The Way The River Runs

Diamond Ring Leader

The first job you get is usually something mainstream, and nothing too crazy. Well not for me. My first job left me with a lot of issues. Now don't get me wrong, I did make a lot of good friends, and some not so good ones, and there are a lot of memories that I can take out of it, again, not all good ones. But one thing I do wish I had done was be more honest with my manager, because that definitely would have made my life a lot easier. Either way, that place has a lot to answer for, especially some of the people in it.

I will start off with a positive, and that was the friends that I now have thanks to working there. One of them, I speak to on a weekly basis and trust with my life. Others I don't speak to as often, but when I see them, the connection is still there all the same. Even if I walk past the store they will all wave at me and smile, showing me that they still care to remember who I am and still welcome me as a friend into their lives. It was these people that made the whole experience that little bit more bearable. I would always check the rota to see if I was working the same shift as one of my favourite girls, and it would fill me with joy if I was.

However, the was on staff member who would fill me with dread if put on the same shift as me. The assistant manager. The ring leader of the group. I don't care what anyone says, she had it out for me. Anyone could see that I was treated differently to the rest of the girls working there at the time. I was the youngest out of all of them, and I guess that she did not like this. Somehow, even when addressing a group of an issue, it got directed to me, and she would make the most eye contact with me. At my interview, she was cold towards me, and had no interest in what was going on. In my last meeting, she was the exact same, if anything she looked happy to see me going. While working there, and even after, she would give me dirty looks and go out of her way to avoid me. I never did anything to her, never provoked her in any way, and yet she just took a disliking me.

A little while into my time working for this company, I was officially diagnosed with anxiety, something that I never told my employer while I was working for them. This only came after a doctors appointment that I was forced to attend by my mother. Every morning, about 10 minutes before I had to leave for my shift, I would throw up. It was like clockwork, and it happened every day without fail. It would start with the butterflies as I was getting ready, then the shakes, followed by a sharp pain in my stomach, then the sickness, and ending with the panic attack. This same cycle every weekend, and through the whole Christmas period, for three months. Three months of being sick every week. My throat was sore, my energy drained, and my mental health left at an all time low.

After that fateful day when I was let go, I went back in to speak to my old manager. Unlike her counterpart, she was a good person, and always happy to help where she could. I told her everything, but it was all said too late. I don't know why I went back to talk to her, at the time I felt it was just something that I had to do for my sanity. I told her about the anxiety and she gave me tips on how to handle it at a new job if I was to get one. I also told her about what was going on with the assistant manager and the fact that it was all still happening even after I had left. I knew that there was nothing she could do, but I wanted her to be aware so that she could try and prevent any other future employee feeling the way that I did because of her actions.

I did gain experience of what it was like to work within a retail environment, it may not have been an entirely positive one, but it was experience nonetheless. I took many valuable skills out of that place, like how to recognise when someone is toxic and needs to be spoken about with your manager. Some of the more practical skills being how to effectively meet the needs of each diverse customer that comes into the store, processing transactions, and all of the other classic technical stuff like that, I won't bore you with all of the details. I have more knowledge of what sales assistants are put through each day, and the total level of stupid that exists within the world. I had my fair share of abusive customers and requests to speak to someone higher up, to which were all told the same thing that I had already told them, and would then go on break and talk about how nasty they were. Yes, retail staff really do that, surprise.

However, the main thing that I took from working with that company, was how to notice when enough is enough and I need to get out. I let myself hit rock bottom while I was there, and I did nothing about it, something I now regret. Once I left the company, I was depressed, stressed, and anxious. I didn't know what to do with myself. While I was still under the control of the ring leader, I was slipping down into my never ending spiral and nobody knew. Nobody ever suspected that anything was wrong with me, the only thing that could have ever said anything was my end of day sales report, because it was always a little lower than everyone else, but still, nothing was ever said. I know now that I should have left sooner than I did, then maybe things would not have been so bad for me now.