Veterinary Technician Bullied At Work

by Laura
(Kankakee, Il)

I was offered a job 3 years ago by my friend and colleague at the time to be her head tech at her new practice she was starting. I jumped at the chance being the place I was working at the time just sold out to a corporation. Unfortunately this ended up being the biggest mistake I ever made.

After our first manager did not work out ( which later got blamed on me ), my boss then let her boyfriend who had absolutely nothing experience ever in an animal hospital take over the manager position. This was after he purposely got rid of the first manager.

Well, slowly but surely I became the next victim. It started by me noticing that our controlled substance log was off by a lot and I kept bringing it to my bosses attention and she would get angry at me. Then suddenly remarks started get made like who will be the next to go who will be the next "insert old managers name" then I would get incoherent texts late at night.

Then the next day a responsibility was taken away from me. He would pace back and forth like a caged animal causing agitation and making everyone uncomfortable. He would take over my jobs, hide things from me, say belittling comments. He would screw up appointment constantly and was rude to clients. And every time I would call him out on his crap or tell my boss then I would suddenly be the bad person, I would be the instigator of whispering and I complained about everything even though other employees brought up same issues with the boss.

Every time he was backed into a corner he convinced my boss it was my fault. Things just became worse and worse. He is a very mentally unstable person. He came into work drunk when our boss was out of town. She did nothing. He spends the night at work and will leave dirty nasty underwear in exam rooms. Messes everywhere. Will tell clients personal information that they should not be hearing. There would beer spilt all over the floor, beer cans in the back yard or garbage cans, we would find spilled pills on the floor. And every time something would be brought to the boss's attention about him, I would be the one to pay.

Papers would be left in the printer or on my computer screen, how to get rid of a toxic employee. He did this again while I was in the middle of a procedure with animal and another employee saw got fed up and posted something on Facebook about bad managers. He saw it and immediately blamed me, even though she told him exactly why she did it because she was tired of him coming into work intoxicated, leaving nasty clothes everywhere, lying, not caring for animals when he says he going to and on and on.

He said I told her to do it then texted my husband asking what to do with me and the only reason they kept me around was out of respect for him and my daughter who also works there. He said that everyone was advising my boss to fire me. At this point I was so depressed and anxiety ridden I could not even think straight. I had to go to the doctor and get medication.

I told my boss, I thought surely she will finally see the light. Nope I was forced to take a week off for "for my own good" was told it would be paid time off. Came into work today and my code was out of the computer so I couldn't clock in. When I approached them asking why, my boss said we will have to talk about that. I asked about my paid time off, and was told I was only getting part of it but was going to loose vacation time for my behavior. When I asked what I did I was told again that I do nothing but complain and instigate problems and that last week was so nice without me there.

When I ask about the harassment from her boyfriend she admitted there was a problem, but then immediately started blaming me for everything. Needless to say I quit. 27 years as a vet tech and it's now ruined by a drunken narcissistic jerk, playing manager and a person I thought was my friend and mentor choosing to believe him instead of facing the truth.