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The original was posted on /r/antiwork by /u/Much_Ad_9312 on 2024-08-11 10:21:40+00:00.

I made this post about my work environment the other on my city's subreddit, and people didn't like hearing about my update so I'm moving it here.

I told my boss earlier today that I'd be leaving in 3 weeks and she was not happy.

This morning, my boss called our restaurant, while my coworker and I were there, to let me know she transferred my money to me. She asked me a sudden question, asking if I plan to keep working for her. Initially, I'd already planned on telling her in person, but I saw this as a good opportunity to let her know earlier and on her own accord. I told her that I wanted to leave on the 3rd of September and that I had already talked to my mom about it. I couldn't tell what she was thinking, but her tone indicated that she was upset and possibly sad. I felt a little empathy (very little) but it's something that needed to be done and I felt relieved. I handed the phone to my coworker, whom she'd asked to speak with. I've been talking to my coworker about how I'm pretty sure our work condition is very illegal and emotionally draining and I think we need to remove ourselves from that situation. I guess they had about the same conversation, only he told her that he wanted to move to Toronto to be safe with his dad.

After the phone call, I felt free for the first time. I felt like there was finally something to look forward to. This whole experience made me lose so much sanity and I felt trapped for the longest time, from my parents' refusal to listen to my feelings about school, to my boss guilt-tripping me into not leaving her restaurant because her family depends on it to survive. I would feel bad if she didn't treat me like her servant all the time. Every morning, I wake up to get her coffee, drives me to the grocery store to buy supplies for the restaurant (which is okay I guess, she often makes me late for work because she wants me to wait for her so I can run errands for the restaurant). On my days off, she sometimes makes me go to the grocery store or Costco to prep groceries; whenever there's free time, she makes me help her prepare pork buns for the next week. All my free time is used to work, whether I like it or not. I can't really say anything because she thinks that I'm just doing it as a friend to her and she pays me in under-the-table money, and food and cheaper rent. My entire life for the last year had been dedicated to her restaurant. I rarely had moments where I felt like I didn't have to think about work.

I calculated my salary, for the hours that I worked, the money she gives me is way under minimum wage. I reasoned that, since she made me stay back from work a lot, my hours would be less than the actual scheduled hours; but it wasn't fair, my coworker, who arrives at work 3 hours earlier, per my boss' request, gets paid exactly the same as me. $1600 for 184 hours of work at what should be $17.4/hr. This is not counting the fact that she hasn't given us any tips, threatened to cut our pay every time we made mistakes or slacked off, and the overtime we often have to do because we often end up cleaning past midnight due to there only being two of us and her family just sits on their ass not helping or doing other tasks that actively make it harder to clean. Yet, every time she's gotten mad at us, she tells us how she's paying us so much and that we should be appreciative of her. It gets a lot complicated when considering that I live with them and my pay is $1100 after she deducts $500 for rent. Even though our agreed amount for my rent is $500, whenever she gets mad at me, she'll bring up how my pay is a lot after considering food and rent. We work Wednesday to Sunday, with very little breathing room; we get meals at work and on our day offs, her husband cooks me food. It's nice, but it's at the cost of my mental health, free time and my own individuality. I'm being paid in food, housing and very little amount of money, which sounds a lot like slavery.

A few hours later, my boss finally came to work four hours past schedule. She proceeded to berate us for slacking off at work when we've been waiting for her and customers to come back. She kept complaining about how we didn't do any food prep and how we didn't clean up the stations. Okay, I accept her complaints, we were having conversations about how we're finally free and lost track of time. Of course it's not as simple as that though. She hinted at me that she wants me to sign an NDA to keep her business' secrets hidden and also her family details. I was dumbstruck (well a little); I'm literally 21 and considered myself a kid, and have no reason to hurt your business or your family, I don't even know what I'd gain from it. I guess two of her only employees quitting at the same time caused her to spiral into her paranoia? Should've treated us better. She kept berating me, asking me if I'm playing games with her. In my head, I wanted to tell her that, there are absolutely no reasons for me to "play games" with her and I only want to leave for my own sanity. She asked to see my phone and when I asked why, she told me that she wants to see if I'm recording our conversation (why would you be scared?). I told her that I left it at the front and then she asked me, "don't you have two phones?" I do, but the other one is dead and in my room. I told her that but she kept being suspicious of me and she clearly doesn't believe that my phone is somewhere else.

Hours gone by and we kept working as normal (with more of her scolding), until she told me that she needed me to go with her to buy groceries. I packed up my stuff and got in her car. She drove us to the grocery store and parked there. Yes, it was a trick so she could talk to me, very subtle. She basically repeated what she said before and asked me if I'm slacking off to make her go out of business. I wasn't, but wouldn't that be nice? Then she told me that three weeks of notice isn't enough time for her to find a replacement and common courtesy is a month of notice. I told her that it's actually two weeks of notice.

"Oh so we're reading up on laws now?" She said. "I can read about laws too. You want to give me two weeks of notice so that I have to pay you for the remainder of your work?" My memory was a fuzzy but this is what I remembered. I also remembering it making her bring up her contract again and everything just sounds so absurd. It's so absurd that she somehow deluded herself into believing that someone as shy and non-confrontational as me, is crazy enough to seek to hurt her insignificant business and her family. By law, I'm not even obligated to give you a notice, if I feel threatened. Three weeks is generous considering how long I've waited to leave.

She brought up my parents and asked me if they were the ones who taught me to behave like this. I hate when she brings them up, she thinks she knows everything about them because she was briefly friends with my dad and my mom. When she had a falling out with my dad, she kept shit-talking to me about them and how I shouldn't be like them. Actually that happened before they had that falling out. She's always worried about other people talking shit behind her back, she forgets that she literally does the same thing with everyone else, including someone who is supposed to be your friend. Those are my parents, if I have any problems with them, I'll deal with it myself; in the end, I still love them and I can't tolerate shit-talk from some paranoid-anger-issue-narcissist lady. You have no right talking about them like that.

She said that she doesn't care anymore, because if I do something to harm her business or her family (tiring), or if I leave on bad terms with her, she knows where I live and will "play games" (what does that mean, harassment?) with my family. So I was forced to be "friends" with her until I leave unless I want her to harass my family; great. I don't even know if she'll let me leave, she told me that she wants me to stay until she finds a replacement and who knows how long that's going to be.

On our drive home, she brought up my phone again and I told her the same thing, I haven't brought my second phone out in a while because I haven't charged it, therefore there's no reason to bring it. She gave me a look that said she "definitely knows I'm hiding something" and told me that, "you know you lie a lot right?"... I lied like once, because of you screaming at my coworker; and anyway, don't give me that look like you know shit, I literally don't have my other phone on me. I really should be recording our conversation for legal reasons, but I'm not.