So many things I think contributed to my depression. When I was very first diagnosed with it, which was about seventeen or eighteen years ago, the main contributor was my job. I drove a school bus for a living and when I got a new job in my hometown, I had a supervisor who liked talking disgusting to the women there. You know the type. I was friends with the mechanics and during our break times, talk in the break room could get pretty bad, we were all like sailors. But the mechanics knew how far to take it, our boss did not. First, I don't think it is appropriate for a boss to try to be one of the guys, he has too much power. Well his talking led to touching, like slapping my butt and saying very rude things to me. I would beg him to stop and I even told him that I did not want to file sexual harassment charges against him, I didn't want the trouble. His reasoning was he was one of the guys and it was just all in fun. I had several meetings with him with a union rep with me, begging him to stop. He didn't so I was force to file a complaint with the district. He ended up leaving his job and I heard he went from job to job doing the same thing and getting in trouble for it.
You would think things would have gotten easier for me. Wrong. I made the district and the good old boys club look bad so I started getting into trouble for everything. I would get written up for clocking in at 6:01 am when my time to start was 6:00. But no one else was written up just me. After about a year of this harassment, I was put off of work because I couldn't stop my crying jags. I couldn't function. While I was off, they tried to write me up because they said I flipped off a worker at one of the schools. I was off on Workers Comp and they still were messing with me.
I found out I was pregnant in early 99 with my first child. During that pregnancy, the harassment worsened and I was on egg shells throughout my pregnancy. My daughter came five weeks early thanks to all that stress. While out on maternity leave, they tried to have me fired. Again. My union was worthless, the rep just bent over backwards for the district so I went and found my own lawyer. We sued the district and I won because everyone they subpoenaed had to tell the truth, even a supervisor told the truth, which shocked me. They weren't done because they tried a few times to fire me but I never did anything wrong to give them grounds.
I'd like to say this had a happy ending, and I guess in a way it did. After 16 years of this crap, I finally quit and my family moved to Texas. We sold our house and moved so I could stay home. I was in no shape to work anymore. But wait, I am jumping ahead of myself. Backup. Reverse this baby.
