Apologies in advance, if this is a bit waffley, I need a sense check as I am overthinking this, but just not sure how or whether I should approach this.
My LM is not based in the same building as me and we work in linked but slightly different areas, during my 1-1's I am honest about the highs and lows. This week the area manager spoke to me quite abruptly about discussions where I had apparently said my role wasn't as expected or that I didn't expect to be doing x,y,z. I have never said anything along these lines to either to my LM or area manager, I have said to my LM during a 1-1 that I didn't expect to be almost checking work for 2 colleagues who were much higher than me, which was quite difficult because of my workload and lack of knowledge in the particular case at the time. I have always taken on whatever has been asked of me and feel that I go above and beyond to support the team in my area. I have quite recently said to my area manager that I enjoy my role, so it has been difficult to find a logic to the conversation. There was a similar discussion recently what I do in my role was compared to the same role in a different area, which my LM also line manages (I wasn't in the meeting, but my counterpart was). I was advised that the area manager had asked if I could do a certain task and the outcome was that as my counterpart did it, it was something I could do as well. When I was told about it I thought it was a bit strange as I already do this task. My area manager messaged me after the abrupt discussion to see if the conversation had upset me, it was a late message which I didn't pick up until the next day and have just tried to look past it, but I feel really unsettled by it all. On the one hand I want to pick this up with the area manager, but I also don't want to be seen as difficult, but I feel that my honesty has been misrepresented and I just don't know why. As I say there is an element of overthinking, and I just don't know how to approach this. I thought my relationship with my LM was ok and that it was a' safe space' but now I am not sure, so any advice or words of wisdom would be very much appreciated.