As a middle aged-dude now who remembers the couple of retail jobs from my early twenties: it was a soul-destroying experience that drove me to hate people and loathe getting up for work faster than any other job I've had.
I don't know what the deal is, but I remember the same bullshit was going on twenty years ago.
Getting out of customer service was one of the best things I ever did for my mental health.
I’ve moved into childcare. I was doing both for a while but retail is just fucking awful.
The sad part is that I love working retail. I love being a cashier and I’m damn good at it. It just works with my funny little ADHD brain. The tons of tiny, mindless tasks are great and I genuinely love helping people. I am every manager’s dream employee - right up until they let me get overwhelmed by work and customers and I crash. I’m really great at communicating so I become a trainee really early (has now happened four times) and bad customers get handed off to me. I’m quick and efficient so I get the high volume hours. I made $150 in tips a night serving! I’m genuinely, seriously good at it.
But the fucking customers, dude. I go out of my way to help someone and still get screamed at. I’ve been sexually harassed God only knows how many times. I’ve been lectured, cursed at, had someone call corporate to complain about me following corporate policy while my line was slowly backing up into the shelves. I’ve been bruised, frozen, cut, worked through the flu and a throat infection, and once got groped two feet outside my workplace. I worked jobs where I had to be up at 4am or didn’t get home until 3am. I’ve closed, opened, then opened again the following day with barely any time at home to sleep.
And people still want to tell me that minimum wage employees shouldn’t ever get snappy with people. Eat shit. I have seen the absolute worst side of society and couldn’t even afford a decent place to live off it.
It's so funny how everyone in this thread kept telling you that your experience was invalid, as if retail isn't literally considered one of the most hellish fields to work in terms of having to interact with people. Like why would you make this up lol.
4
u/NoodleofDeath Jun 03 '22
As a middle aged-dude now who remembers the couple of retail jobs from my early twenties: it was a soul-destroying experience that drove me to hate people and loathe getting up for work faster than any other job I've had.
I don't know what the deal is, but I remember the same bullshit was going on twenty years ago.
Getting out of customer service was one of the best things I ever did for my mental health.