Hi All,
I have been poking around here for some time and have never had the time/willingness to create a post of my own. I'm sure this has been addressed to nauseum but I really would like to get some feedback to my specific situation and I have just a few precious moments to do so.
I have bee working for my wife's father for going on over eight years now and I simply cannot handle it anymore. My health has been rapidly declining because of the stress at my job and the routine 10-12+ hours shifts that I routinely work. I work for a “seasonal company”, which has always been used against me to justify working 50-60+ hours a week 9-months out of the year. The justification often comes from the fact that three months a year in the winter I work 32-35 hours minimum (often more). This is always seen as “recovery time”, which happens to be the worst weather here in New Hampshire. I'll briefly describe my health below, which will explain why this is the worst time for leisure for me.
I run a service office with roughly 8 technicians servicing in three states. We have had perpetual staffing issues the entire time I have been here and have always been performing well beyond the scope of my job. I am literally capable and often responsible for every single aspect of what my company does. AP/AR, Receptionist, ALL e-mail correspondence and MAINTENANCE (which should be a full time job by its self. I know I am rambling but I have reached a point where I simply don't know what to do anymore.
Being our busiest time of year, I have worked 7 15+ hour shifts, sleeping on the floor in my cubical and starting my work the second I come back to life. My wife is completely overwhelmed at home with our two young children. She is rightfully upset with my working habits and I feel so fucking trapped I have been stomach sick for a few months and my hands visibly shake throughout the work day. I am the complete punching bag of the company and I need to find a way out, even if it fucks up the family dynamic.
The worst part is that I am getting okay pay for the first time and I thought that would allow me to continue further but I simply can not. Since my time with the company, I have never taken a “week long vacation” or more that 2 congruent days off to be with my children. I can work50+ hours in a week but if I do it in four days because I have an outside work obligation, I am still docked a day from my fucking father in law.
Since my time working here I have had four surgeries and several broken bones, which have taken up all my vacation time for PT and so forth. I am 35 with several failed knee surgeries, 2 colon surgeries and a degenerative autoimmune disorder that there is currently no cure for. This disorder is slowly breaking down all the joints in my body and ruining my bone density among other things. I have also dealt with blood clots after several surgeries. Heck I broke my femur last summer and only missed two days of work… I spend a good portion of the year using arm crutches as well. This being said, I still perform all the work stated above at a higher and more efficient manner than anyone else here. I am allowed to eat at my desk but have NEVER been allowed a proper lunch or any scheduled breaks.
I'm sure I'm leaving out a lot of important stuff but this should be enough to get some feedback. I've always gone with the “I'm doing this for my family” but I can not sustain this any longer. I seldomly sleep even 5 hours a night and my commute is one hour, which I sometimes have to pull over to splash water on my face or have even napped to make it home without falling asleep. I simply don't know how to navigate this….I'm currently on hour 12 of todays shift and this is extremely out of character for me to do on work time. I hope to leave within the hour to start my trek home and hope to find something to read when I get home.