I work at a local owned restaurant that I live around 20 minutes from. This is my first job. Minimum wage is $7.25 an hour in my state (I live in the United States), and I just got a raise from $8 to $8.75. The boss is laid back and chill with the hours. Employees are expected to be there everyday normally either 10-3, 3-8, or even 10-8, with me working the 3-8 shift.
The job isn’t hard, so other than the pay, I would actually like it. However, the night manager is an asshole.
She’s worked there for 3 years, so she knows more than anyone else on night shift. If you’re new and you have a question, she’s the person you go to. She knows what she’s talking about, but she expects everyone (even the new people) to know the in’s and out’s of the job as well as her.
When I first started, she made my life a living hell. She was constantly yelling at me and belittling me if I did anything wrong or simply asked a question. She wouldn’t properly train me either, so if I wasn’t a fast learner, then I wouldn’t have ever caught on. Not to mention I was terrified to even ask a question or make a mistake. On top of that, I heard her talking shit about me to the other employees any time she thought I was out of earshot.
I just put up with the suffering because I was under the impression that this was just how it was and there was nothing I could do. After all, I was there to make money, not make friends. Slowly but surely, my days were spent having panic attacks and dreading going into work, and then getting there and enduring her abuse.
Finally, I just broke down. That faithful day, I pulled into work and parked. I couldn’t stop panicking, which sounds stupid, but I felt so helpless. The idea that this could be forever was more than I could handle. My mental health since starting there had just gone to shit.
Finally, I said “fuck it” and called my boss. I told her I had to quit and that I wouldn’t be going into work. I was planning to leave anything about the night manger out, but she asked why I was quitting, and I just let it all out. I told her that the night manager keeps treating me like I’m less than human and that it’s making my life worse.
In response, my boss told me that the night manager actually really liked me and was always bragging on me. I didn’t know what to believe, if I should believe my boss or my own eyes and ears. My boss told me all about how the manager had a rough past and that she doesn’t know why she is the way she is. Finally, she wore me down into staying.
I feel like now is a good time to mention that I’m queer (but in the closet). This business is a Christian business and is blatantly homophobic and transphobic on top of everything else. More than just that, they don’t want anyone other than cis straight white Christians working there. We do not have enough people working there, but the boss won’t hire anyone else. In the months I’ve been working there, they’ve only hired one new person.
Anyway, I stuck it out for a while. Eventually, the boss hired a woman to be the new night manager. She stayed with us for about a week, then quit. The reason was because of the old night manager. The same things I was experiencing were what she was experiencing. Not getting properly trained, getting yelled at and belittled when making a mistake, and feeling terrible about going into and being at work. One of my coworkers told the boss that the old manager was being terrible to the new manager, and my boss’s response was “She’ll get over it”.
The manager was better than I was for actually quitting though. I tried to quit around the same time as her- for a second time- and my boss told me that she would do what she could to get me to stay. She kept saying everything under the moon, except actually confronting the old night manager. She wore me down again, and I’m due to go back into work tomorrow.
Before anyone says “You’re going to have assholes at every job”, I just want to clarify that my issue ISNT the fact that my manager’s an asshole. It’s the fact that the boss KNOWS how the manager treats her employees and still does nothing. She just tells anyone who complains “You have to learn to tolerate it”.
I guess I just want to see if I’m being dramatic and every job really is like this, or if I need to just ghost. Should I go in tomorrow and tell her it’s my last day and be strong? Or should I cut all ties and never go in again? Does it even matter? $8.75 isn’t worth this stress.