I used to work at a Speedway, and from February to June of this year, the district manager had started something called the Duck Game. Basically, each store in the district had a duck, and the goal was for the employees from each store to steal the ducks from other stores. The way you got it was if you went in, and the person at the register didn’t say hello, try and upsell you, or ask for your rewards card.
The game was supposed to be a fun thing, but it became a nightmare for everyone, especially me. The managers played really dirty, like going to the other stores and taking photos of the employees so they’d know who to look out for. So people who I had never met just knew who I was, and had pictures of my other coworkers, some of who were still teenagers. And one manager said if you didn’t do good at the duck game, you would lose your job.
The employees from other stores would come in and cause messes or break stuff to distract us so we would screw up and they could take our duck. One time, a woman spilled her maximum sized soda all over the floor while I had a huge line of people, and then she asked for the duck, so I gave it to her. One lady had her husband who worked at another store get ducks for hers, which was against the rules.
I was dogpiled on by literally the entire district, more so than anyone else. All the managers would say to go to me because I’m an idiot and would mess it up, and I did. And when I would mess up, my store’s general manager would yell at me and tell me how much of a stupid piece of shit I am, and a lot of the time he would do it in front of customers too.
One time, I came in, and we had three ducks. I lost one of the ducks within the first hour of my shift, and my manager kept berating and insulting me while I was standing at the door to keep the middle schoolers from across the street from overcrowding the store. Then I lost another duck later that night, and I felt even worse, and then I lost the final duck, and I started crying in front of everybody. The general manager called the store to tell me I’m the worst employee and he was genuinely pissed off at me. I broke down again and left for the night, and he called the store again about a half hour later to check up on me, but by then I had already left, and he didn’t call my cellphone or anything to try and follow up.
My coworkers would tell me not to worry about what the general manager would say to me, but he’d always say hurtful things to me even outside of the game. Telling me I’m ugly, and stupid, and I’m worthless. I always came in when I needed to, I came in on almost all my off days, and I did my best whenever I could. But the duck game destroyed any sort of confidence I had in myself, and made me realize that maybe the manager was right about me being a worthless piece of garbage.
It’s been a few months since I left my old store, but I still don’t really have any self confidence in myself. Whenever I make mistakes at my new job, I start to get teally stressed and worried, and I’m scared of making everyone hate me. I shouldn’t let the past bother me, but I can’t shake it off.