You haven't heard from me for a while.
The reason is that I took a part time job in August, which for about a month in December turned into a full-time job. I went into it with hope, as I, like many of you, have been negatively affected by the Covid shut down experience. For all the news that there are plenty of jobs, well, I think there are certain kinds of jobs that are available in some places, but the good jobs, people clung to. So, I took this job in part because I needed to earn money and in part because they made certain 'promises' about the future that to me sounded good.
My immediate boss was a woman who upon meeting me started bragging about one of her children. I didn't realize she was baiting me to talk about my personal life. I wasn't ready to get into a 'tell all' chat with her. It was soon clear that she had no respect for me or appreciation of my very hard work. I soon knew I was doing the job of 2 people, sometimes 3, but I held onto their promise that soon I would be working full time and at a livable wage. I knew from the way they were set up that probably that meant I would work in other departments with other people. From others I learned that she was from a family of five children and the only daughter, and that she had married a high school sweetheart and had four sons. She wanted for nothing. Her husband had a successful business, she did not 'have' to work, but she wanted to. She was a volunteer who had taken on a big project.
For a few months I came home exhausted every day and my hope dwindled. I kept my behavior professional, ignoring her taunts, but one day I felt myself shaking. Two other women showed up to work, I thought for the holidays. One was intimidated by her and the other, the mother of seven who had lost custody of her children because of her drug addiction, was aggressively trying to prove she was worthy of the job. Actually, having any job at all was important to both these women, but their labor was being paid for by an outside source since they were both from a sober living situation. I and my friends by November thought that there was now no incentive for this employer to keep their word to me. They didn't want to pay.
However, when a Covid economic relief program paid me to work there full time for the last few weeks of the year, I could not say no. The boss was supposed to go on a vacation the last week of the year, and I looked forward to working without her being there. Though she had said and done much to demean and diminish me, and I knew it was abuse, and the two women who came out of the sober living decided they did not want to work that last week of the year, I persisted. I came home every night and pretty much went straight to bed to be ready for the next day.
It was then announced that a member of her immediate family, living with her, had a positive Covid test and if I wanted to, I could get tested. I had been told everyone who worked there was supposed to be vaccinated but I knew she claimed she had already had Covid so there was no need...Just before she left, she and the mother of seven were talking together about a program for Christmas in which poor children were given presents from Santa. The boss said how she had "made' her single childless brothers fork over money for this program. Looking directly at me she sneered and said, "These people with no children."
That was not the beginning of the end. I knew this job would not sustain me.
When the new year began, the program that was paying me that last month was over. The employer had not asked me to meet with them to discuss my future in the new year, and I did not go back. The company has not provided me the forms to do my taxes.
I have been a long time advocate for us NMNK who are used up and spit out in the workplace. I can't say this experience is typical, but I have noticed in other situations that it's assumed that the NMNK will be happy to cover for and compensate for other employees who have children. Once in a while that is appropriate, but NMNK have things going on in their lives besides work, including caring for parents and other family members or the friends in their family of choice.
C 2022 Never Married No Kids - BlogSpot
