Control Freak
I had a boss one time who was such a control freak that she demanded to know specifically why I was calling out sick (WILDLY illegal where I live) one day. And for reference I’m typically the guy who never gets sick, so it wasn’t an attendance issue.
I told her I think I had food poisoning and she kept pressing me as to explain what my symptoms were and why I couldn’t make it in — all via text. I had finally had enough and was like “look, I’m not physically capable of working today and you are not allowed to ask me personal questions about illness and medical history!”
She threatened me with a write up if I couldn’t specifically explain/prove why I couldn’t make it into work. This is where the pro revenge comes in. I was about to send her something horrific, that she could not unsee… and she wouldn’t be able to do anything about it, since she technically asked for it.
Being that I was living in the bathroom for more than two days and had aggressive diarrhea every 15-30 minutes and the worst abdominal pain I’ve ever experienced, I took a pretty disturbing picture of me painting the bowl brown right before I flushed and sent it to her.
“This is happening every 15-30 minutes and I haven’t been able to leave the bathroom for the last 6 hours. Here is your proof, check the timestamp. I’ll let you know as soon as I can if I’ll be in tomorrow.”
So after 3 days off I show up for my shift, sleep deprived and sore from sleeping in my bath tub or on the floor for 2.5 days. She immediately escorts me into her office where our regional HR rep is waiting for me, and we all sit down. He has paperwork in front of him and is discussing the ‘incident’ with me and gets me to acknowledge what I did and that sending “unprovoked and offensive content” to coworkers constitutes harassment right before he asks me to sign a final write up (if you do something like this again, you’re fired).
Before signing I asked him, “Did she tell you why i sent this?” He was dumbfounded and said this isn’t really excusable and basically handed me a screenshot printout of the text messages where she deleted everything in the exchange (in her phone) BUT me saying “sorry, but I need to take a sick day today,” and the picture.
I laughed and handed him my phone and said here is the full exchange. He asked me to leave and “give them a few minutes.” About 10 minutes later he calls me in, by myself, and explained what I already knew: that she was the harasser and that she had aggressively violated privacy laws and would be dealt with, and to call him “if anything like this ever happens again.”
I found out from one of the assistant managers that she ended up getting a final written notice and was super close to being fired, and it prevented her from getting a big promotion that she was being considered for.
So, if you ever come across a moron boss who wants to play doctor and question your sick leave, send them diarrhea pics and they’ll either STFU or give you lawsuit material.
Story credit: Reddit / jakk86