parents leave. She also supervises and helps me with specific situations until I get more experience. It’s not life or death in my job although it’s important to do things correctly obviously so I want all feedback including negative, but I overheard my supervisor ranting about me to a different supervisor who is supervising another trainee (not me.) TBF I had made a mistake (a very stupid one that I shouldn’t have made!) and she was exasperated to me about it, but also said I’ve only been doing this job for 3 weeks so it’s still normal to make silly errors. It wasn’t a dangerous or terrible mistake, it was more administrative but still a daft error. But I overheard her chatting to the other supervisor about the mistake and she was saying ‘I mean FFS, what even goes on inside that head of hers?’ She was clearly really exasperated about me and was talking about the situation as if I was a complete idiot. I felt so stupid and ever since then I’ve had a pit in my stomach and I feel like I’m totally crap at my job. I had started to build up my confidence and it’s completely gone now. I actually like my supervisor and she is extremely experienced (15+ years) and we get on well, she can be sarcastic at times but never nasty but this has completely knocked my confidence and I’ve been lying awake every night feeling that I’m useless and empty in the head. I’m miles from perfect but I didn’t think I was that bad and she hasn’t had any other concerns or errors but maybe I am and I just can’t see it because I don’t want to.
but regardless, here I am at almost 1am lying in bed playing it over in my mind.

please can someone tell me, how do I toughen up and stop being so sensitive about things?

I don’t think you’re being sensitive at all. If I heard someone talking about me like that at work I’d be gutted too.
I suggest you book a time to talk to her and say you overheard the conversation and it’s really knocked your confidence and whist you appreciate it was a mistake on your behalf you are really trying to learn and improve. Chances are she will be mortified for being caught out.

my supervisor checks my work to ensure it’s ok before my parents leave.
I don't quite follow - what does this mean? Why are your parents involved?

This confused me, I wondered if it was a nursery placement.

Gutted is the perfect word for how it feels!

That’s great advice, I’ll try and pluck up the courage to speak to her about it. As I said, she’s actually very nice so I don’t want to let this be the thing that spoils our working relationship, that’s why I tried to toughen up and shake it off as an unfortunate moment but it upset me.

Exactly my question to? Are you a teen doing work experience?

It awful that you were earshot of hearing them chatting about you though- but I'm very confused too?

oops! autocorrect must have changed it and I didn’t notice! It should say ‘patients’!

Makes more sense now.

I’d approach her, be proactive. Tell her you overheard her, and it’s important to you that you get this right so could she offer anything else that could actively improve your skills.

When I started a new job I used to carry a small notebook with me and write things down, then check them off every day,

If it’s easier put it in an email, then you both have time to digest what’s been said. Try and keep it simple and factual

it was supposed to say patients! that will teach me to try and type so much at 1am without rereading it! 🤦🏼‍♀️

Sorry to hear this, if she's been in her present job the whole fifteen plus years she might not remember what it's like to have to learn something new. Three weeks is just 15 days for goodness sake and I'm presuming at least a couple of those were induction.

And if you're in the NHS right now it's as mad, bad and difficult as it has ever been, but she still shouldn't have been complaining in that way. Good luck with sorting it out and yes, a good lesson to learn early on in the workplace is to always put things in an email so there's an audit trail if required.

Oh, that makes sense now!
It must have been quite hurtful to hear her talking about your mistake. But as AnneElliott123 said, sometimes people who have been doing a job for a long time can forget how it was when they first started and weren't used to the job or that particular workplace. What seems obvious to them might not be to a newbie. She made it clear she was exasperated, but also said to you that you are only a few weeks in and that everyone makes mistakes, so what more can she actually do? She was probably just moaning to an old colleague, like we all do. She was exasperated but she hasn't given you a formal warning or anything, so has probably moved on.
However, have you thought about how and why you made the mistake? Was it avoidable? What steps are you taking to make sure you don't make a similar mistake again? You might need to request more training, or make sure you note everything down when given instructions. Only you can know if her exasperation was reasonable.
As you say she's nice, talk to her, say you feel really bad about it, and discuss what you can do to improve things. I can't see how there would be anything to be gained by saying you overheard her - you already knew that she was annoyed by your mistake.