I recently had my professional evaluation for the year. For the sake of anonymity I will refer to my secondary superior as “S” and my direct superior (my actual boss) as “P”.
Its been a rough year, and I have done hard but rewarding work. Both S and P have commended me for my resilience throughout the year and frequently tell me I changed the atmosphere for within my position for the better. That was not the focus of my interview, however. P and S met beforehand and my evaluation was with P alone.
It came down to the category “professional dress”. Its important to mention that all our contract/handbook says is clean, professional, and no jeans- nothing beyond that.
P says “I feel that your dress is appropriate and professional, however S wonders whether or not you wear a bra some days”. I was dumbfounded. All i could muster was “is that part of our uniform?”. P laughed it off and said S is old fashioned and it didn’t really matter, but they thought theyd bring it up.
I feel so embarrassed and disrespected and undervalued as a woman in the workplace. i expected to discuss my performance but we could only focus on my body. This is a pattern in my life and this comment is causing a massive amount of shame and anxiety for me now. I struggle with an eating disorder and trauma from being molested as a child so sorry if it seems silly or small but this comment really hurt me. We spent the next five minutes discussing my breasts as i held in tears and after I couldnt move on. I’m still hearing the comments.
Cherry on top of everything was I also found out I havent been getting attendance accommodations for my disability and they want to put me on an attendance correction plan. Apparently they have no record of my disclosure… I literally signed and submitted a document declaring so at the start of my employment.
I resigned later.. but I am left now with no idea where to go or what to do next and hating myself and my body. Sucks.