Man Shares The Text He Sent To His Work Group Chat After His 'Narcissistic' Boss Fired Him Days After His Son Was Born
His text put into words what a lot of people were feeling.
nappy / Pexels & Reddit A man took to Reddit’s r/antiwork forum, a subreddit where users can vent about work-related issues, to share a text he sent to his former workplace’s group chat. His boss of five years apparently fired him the day he returned to work after his son was born.
After the new dad was fired, he let his coworkers know just how badly he was treated.
In his text, the man called his former boss “narcissistic” and “ungrateful,” and said he was glad he had been fired so he could spend more time with his son. He warned his old coworkers that their boss would never appreciate them or their work, and to not waste any more of their time working for him.
Photo: Reddit
Tons of people found this Reddit user’s experience with his ‘ungrateful’ employer relatable.
The post resonated with other users in the subreddit, who shared some of their own stories about their bosses who didn’t respect their requests for parental leave.
“My husband’s friend never took a vacation or sick days for 15 years and his kid was born and had issues and he requested a second week off and they told him if he ever did it again he would be fired. It made me so angry. He quit and found a new job thankfully,” said one user. The original poster responded, “I never have and never will put work before my family.”
One user shared that their employer had asked them for proof that they were having a child when they requested a week off in advance and questioned whether this would have happened if he was the one giving birth. Another user responded, “Oh don’t worry, women also get asked for evidence that they were giving birth. A friend of mine needed to provide a doctor's note when she was out of work having a miscarriage.”
The post’s comments were full of people sharing their worst experiences with employers.
Other stories in the comments included people who were loyal workers and went above and beyond at their jobs, right up until getting fired for things like requesting schedule changes or parental leave.
“I got fired 2 days before Christmas because I wanted to leave early on a day I wasn't even scheduled to be in so I could be at a family Christmas party,” shared a commenter. “The kicker was my wife was 6 months pregnant with my first kid.”
In the words of one user, their takeaway was that “employers treat hard workers like trash … I'm not gonna work myself to death for an employer that will replace me the instant they find it beneficial to do so, so why sacrifice my well-being for them?"
America is the only developed nation in the world that does not offer paid parental leave. The Family and Medical Leave Act mandates 12 weeks of unpaid parental leave to most full-time employees and offers protection against retaliation from employers. However, when Reddit users pointed this out, the man who originally made the post explained that he lives in North Carolina, where employees can be terminated without reason. Even so, many Reddit users recommended that he speak to a lawyer to see if he could make a case against his former employer.
Although not many situational details were provided in the original post, the text blew up largely because so many people could relate to having an unsympathetic employer.
One user put it this way: “I cannot understand how people like that can exist. Have they never had a child born? Family member sick? It is mind-boggling to see ‘no one wants to work’ and then get hundreds of examples of why that’s the case. Who would want to put up with this?”
Jessica Bracken is a writer living in Davis, California. She covers entertainment and news for YourTango.