TW: Sexual Assault
TLDR: I busted ass for a small business because I was told we were “family” for almost 5 years. Resigned after being sexually assaulted by a patient, then reprimanded and berated by my boss for taking my hour break to wait outside our office building till after the man had left. Have continued to bust ass for my remaining 2 weeks and asked last night if I could have a letter of referral to apply for future work – the answer was “no, I don't do that”.
I will preface this by saying I am one of those people that loves to work. I take great pride in my work and saw it as an escape from external world problems. When I started work at this small business, I was given the sense of family and guidance that I hadn't really experienced as my home life wasn't always the most ideal. My boss became like my mother, my co-workers like my fun aunts. Over the years, my loyalty to the business became stronger and stronger. As my loyalty increased, my boundaries and values were increasingly crossed. I was lumped with additional duties paid below the standard as I was “young”; I would be expected to work late or take calls outside of hours; my standing as a professional was demeaned and I was constantly referred to as “girl” or “the children” (there is one other who is my age). I would constantly be bullied and gaslit by a new hire who refused to take direction from me because I was younger.
The bullying included being yelled at and shooed away, having the phone receiver slammed down on me whilst on the phone, having my belongings thrown in the trash, having my personal affects such as my personal diary rifled through etc. All the types of things that when you bring up, sound petty and are greeted with the response of “Oh I'm sure it was an accident” or “are you sure they meant it that way?”. I brought these all up with my boss who had advised that my boomer co-worker was too old to change now, and that this was just her personality and that I needed to take the high road. Regarding my personal diary being rifled through, the response was that I should know that my co-worker was like this already, and that I shouldn't have tempted her by leaving my diary at my desk. Due to loyalty, I sucked it up and continued working with a smile on my face.
The straw that finally broke the camel's back was an incident that happened two weeks ago.
I was working reception – I love chatting to people and have a very bubbly personality well suited to the position. I am small of frame and tend to put people at east because of how unassuming I am. I was having my usual chat to a patient, putting them at ease before their appointment with the doctor for their claim (we are a medicolegal office). All is going well and it's a good light hearted chat. The patient asks me where the bathroom is and I happily point him in the right direction. He returns and struggles with the water cooler, so I get up to help. He was an incredibly large man, about 6'2 and heavy set. Imposing, but soft spoken. As I bend to dispense water into the cup, he lifts his oversized hoodie and reveals his penis hanging out of his pulled up sweatpants not 1 foot away from my face which is now at his waist level. I go pale. I tell myself I'm seeing things. I tell myself not to stare and I'm being rude and that perhaps this fellow has lost feeling to his appendages. I walk back to my reception desk and compose an e-mail to my boss, telling her what had just happened. She comes out and tells me to wait at her office. The look on her face was not one of concern but one of excitement because something was happening in the office. I obey and go sit in her office. She rings me and tells me the man is normal and she doesn't see any of what I had described. At this same time, I quickly rifle through this man's medical history and see it was just his hand that was hurt – I was giving him the benefit of the doubt for no reason. It suddenly occurs to me that I was just knowingly and willingly assaulted.
I have a history of violent sexual assault and so it brought all those feelings back up and sends me pale. I ring my boss who is now sitting at my desk, and tell her that I'm going to go out and do the banking and other office errands then go on my lunch break. I asked if she could please contact me when the man had left. I immediately have a breakdown as soon as I leave my office building. I fall apart and am crying like a mad woman at the park opposite the building. Wailing and sobbing like a banshee. I had just done my boss a huge solid by leaving else this would have happened at work lol. My partner leaves work to comfort me and we walk around as I try to calm down. My partner tries to convince me not to go back to work but I tell him that it's a day where only myself and my boss are the only ones working, and I couldn't just leave my boss hanging like that. Loyalty again.
Just as my partner and I are walking back to my office (with the end of my hour lunch break), I receive a call from my boss. She was irate and demanding to know where I was, saying that the man had left half an hour ago and asked why I don't ever check my texts. I stammer and my stomach drops as I tell her I'm on my way back in. I run back to the office and into my boss' room. I apologise that I didn't see her text from 30 minutes ago, and she proceeds to absolutely lay into me. She asks me why I thought it was appropriate to just leave her like that; didn't I know this was a place of business; how unprofessional I was; why didn't I come back when she had texted etc. I answered each question seriously: I didn't think it was appropriate to leave but I felt unsafe and had just had a breakdown in the park; I'm sorry I left and I came back because I knew it was just us two today and I just wanted to get back to work; I didn't see her text because I was in the midst of a full-blown public breakdown etc. With each answer, she kept circling back to the same questions over and over because I guess she wasn't hearing what she wanted / hadn't humiliated me enough. She then tells me that the man was lovely to her and the doctor he had gone in to see, and that he was actually very severely disabled with renal failure which is maybe why I saw what I saw (a blatant lie to shut me up – his file had nothing on renal failure or anything to do with his penis). I tell her that he was lovely to me too until he whipped out his dick, and told her that I was resigning and that we needed to stop whatever the conversation just then was because we were going in circles and I just wanted to get back to my work. She rolls her eyes and dismisses me by shooing me away. I go back to doing my work like an absolute champ whilst biting my lip to stop myself from screaming from another breakdown.
One of our psychiatrist independent examiners overheard the whole ordeal and must have given her a talking to because after about 2 hours, my boss was hovering over my like a helicopter parent. The psych was lovely and came around to check up on me through the day and reiterated just how great I was at my job. My boss kept asking if she could get anything for me and if I'd like some toast. I told her that I couldn't eat, as I was anxious and disgusted and the thought of food was making me nauseous. She proceeded to fix me some toast and let's me know t's on the counter. I did not eat the toast.
It has been two weeks and I am still not eating properly and have lost much sleep due to the flashbacks. I can't keep food down due to the anxiety and constantly throw up at work. My whole office knows I've been throwing up at lunch time because they can hear it. Today is my second last day at work – my boss asked me what cake I wanted. I said it was fine, I still can't eat. She said I didn't need to have any and that the cake was for everyone.
I asked my boss if she would write me a letter of referral. I had spent almost 5 years of my life dedicated to helping grow this business and keep it afloat during COVID. I had also just spent the last 2 weeks teaching my boss how to do my job as I am the only one in the office that knows how to do what I do. The answer was a flat “no, I don't do that.”.
So yeah, fuck loyalty.
Please be your own advocate.
I did everything boomers say millennials are sorely lacking, and still got shafted.
You are expendable.
Please live your life doing what you love and do it for what you're worth.
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Bonus: I'm surprised I hadn't resigned sooner. I had been sick one time but expected to stay on past my assigned hours because my boss was away. One of our specialists was running over-time, so I stayed as long as I could till 5:20 PM. I was only rostered on till 5:00 PM that day, and had a doctor's appointment booked at 5:30 PM. The next day I was in, I was humiliated in front of the rest of the office who had been called into my boss' office for a 'meeting', where she proceeded to lay into me about unprofessionalism and how dare I leave a specialist in the building alone. When I said that I was only rostered till 5:00 PM and even stayed until 5:20 PM, I was met with a scoff and told to “leave kindergarten at home”. I explained that I had only left because I had a doctor's appointment at 5:30 PM that I needed to go to, and the response was “well was it life or death that you needed to put my business in jeopardy like that?”. My hours were changed to 9:00 AM – 5:30 PM a day later. I was late twice due to not being familiar with the bus schedule to get me in on time (the busses are more unreliable the closer to 9:00 AM apparently). This was met with more scolding.