I am working in my first job out of college at a small marketing firm. It’s really taking it’s toll on me. My job is fully in person. I don’t know what to do because I verbally committed to a year but I am thinking about looking for a remote job and claiming that unforeseen health issues came up that won’t allow me to work in person. It took me over 6 months to land this job so I’m not super hopeful that I’ll be able to find anything else.
In the 6 months that I have been here, I have come down with 2 really severe illnesses including covid. Before that I’d maybe get sick every year and a half. Being that I have an autoimmune disorder, this means that I’m sick for weeks on end and haven’t been able to catch a break. I am worried about the long term effects. I had laryngitis and was asked to cold call 30 companies and they could not even hear me over the phone.
There’s a lot of self righteous employees who are unbearable. They come into the office sick. I can hear them puking in the bathroom and then coming out and sitting at their computer, barely washing their hands. They think they are so important that the company can’t run without them in the office for even a week. My boss (the CEO) is even worse. He refuses to test himself because if he does test positive, he would have to quarantine. So if he doesn’t test then in his mind, he doesn’t have it. We have no mask mandate in the office so there’s a lot of unvaccinated people just running amok with no protection.
We aren’t even in cold and flu season so I’m terrified of what’s to come. Despite the increasing illnesses, my boss is demanding that all of our remote employees come back to the office at least 3 days a week to promote “collaboration, teamwork and innovation”. Mind you, our office is small. It’s probably 2,000 square feet with 5-15 people. This is partially a rant but I’m also looking for advice. What should I do?