The Struggle Is Real(er)?..

Courtney speaking again..

So, for those of you who don't know, which is all of you.. I work from home. I was living in Chattanooga and Jamie was living in Knoxville when we met. As our relationship progressed we decided to move in together and, given that Jamie has a home and a supportive family and I had neither, I made the move to Knoxville. I was up front with my place of employment and they decided that I was an asset that they did not want to lose so they set me up with a work from home position here.

Fast forward to this Tuesday. My manager (administrator really, but she's in charge of me, but not the one who decides my fate) casually mentions she'll be in town previous to Tuesday and on Tuesday she texts me and asks if she can stop by while she's in the area. I said yes and she comes over to chit chat, I presumed. We made our way to my "office" and she sits down and sighs and has this face that shows an uncomfortable smile and I immediately knew why she was there. The big boss woman in charge had sent her there to let me know that they no longer needed me. I knew there was an issue because recently they had discussed losing money, but since I had been there the longest out of all the office staff and I know what I'm doing I didn't think they would let me go. Not to mention this other little thing... WE HAVE A BABY ON THE WAY! Excuse my French, but what in the hell could they be thinking?! I mean seriously.. who fires someone who has a baby on the way?? Now apparently I was to be told that I did have the option to either commute to Chattanooga (that comes up to 1000 miles a week, people) WITHOUT mileage reimbursement or any pay increase whatsoever OR no big deal.. I could stay in Chattanooga Monday through Friday to save the gas and be able to be in the office. Yeah let me just remind you again that we have a baby on the way. If I can help it I'm not going to choose to be living in another city when my first child could decide to come early. No thank you.

I am honestly thinking that the only reason working in Chattanooga was given as an option was so that they could use that to fight paying me unemployment. Not cool, but totally something that the main person in charge would do. As for the manager who had the pleasure of being told to meet with me, she said that the decision maker said "She's smart. She'll find another job." Yeah that makes me feel a lot better. So they have given me until August 23rd to work out my time with them. It's funny because a previous employee who was fired for doing absolutely no work when she was at work was given a month to get it together and was offered a severance package, but I get a 2.5 week notice and a "you're smart." To me that's pretty close to an eff you. Smart isn't going to put diapers on our baby's butt or food in her mouth. Fortunately if I can find another decent paying job or get unemployment we will be just ok financially, definitely not anywhere fantastic, but I am just so peeved by this woman's lack of understanding for my situation. She is in her 40s I believe and she has no children, has never wanted any and within the past decade was married. Work is her child and I'm sure that's why she has room to be so heartless, because the company is her baby and she had to save it. It just absolutely blows my mind that a person can, with no regard, eliminate somebody's paycheck when they have a baby due soon. November is not that far away and she may not even wait that long to meet us.

All of this came as a shock, not to mention I have never received any warnings or reprimand, verbal or written, stating that my work has been unsatisfactory or anything of that nature. It's just complete BS. So accordingly I sent an email stating that I would like to hold onto my position until closer to when Sophia is due that way I can end my job there, take time to be with my family, then return to work. For those of you who live in the south, you can imagine how easy it would be, not to mention how well you would be received, if you were to apply for a new job and say "Hey by the way, employer in Tennessee, very shortly into my time with you I would like to take 2-5 days off to be with my newborn baby that my lesbian partner is delivering." Yeah I mean people can surprise us, but that's not something I particularly want to even deal with.

So there is my vent session for the evening. I have been letting the amount of disrespect I have been fed stew for the past two days so I had to get it all out.

Oh hey not to mention some of this stress was brought on by upcoming adoption procedures. We finally got ahold of a lawyer and an agency willing to do work with us regarding the adoption. We will owe about $4000 in fees and half of the paperwork from the agency that will process the second parent adoption wants to know about employers and bills and salaries, etc. So this is just the perfect time. They couldn't have planned it better really.

But lets end on a positive note. I didn't LOVE my job and it certainly wasn't making me the bread winner of the family so maybe this is a chance for me to move onto something that pays better or something that I enjoy more. Jamie has been so supportive even though I feel like a complete loser, but she knows what I'm worth and she has been here to support me all the way. Fingers crossed for better things coming our way!!


:)