I had a very rough day at work. And I know that sounds like a great deal of unnecessary emoting, but the truth is that it happened. I was treated poorly, and it doesn’t sit well with me. I’m pretty good at taking criticism (constructive or not) and learning from what mistakes I make, but I don’t do well with being degraded. And that’s how I felt today.

Going into the whole story wouldn’t make a great deal of sense to the majority of people because my job is a little different and explaining what happened would involve going into a great deal of detail about what I do. And I don’t want to take up too much of anyone’s time, nor do I want to go off and say ill things about anyone that I work with. Because, the truth is that they’re all good people. I like them. But for some reason, this particular supervisor that I work directly beneath has been picking at me lately. I can’t quite figure out why. It’s not uncommon to have disagreements among coworkers, I think I’d be more concerned if everyone got along just swimmingly because there wouldn’t be much individuality, would there? And yet I recognize there to be a fine line between criticism and picking at someone’s movements just because you can.

I’m not going to sit here and pretend I’m flawless. I’m not. I prop my feet up on a footstool under my desk, sneak texts when the phone is silent – things that everyone else in my department is guilty of in some capacity or another. But I do come in every day early (lateness is so rare for me, you’ll only see it happen if the traffic is severe and there’s no way around it), put forth what I believe to be a good work effort, and do whatever I can to get everything that needs to be finished, finished. This week I’ve had to pick up some extra responsibilities because we were, quite literally, operating with only half of the department present. So that meant I had to double up on staying late this week, make extra phone calls, take care of extra things, and consequently not finish what I needed to complete for the week. Thankfully, my other supervisor (there’s two, the one who’s picked at me and the one who hasn’t been) was understanding as far as to what had been done and what was realistic in terms of getting things finished. She understood what I was doing and how hard I was working to help out and get the necessary tasks accomplished. As a result, things were finished and I lost a few hours of sleep over the course of the week, but we did well with what we were able to work with, me and supervisor #2.

Did supervisor #1 care? No. Brushed off as something that ‘was to be expected.’

Okay. I can live with that.

But what I can’t live with is being reprimanded in front of half of the office by supervisor #1 with her hand on her hip, shaking her finger in my face.

Yeah, I’m serious. Literally shaking her finger in my face, as if I’m either a child who’s spilled her drink or a dog who made a mess on the carpet.

Let’s not even go into the fact that what happened wasn’t even a major problem. It was a roundabout set of communication between me and one of our clients, that I was going to solve in the proper way. It took me a bit to get there, but I did get to the proper conclusion and solution. The client and I had a bit of an initial communication problem – I didn’t understand what their issue was and suggested one solution to begin with. Seconds later, the client revealed further information and that became a horse of a different color. The first solution I had suggested became exactly the wrong thing to do, and I then made a second suggestion for a solution which was correct. Not catastrophic, I thought. Just a miscommunication – the client wasn’t angry at me, she was angry at something else that had happened in the company and wanted it remedied. So I then went about the proper pathways to get that accomplished.

Supervisor #1 heard the first solution I had suggested and proceeded to reprimand me in front of half the office for it, because it was the incorrect thing to do. Never mind that it was a miscommunication, never mind that as soon as I became aware of what the situation was, I went down the proper channels. No, she instead put her hand on her hip and shook her finger in my face.

I don’t think I’ve ever been so embarrassed and humiliated at work before.

I did explain what happened to her, as clearly as I was able, and did everything I could to communicate what had happened to her. She didn’t offer forth any agreement, any understanding – nothing. And after that, I realized that I had done all I could do. I closed the conversation by telling her that I didn’t know everything, and she said she didn’t expect me to know everything, and that she hadn’t intended for her response to come off that way. I said nothing and went back about the last half hour of my day.

And my face was bright crimson.

I don’t know why someone would feel the need to treat me this way. This is the same person who, when I present her with ideas about things that might help in development of the company? She tells me I’m not thinking up anything they haven’t already discussed. After awhile, it starts to make me wonder – why cut me down? Why not build me up? Isn’t that what a supervisor should do?

Regardless, it’s Friday evening and after coming home to cry about the entire situation, I was taken out for Italian with my parents. I relaxed with an iced tea, a Caesar salad, and some chicken marsala pasta before coming home and finding comfort in pajamas for the rest of the night.

Verdict? I think it’s time to look for something new. Whatever happened, mistake or not, misunderstanding or not, I didn’t deserve to be treated that way.