I’ve been fired. Not laid off, not downsized, just “you’re not good enough anymore.”
I used to love this job, then the company changed but I still thought they meant it when they said they wanted us to speak out when we thought company policy was hurting our customers (which, in the healthcare software industry, means hurting patients).
The job paid really well. I moved here to the midwest US, far away from my family on the east coast and my husband’s on the west coast.
I should have squirreled away every penny, realizing that eventually the company would boot me out like the worthless person I am. Instead, I invested in sending my husband to school, getting an MBA and a CPA — which still has left him unemployed, and now my income is ending.
I am 32 now. I first thought about killing myself when I was nine; I had tried to teach myself how to knit but did such a poor job my mom made fun of it, and I tried to make a noose out of the leftover yarn.
Why am I still alive? I told myself things would get better. They would have to get better. And for one glorious year, they did. My job was awesome. I bought a house. My husband and I were deliriously happy.
But that’s it. Since then, the past year and a half or so, things at work have just gone so downhill that I shouldn’t be surprised they kicked me out. I still am, since my job was customer support and my customers absolutely loved me. But my supervisor said he just plain didn’t believe them — it wasn’t possible for him to dislike me as much as he did and yet have other folks like me. It was his way or the highway, and because I wouldn’t choose, he chose for me.
My husband just kept saying, “Things will get better,” while he comforted himself with large expensive McDonald’s breakfasts every morning and World of Warcraft the rest of the day. Now, while he’s trying to be supportive, he still can’t seem to fathom that we’re going to be broke.
Why don’t I just find another job? Do you think I haven’t tried? My job has a ridiculous non-compete agreement that prevents me from working anywhere else in the healthcare industry. Yes, it’s legally unenforceable, but if you break it they blacklist you for life and you can never work with them or update your certifications ever again.
Why is my self worth so tied to this job? I guess because it’s just one in a long series of failures, from that knitting project so long ago through my attempts to become a college professor (turns out a handful of students hate me as much as my supervisor at my job does, and that’s enough to kill your chances in academia).
I’m left here wishing that I had killed myself when I was younger. I don’t think that one year of happiness was worth the other 31 years of pain. And I don’t think things will get better, looking at my parents who are already planning their own suicide because they have no retirement savings after they, too, were unemployed for too long.
Lots of people have it worse than I do. But that’s not a reason not to kill myself. Not when the pain has always outweighed what little happiness is out there, and when, looking forward, I see nothing but more pain.
7 comments
I know what you’re going through. Unfortunately. Everything is tied to your job because without it you can’t live life with any enjoyment since everything costs a fee, even just having the basic necessities. Don’t know what state you’re in, but are you eligible to collect unemployment?
From this little bit of info I’ve read about you I believe the world would be a better place if you stayed. You’re clearly intelligent, dedicated, and have morals that you’re willing to stick up for, that makes you rare and beautiful. Everyone’s in hell right now, the economy sucks, the housing market is screwed, everyone’s hanging on by a thread. I say we stick it out for another year or two and then consider mass suicide if things haven’t improved. Hang in there.
@Ender: that sounds like a great idea.
I would even add, just like according to the line of one very-popular thread in SuicideProject around last August (just google “Suicide project + Let’s face it we’re all evil in some way”, then read it and the numerous comments there..and you’ll know what I mean), that since we live in this fucking ‘System’, set by those unfortunately “FEW powerful evil”, I would probably do some kind of a jihad-like mission, but this time to crash or burn the house of those Powers-that-be that are sickeningly corrupt and responsible for this whole financial-system twiddling-around, because of these few corrupt and greedy individuals, there are a damn whole LOTS of good people, just like yourself, who have gotten into this bloody mess they don’t deserve!
I say fuck it.
and I’ll probably try to die in a bang/blast so hopefully the world (or at least media) would take a note of the important *Message* I’m trying to relay, ie: that we all good people need to NOT be silent and tortured anymore, that we all need to STAND UP together, and fight for our rights, as Humans that should-be, and never let ANYONE even those few powers-that-be fuck up our life and rights.
At least let this be a message for the future generations of Humanity, for our children, grandchildren, etc.
Let’s make our deaths (even EACH of our death) to be remembered until future generations, by leaving a very shocking and powerful *Message* (whether in writing, blog, action, bravest mission you’ll ever done in life, etc) when you die.
We all will die eventually, so might as well make a shocking blast out of it.
1. You had shitty parenting from your mother. Forgive her and forget her.
2. You have shitty suicidal role models. Forgive your parents and forget them.
3. You have a shitty husband. Divorce him, forgive and forget him.
4. If you want to salvage your marriage do this: Call 800-558-6767 (Schneider National, Inc. | Truckload and Transportation Services) and let them train you and your husband to be OTR truck drivers if he’s is too fucking lazy to find a job in his field that you’ve trained him for. You can live in the truck and won’t need a house and it will cure him of his WoW addiction. He can still have his McDonald’s breakfast anywhere in the USA.
5. Don’t feel bad about losing your house if you did or do. Everyone’s doing it.
6. Don’t kill yourself over a non-enforcible no-compete clause. You should try to work elsewhere in your field. If you get black-listed as you fear, move to another industry for customer service work or retrain with student loans to do something related like nursing or to find a job quickly train to be a Certified Nursing Assistant.
7. You have options. Your life will improve.
Corporations (aka pure evil) do this crap to people all the time. Don’t blame yourself, the blame is theirs. I get treated like garbage at work, too. I don’t believe in hell, per se, but I like to think that those people that did that to you will have a special place there 🙂 There is something better coming for you soon. I went through dozens of jobs before I got this “dream job” only its just another nightmare. I am thankful that I have it, but I am also painfully aware that it is killing me. I feel what you feel, even if I’m still working, I’ve had that feeling you’ve got now for so long, I’ll never be free of it. Scarred for life. We all feel your grief, remember that and tell yourself that over and over so you will not feel so alone.
You and especially your husband are still just kids. If you love each other you’ve got the toughest part of life figured out. Maybe he will grow up. Seems like a situation that can turn on a dime (literally) I’ve been in a similar corporate boat and the scumbags who hosed you will end up in hell working for eternity under Hitler or Stalin.