On August 22, 2024, TBG employees received an email. The email stated that 38 employees were about to be laid off. WTF? Naturally I started freaking out. It was horrible. The email also stated that immediately after that original email, they would contact the 38 and then everyone else would get an email too.

Stupid Stupid Stupid.
What the fuck were they thinking. “Immediately” was about 20 minutes for me. Others maybe wasn’t as long but seriously, those were long 20 minutes. I mean, I was pretty sure, but then I was also scared about my friends and co-workers. I sent messages to my Thunder Sisters and some PMs to others.

My boss did tell me he heard about one big wig let go, although my boss wasn’t fond of him, he didn’t deserve this. No one did. It was handled in such a horrible way. Soon after hearng about that, another co-worker friend and I figured out another who was missing. We figured out the status on Teams when dark, with status stating unknown. 2 down.

The third who was a friend I had PM’d. She was sick and OOO that day. Horrifying. When hers went dark, I messaged who I thought was her manager. She was aware but warned me that she didn’t know if that one had heard yet since she was OOO. I was kinda hurt, as if I would take it upon myself to let anyone know. I told her I would not reach out until I saw LinkedIn set to Looking for Work or something. Then I realized that this person isn’t even on LinkedIn. I have NO WAY to contact her.

We were watching K-Dramas together,  chatting about them. We were reading a book You are A Badass by Jen Sicereo. Now I may never hear from her again. I mean, I’m sure her boss has her email but who will she even want to hear from? Anyone? I don’t know what I would feel. I certainly would be very very upset. I hope she suspected. I hope she knew his was coming.

Supposedly they got paid 5 months out, so a nice separation package. Another gal I worked with almost wished she would have been let go. I don’t understand why people who are unhappy with their job stay?

The first one I heard about was someone who had been ill and had not ever fully recovered and wasn’t honestly at the same mental state he used to be. This was probably good for him too, but where will he go from here?

The second one was part of WALC and I’m not going to explain that because I don’t want to, but we met once every six weeks or so with a few other gals and talked about stuff we had read and learned. Now there is only three of us left. We started as six. Another one from that group was also OOO.

The gal who discovered with me that the Teams statuses went dark is also friends with both and affected.The third from WALC was also on an extended vacation. She didn’t go dark but she’s going to be surprised when she gets back. Or maybe not. She was HR so maybe she already knew or suspected. The other HR person had suspected.

My boss was cold at first. He is definitely not an empath. It is so difficult to explain how one feels when this shit is happening. It’s like, yes, I’m glad that I wasn’t laidoff, but it still hurts. The people who were hurts, I can feel their hurt. I hurt too. I am not cold and callous about that, but how does one explain?

Fortunately the company as a whole recognizes and plans a few meetings, but then, I will be meeting with my boss and all I will hear is how it affected him. This part is also stressful. I miss my old boss at CE. He was a good boss. I talk to him still sometimes… He understood. He learned what he didn’t understand. He listened.

How does one teach one’s boss to listen? You can’t. You just sit through and listen to HIM and then you go eat chocolate or hug trees.

Five more years, just give me five more years and if I’m lucky and it’s hell, I can retire. Or work part time or at least stop stressing about what happens next.

Two more years and I’m fully vested for my 401k so definitely need to hang on for two more years… 5 would be best though. 2029. I will be 60 years old. Some say that’s too early for retirement but others have done it. I will manifest retiring in 2029 or at least cutting back and somehow keepin insurance… I mean, if I’m happy and having fun, that will be a whole different story but if I’m not, if I’m the same as I am now, I will definitely maybe look into contract work.

Contract work would be amazing at this time in my life except for insurance. Of course, insurance is the main concern for retiring early too.

I wish we could retire after a certain number of years working instead of at a certain age.

This blog is part of a 52 week challenge