Emotions and fallout

With the last post, I mostly just went over the facts, but not really how I was feeling emotionally.

When I first got symptoms, there was some confusion. I never had symptoms like that before. I had sore throats in the past, but not anything like this.

It ended up progressing to fear and worry for a number of reasons. I didn't know what was wrong, and didn't know for nearly three years. I was afraid that I was going to be fired, especially because of the company being in a poor state financially. I was worried about how I was going to pay for my apartment and utilities when I was only getting in half of my hours and having a lot of money go towards doctor visits.

Then I felt sad, and upset, and just defeated. My coworkers were horrible to me. A couple that supported me I still keep in contact with, but most were just outright mean. What makes them think they have the right to throw out stuff of mine? I never did anything to them. I was a bit of a loner and not really a team player, but I wasn't outright mean to anybody. I didn't really say anything about anyone else. The coworkers I disliked were the ones that were the meanest about things, so I guess the feeling was mutual. My aunt, who also worked in the office, said that I quit because of a couple of the coworkers, and I guess my boss felt really awful about it, but I don't see how she couldn't have figured out that I had to break at some point with how terrible they were to me.

And what's with my boss just rolling over and letting them treat me like that, and actually agreeing with some things? Why would she think I'd want to cut back my working hours by half? She knew my roommate was deployed and I would have to pay for everything myself for a while. I wasn't a bad employee. As I said, I had used up some sick time, but never went over my alloted p.t.o. hours. I had helped out multiple times for company-sponsored events, and since I knew computers better than my coworkers, I made various guides to help everyone out. My aunt blames things mostly on my boss's boss, who my aunt always had problems with. I think my boss just went with the pack and didn't want to stand up for me, which, to me, is just as bad as being one of the instigators.

Eventually, being upset led to anger, an emotion that I'm still not entirely out of today. It's not that I'm not comfortable with or accept where I am today, but unfortunately, I'm one to hold a grudge. My aunt took me around the office once after I had my first child, and I made it a point to let them know that I still had the symptoms (this would have been 2005). Of course, they were a bit surprised, but I hope that they realized that they made a mistake.

To jump ahead a bit, my dad, who can be a little sue-happy, I think, threatened the company with a lawsuit. As SD can be considered a disability, he figured that he could scare the company a bit, as discrimination against someone with a disability is against the Americans with Disabilities Act. I argued that I didn't know it could be considered a disability at the time, and neither did they, so I wasn't sure how well things would go over. Regardless, the threats didn't work too well, as the company had been bought out by a different one, and I'm sure the new company didn't feel they were responsible for something that happened years earlier. I'll go into my thoughts regarding SD being a disability later.

One day recently when my aunt was calling for some glass from a different auto glass company, my aunt caught my old boss on the phone. That stirred up some bad feelings, and that's when my aunt blamed stuff on my boss's boss.

Next up: the joys of working retail when you don't have a voice.