If Dark Humor Disgusts You, You Might Want to Scroll on By...Sad Dog Story

Linda Bittle
Linda Bittle Posts: 1,518 ✭✭✭✭✭

Oh,friends, it's been another one of those crazy 2020 weeks. I don't really need any feedback. I know many of you are dog lovers, so don't read this if it's going to hurt too much.

I mostly need a safe place to vent.

Let me start by saying that I am extremely careful in my personal life to avoid drama, and I never, ever, take it to work. If only my coworkers would do the same...

Yes, I'm already looking for a new job. Because working with grown women who treat each other badly and then attempt to drag me into the fight make working conditions unacceptable. This week I've had to talk to 2 supervisors, and write a page and a half about what I saw and heard when one employee verbally abused another on Friday evening. Now the abuser is trying to be super nice to me, and I know that she knows that I gave my honest account of what happened. Let's just say that I am watching my back and am prepared for her to launch a counter complaint against me.

I had a fairly chaotic childhood and a bad marriage, and this drama is making me ill.

(Dark humor warning - what follows is a completely true and very sad account of my weekend with my family. We - my Mom and sister and I - have been planning this girls weekend for weeks. Staying at their place, eating favorite foods, watching Christmas movies in our pajamas...so, be warned.)

As planned, my mom and sister picked me and Sammy up on Saturday morning, and we went to their place in Cabool. Mind you, I was suffering from a sinus infection and my sister had a urinary tract infection, so we were already not having a great time.

Sammy has had random seizures almost since I got him in 2017 when his previous owner passed away. He's been on medication twice a day ever since, and it has mostly worked well. Medication doesn't always stop them, but it did help alleviate the worst of them.

Seizures, in and of themselves are not dangerous. Scary, but generally self limiting. I've sat up with Sammy many nights while he recovered from them.

And Sammy had had a GOOD DAY. He'd visited his friend, the retired Marine who lives around the corner and cannot have a pet of his own. Carey always had treats, and Saturday was no different. Then he got a 30 minute car ride and a chance to play with my sister's Cocker Spaniel. He got too excited, and I medicated him again, but he had a seizure (not unexpected), and was later resting by my side. (WARNING)

My dog died.

In my sister's living room.

While we were watching Christmas movies.

(I always thought that if I needed her help to deal with a body, it would be an ex-relative or 3.)

My Mom tried to console me by telling me every single sad dog story she's accumulated in her 81 years. That wasn't so helpful since many of my childhood dog traumas were related to her allowing boyfriends, husbands, or "friends" to haul off and dump my pets because they were too much trouble...

And I still do not have as much drama in my life as I've had to put up with at work this week!

This is Sammy's last photograph, taken about 3 hours before he had what I would call a massive stroke. It was very different from his usual seizure activity. In this photo, I cannot see any indication that he was ill.

That makes me happy.

My sister's boyfriend buried Sammy on his family's farm.

Today I'm packing up all this things. The cats seem not to miss him, and have already claimed his spot on the bed as their own.

I'm thankful that he only had 3 minutes of pain before he passed, and that I did not come home at the end of a 12 hour shift to find him. That would have haunted me.

If you are the praying kind, please keep me in your thoughts tomorrow. I have to go in for an hour for our department Christmas party and be civil to everyone. Even the woman who is probably plotting to metaphorically stab me in the back.


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Comments

  • shllnzl
    shllnzl Posts: 1,820 ✭✭✭✭✭

    My dog passed on Friday, so I can relate. Keep your head up during these trying times. You are trying to live right, too bad other people don't have the wisdom to do so as well.

  • Linda Bittle
    Linda Bittle Posts: 1,518 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @shllnzl Thank you. I try. I'm so sorry that your dog passed, too. I don't know what we would do without them, but it sure is hard to lose them.

  • LaurieLovesLearning
    LaurieLovesLearning Posts: 7,576 admin
    edited December 2020

    @Mary Linda Bittle, West Plains, Missouri I don't know that this is dark humor, just a very unfortunate series of events.

    I am glad that you could be there for your dog even if the situation wasn't perfect. It sound as though your dog was happy.

    As for the work situation, that's difficult. You are wise to be looking elsewhere. This sounds like a very poor workplace atmosphere.

    I will pray for you.

  • Linda Bittle
    Linda Bittle Posts: 1,518 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @LaurieLovesLearning my first day on the job, 2 people warned me to beware of this one woman. Can't believe what you hear her say, etc. So they KNOW. And she's gotten away with being a bully for a long time.

    She's great as long as someone who outranks her is there, but works the afternoon-evening shift, so those people go home. And she becomes a different person.

    I do not understand why she's been allowed to create such drama. It's not easy to find a cook, but she is crazy, and they should have dealt with it long before now.

    Probably this is the first time that the person being bullied has filed a written complaint, and two of us - both new - completed our written statements. I think she's always counted on not being written up.

    Unfortunately, I did not hear the language she used that would be an automatic firing. She's clever enough not to say those things where she can be overheard. But she knows she's in danger now, and I worry about her stability.

  • Linda Bittle
    Linda Bittle Posts: 1,518 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @LaurieLovesLearning Yes, mam! I am generally pretty cautious, and I am aware that she's a potential danger. More afraid of her making a false claim against me than of physical danger. However, I lead a pretty boring life, so there's nothing real that she can use against me, and I'm not afraid to go up against her with human resources if it comes to that. I think she's gotten away with a lot because people don't like to get official.

    I've already decided next time she gets going, I will call the department head and walk in close enough for him to hear her ranting. Otherwise, it's just our word against hers. But at least we have started a paper trail.

  • Slippy
    Slippy Posts: 117 ✭✭✭

    @Mary Linda Bittle, West Plains, Missouri sorry to hear about little Sammy.

    As far as the co workers...I may know a guy who knows some guys...(f you know what I mean) 🤐

    Just kidding...BUT some dead sardines strategically placed up underneath your co-workers desk in a small little cubby hole may not be a bad idea...(if you know what I mean!) 🤐

  • ltwickey
    ltwickey Posts: 369 ✭✭✭

    The loss of a pet is never easy, probably harder to take than the loss of some relative....or coworkers.....

  • Michelle D
    Michelle D Posts: 1,465 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @Mary Linda Bittle, West Plains, Missouri I'm sorry to hear about the loss of your beloved pet. I'm glad that you could be with him for his final minutes. A toxic work environment isn't something worth sticking with. I'm glad to here that you are looking elsewhere. I will keep you in my prayers.