Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap

Trey Smith

No one likes to be told that you're no longer wanted, particularly when no reason is given. For the past two weeks, my wife has been trying to keep her spirits up, but it's difficult to do when you get fired from a job.

Her firing has caused us to reassess our situation. We have come to two conclusions: 1) If she is not able to secure more hours from different clients, we will be unable to pay our mortgage at some point and 2) The kind of work that Della is doing -- in-home care services for individuals with varying disabilities and other health issues -- is ruining HER health. So, while we hope she can secure more hours in the immediate short-term (she recently picked up another 20 hours per month from a new client), we need to move another direction in the long-term. (I'll share the direction we hope to head in a subsequent post.)

While Della is fighting depression and low self-esteem due to being terminated, my issue has more to do with anger. She had worked for this family for nearly 3 1/2 years and it just galls the heck out of me that, after all she's done for them, they just so cavalierly kicked her to the curb!!

This family has not been easy to work for. They routinely have made unrealistic demands and they always seemed to be switching schedules. In the period Della worked for them, they went through nearly one dozen home care workers and yet my wife was the one constant.

When other workers failed to show up, Della would be called and, in almost every instance, she dropped what she was doing and went in. When a family emergency arose a few months ago and the family flew back east, Della went to live at their house for over a week to give constant care to the client. When the client was hospitalized, it was Della, not the family, who accompanied her to the hospital and stayed with her until she knew the client was comfortable.

Time and time again, Della was asked to go above and beyond the call of duty and, with very few exceptions, she did. She did this, not only because she takes her job seriously, but she truly cared for her client.

So, Della was caught completely off guard when the family suggested that she take off one-half of September to focus on herself. The initial idea expressed was that the family wanted to reduce her stress, but they somehow didn't factor in that being far poorer than usual is, in and of itself, stressful!

Of course, we later learned that this tack was nothing more than a ruse. When Della was scheduled to return, she was told that she no longer had a job! No reason was offered as to WHY she had been replaced. She wasn't thanked for her devoted service to this family. They basically told her, "Don't let the door hit you on the way out!"

On the surface, this is a bad situation, but, as Zhuangzi likes to remind us, a seemingly bad situation may turn out for the better or vice versa. We'll have to see which this is.