The past week, my life has been crazy. Not just crazy-busy, but full-on crazy. My boss–who I’ve been working for since January—turned in his notice. Somehow, I managed not to cry, but I’m far from happy over it, although I respect his decision, and his reasons. They jerked him around for months, overworked him, forced him to put up with worthless and/or useless staff with attitudes, and now can’t believe he quit. I’m maybe sort of having a mental panic attack over the idea of working without him, especially since the only other mentally adjusted person I work with is transferring the week after he leaves. What? I get to work by myself, AGAIN? (Okay, not alone, but without mental support, yes.). I’m just not sure I can handle it.

True, the Diva will be there for a while after he leaves, but it won’t be the same. She’s in the float pool, so it’s not permanent, and then we’ll have at least one brand new tech to contend with, plus a new charge nurse and a new boss. It’s not that I don’t adjust to change well. But this much change? I don’t know. This company has always had a high turnover rate, but this is ridiculous. Our dietician and our secretary also transferred, but that’s no great loss, as they were creating more problems than anything. (Edit:  Wait.  I just found out that since the boss is leaving, a.k.a. the one who expected her to actually do her job, the secretary is not leaving…).

On the plus side…the big boss came out last Friday to check on things, and me specifically (thank you, Diva), and he seemed very worried I would quit. He fed me some b.s. about “You know I really depend on you to keep this place going, right?” I went along with it, but when he asked what would reduce my stress, I told him money.

I don’t mean to sound greedy. I’m not. But I live paycheck to paycheck. Barely. And the company has dropped the ball on some pay increases for me at least once, probably more times, over the three and a half years I’ve been there. And I know that one of the new staff, with no experience, is making less than $1 less than I am, and I’m certified, with a lot of experience. So, yeah, it’s kind of a sore subject. And other companies pay a lot better. I’m just saying…

The big boss got the drift. Claimed he had “no idea” I was making that little (Riiight. Except I know my boss tried to fix it months ago, and got shot down by H.R.). He promised to work on it. And he did, because I got a call later that day that started off “Are you going to stay?”, and ended up with a $2 raise. Not big money, but more than I expected, and enough to give me some breathing room.

So, breathing room is great. Buuut…do I really want to stay with a company that jerks their employees around like this, not to mention takes advantage of the good ones until they quit, then pretends like they knew nothing about the problems that caused it? I love my patients, but, again, there are so many things going on. Is it worth it?

Then I see little blurbs online about how great it is to work for Facebook, which has a village for its employees, with free food and everything, and I think “Really? And I can’t even get my company to pay me what they should’ve been paying me years ago?”

How much is acceptable, and how much is just too much?