A Job That Walks All Over You

At the end of July I started working as an in-home caretaker, and at the beginning I really enjoyed this work, and my clients were great! I enjoy being able to help people and provide them with kindness in a field where it is a stereotype that caregivers are neglectful. I got amazing reviews and gained a lot of experience in aiding individuals with disabilities. I may be small, but I can lift and transfer a full grown man!

Honestly, that is the bulk of what I have done these past months. I've also taken to selling a lot of my clothes on Depop to free up some closet space and make some extra cash. It has been successful, besides the fact that when I make a sale I decide it's my turn to shop on Depop, and I always end up buying something! I guess what's gained is lost in both my wallet and my closet.

I spent a lot of time with my guinea pigs Donut and Apollo, its hard to ignore them when they look so cute. A lot of my photos I've taken are of them!

I tried to romanticize October as much as possible this year, I was autumn obsessed. I bought decor, bought Halloween pajamas, stayed cozy inside reading, and preparing for a Halloween party.

I'd say late October to early November is when I started to have issues with my job. My client started to take advantage of my kindness to make me stay longer hours and complete tasks that were not part of my job. In addition, they lived with a family member that would yell at them and that created a stressful environment.

I started to dread going to work their shift, and paired with the insane traffic, it started to affect my mental health. The final straw was the fact that my company had not paid me in a month, on what was supposed to be weekly pay. When I quit, I was told that all my shifts were covered and my money would be paid that I was owed.

My normal shift time comes around and my ex-client starts to text and call me repeatedly. I start to become really stressed out because they are a high needs individual and they need someone to preform almost every task. Finally I couldn't take the spam calls anymore and sent a kind message explaining that I had quit because of lack of pay, and that I was told their shifts would be covered and I even apologized on behalf of the company for their lack of communication with the client.

They went off on me and were very disrespectful, and a few days later I get text messages from both the ex-client and the sister accusing me of stealing a watch. They said they had me on camera taking it, and that they would go to the police and take the report to my college. Basically they threatened my future, and I was going through every even of that last day of working trying to figure out how in the world I would have misplaced or even put the watching n my pocket, but there was just no way.

Photo by Matthias Zomer on Pexels.com

I always carried the watch with two hands because I was warned about stealing accusations when I started my job in July, I had to put the watch down before I preformed any other task, so there was no scenario where I would have taken it. Still, I was very stressed out. I checked all of my work clothes pockets and my car and nothing turned up. After a few days of stress I get two final messages from my ex-client and the sister- apologizing. Another aide had misplaced the watch and it had been found.All I could really do was scoff and laugh it off- I am finally free! I am still working for another caregiving company and I have a regular client that I really enjoy spending time with. I am hoping to find a second job in another field because I have some more time on my hands.

Check out my main blog here!

https://lifeastwodirections.wordpress.com