Terry the hedge guy

“Terry’s useless!” ( #devaluation #vitriol ) .

We’re very fortunate, we have a large garden. The garden is lined on one side by a laurel hedge and on the other by a leylandii hedge. In the early days of us living in this house I tried to cut the hedges myself. Without proper equipment the job is just too much. So now, every year we get professionals. In previous years we got random guys including a guy Susan knows. Long story short, the guy made a complete mess of the hedges. A professional he was not. It took the leylandii hedge a couple of years to recover from being brown and patchy back to being green again. It recovered due to the care and attention it got from Terry the hedge guy. Terry is not cheap but year after year he does a great job. He also happens to be a pretty nice guy, easy to talk to. He’s also done other jobs for us such as power washing moss from the roof of the house. He even repainted a section of the wall high up where power washing removed some paint. We still have the paint here so it wasn’t difficult for him who has no issue with heights. Every August without fail he turns up when asked. I’m here working from home. Every year without fail we have a cup of coffee and chat in the garden during his and his colleagues’ break. As it’s during the summer holidays Emma enjoys being the waiter for this and seems to enjoy the annual event.

Every year without fail Susan aggressively attacks his character and his work claiming that he’s useless and I shouldn’t be getting him ( #devaluation #vitriol #control ) . Like clockwork, year after year, the criticism goes on for days ( #vitriol #punishment ) . Weirdly, it’ll toggle to “He did a really great job” every now and again but will inevitably return to bashing mode for 99% of the time ( #splitting #manipulation ) . She refuses to pay for any part of such shoddy workmanship ( #entitlement #control ) .

Tip: Just in case you weren’t aware, this antagonism is a component of narcissistic abuse, it’s also a petty excuse not to pay ( #manipulation #control ) . It’s also an assertion of control, by belittling him, she’s belittling me ( #control #devaluation ) . It’s also gaslighting of course. The actual reality is that he does a good job. She tries to convince me that the opposite is true ( #gaslighting #manipulation ) . It’s this exhausting back-and-fourth where if I make a statement, she’ll automatically counter it ( #argumentative #control ) .