I (43F) work in retail, and lately, I\u2019ve been losing patience with my coworker, Diane (30F), who just had a baby. Ever since she came back from maternity leave, she\u2019s been late almost every other shift\u2014or just doesn\u2019t show up at all\u2014because, as she puts it, \u201cthe baby kept me up all night.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\u2019ve covered for her three times in the past month, including once on my only day off. This Sunday, at 6 AM, she texted asking me to cover her again because she needed to sleep after a rough night with the baby. \u201cYou\u2019re single, so you have time!\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I had actual plans and wasn\u2019t going to drop everything again. So I snapped and texted back: \u201cSorry, your time isn\u2019t more valuable, just cause you\u2019re a mom!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
No reply.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When I got to work on Monday, I froze as I saw a Post-it note from HR on my desk asking for an immediate meeting. Apparently, Diane had complained that I refused to help the \u201cteam.\u201d HR asked why I didn\u2019t step up if I had the chance. I said I\u2019m not paid to fix other people\u2019s irresponsibility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now, some coworkers think I was heartless toward a struggling new mom, while others say Diane\u2019s just milking the sympathy card.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So now I\u2019m wondering \u2014 am I actually the bad guy for refusing to cover, or is everyone just too afraid to call out someone using motherhood as an excuse?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I (43F) work in retail, and lately, I\u2019ve been losing patience with my coworker, Diane (30F), who just had a baby. Ever since she came back from… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17144,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"views":351,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17143"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17143\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17145,"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17143\/revisions\/17145"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17144"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsinbr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}