People are saying you dont need to work to support your bunnies?
Even if you didn’t consider your rabbits your babies, they still require things that require money. How is that hard to see?
I can understand how that would be very aggravating.
I’m sorry that someone is spreading lies about you. Hopefully, they will see the truth soon. Until then, at least you have a good place to vent where people understand all about the misconceptions that come with being a bunny owner.
((((((HUGS))))))

Wait… you do have kids… the buns! Haha.
My animals are part of the family, and right now I’m jobless but I would love extra cash to spoil my pets more then I do. I rescued all my babies, so it is fair I support them by feeding them, vet checks and what ever else they will need. If people don’t understand that about you tell the to kiss your buns bum. Haha.

People can be so ignorant when to comes to pet family members. I talked to a guy a few days ago who gets “free” pets from the newspaper and never does vet checks or anything else. He seemed very ignorant about actual ownership of an animals. You care for a pet much you do a child with their doctor appointments, making sure you have the best (and healthiest) food for them and spoiling them crazy. :/

I understand, I get it a lot because I have a lot of pets myself that I support.

Oh dang, this is all at work! It’s hard enough right now to get a job, then keep the job, let alone enjoy it. To have someone making it so miserable just makes it almost impossible. You both have an equal right to the job for your own reasons. Everyone needs a job, whether you are supporting a kid, a pet, yourself or a habit of taking your dollars and folding them into paper cranes (just trying to illustrate a point). She doesn’t have the right to decide who has a greater need for the job. If you were both hired, then you both should have equal opportunity to hours unless one of you has restricted your own ability to get hours by saying you aren’t available for some amount of time.

Does she expect you to live in a cardboard box then? Jobs aren’t just to support kids and pets, they are to support you as well.

bah.

I had issues with someone at work telling lies and spreading gossip about me (mostly had to do with my “dead beat” husband). Ugh, so annoying. I haven’t had anyone try to swindle themselves some more hours by telling the boss that I didn’t need them though. That is just dirty and shouldn’t be tolerated by your boss. Unfortunately, you might be fighting a losing battle. Especially if your boss is seriously considering what she is saying. Just out of curiosity, who was there first? Is there any sort of seniority? Would it be possible to look for a different job? One that actually needs people to work instead of only having X number of hours to split up among too many people? It is just a thought, I know jobs can be hard to come by right now.

You need to step back and see this for what it is: a desperate attempt to get rid of a coworker during tight times so she can benefit from it.
It needs to backfire, if anything, jeopardize her own job by shedding light on her unprofessional behavior.
You need to address your concerns with your boss, and with Human Resources if you have one. Do not even discuss your personal circumstances, ie. your “need” with this person ever again. It’s not her goal. She could care less about how she gets rid of you, she just wants your hours and more $.
What you need to ask your boss is first, whether s/he is satisfied with your work performance, and is there anything you need to concentrate on to improve. Then say you have learned about a problem that you would hope the boss can help you with. It seems that a coworker has been spreading lies about you, which someone else alerted you to, and you are afraid the boss may be believing them. Ask if the boss has heard anything negative about you, and if so, would they please talk to you directly about it? Ask if they would like you to take on any more work or hours, because you really like the job and have every intention of staying and doing your best. But you really don’t enjoy being the brunt of someone else’s issues about their own hours and pay. It just isn’t relevant to yours. So if you can do anything to be a greater asset to your boss and on the job, if they can advise you on how to ignore a difficult coworker so you can concentrate on your work, you would really appreciate their support.

Get it?

Who would ever say that someone doesn’t need to work?! Unless you’re living large on a trust fund or something, I don’t see how anyone could say that you don’t deserve to have a job and hours to support yourself.

I agree with Pam that you should approach your boss about this (in as nice a way as possible) and ask for her advice. Even if she can’t help you much with the situation, at least you’ll have been able to air it out.

After bringing it up with your boss, I would just ignore it. She’s probably just unhappy and wants to make you miserable too for some reason – don’t listen to her or pay any attention.

Posted By Monkeybun on 11/08/2011 08:51 PM
Does she expect you to live in a cardboard box then? Jobs aren’t just to support kids and pets, they are to support you as well.

bah.

Exactly.  Just “living” costs money… and it’s your right to have a job if you want/need one.  

I know hours and positions are scarce, but if she needs more hours, she also has the option to look for a 2nd part-time job.  Your company has hired all of the employees for a reason, so even if YOU left, they would probably just hire another part-time person to replace YOU, NOT give her more hours.

And what you use the money for isn’t her business.  If you wanted to sit outside and light $100 bills on fire, that’s your perogative.  Altho I wouldn’t recommend it… lol… 

When people suck, I generally try to remember that everyone is dealing with something, and how do I like to treated during the times my life is at a low. It tends to help my outlook on life, and also helps get rid of anger and resentment, which aren’t healthy to live with

Elrohwen – I have actually heard my boss say stuff like that about people who were in high school. They are in high school, so they don’t really “need” the money like other people do since other people are most likely supporting themselves.

LBJ – that’s such a ridiculous thing to say. Shame on those bosses! What if the high school kid is helping to support a family? What if they are saving very hard for college? I have heard similar things about people who are immigrants, which I also think is ridiculous – like those people who are new to the US don’t deserve to make money and only people who have lived here a certain amount of time should get the jobs. We were all immigrants at one point.

Personally, I’d like to be in a position where I worked just because I wanted to, not because I needed money to live. Maybe these people are a bit jealous thinking you don’t need to worry about finances the way they do, so they take it out on you in an inappropriate way.

In another thread LoveChacha posted about how her father is losing his job… so this is a similar situation. She doesn’t have (human) children, but if someone doesn’t know the circumstances, they’re not going to know that she may be working to help support the household.

My boss when I worked at Subway would always ask us to give up hours for the people with kids, or explain why he gave extra hours to people with kids. He would ALWAYS give the people with kids 40+ hours and every one else just had to make do with what was left over. He cut one of the guys there who was single to about 30 hours and he stopped being able to make gas money because of it. Another got another job because he needed the extra money to be able to move out on his own. Promotions and raises to anyone who was childless took FOREVER, even if deserved. A lot of people carry that silly way of thinking. Especially in jobs that pay low, like food service, it’s hard to make ends meet for ANYONE and everyone needs as many hours as they can get. At the end of it, I was making just enough money to pay for my boyfriends gas to his job so we ended up just moving closer to his work, since it was the same thing as me working. I also was entitled by the company rules to two raises I never got.

Unfortunately, people are always going to feel entitled and that means they think they deserve more than the next person. Just ignore it and explain to your boss that you have needs too and need the hours as much as she does.

agree with monkeybun, does this chick think the ONLY reason people need money is to support kids? we all have living costs and bills too! haha. da heooo.

anyway, I had a slightly similar situation at my new job. this girl we hired around the same time as me totally had it out for me and tried to throw me under the bus SEVERAL times. I would say, just ignore her and do what you do, and do a damn good job at it. she’s making herself look unprofessional by talking about you and trying to make you out to look bad, and it will DEFINITELY backfire on her later if she keeps it up. your coworkers have noticed too, and I’m sure they will put in a good word or at least report to your boss that work conditions are getting uncomfortable by all of her trash talking. my coworkers noticed in my situation, and things got super awkward at the office for awhile. then it got unbearable, and clearly this other girl was behind it since I was just going about my business… so she got fired. you will succeed by keeping your dignity =]

Sorry you’re dealing with this nonsense. I don’t care who anyone is, jobs are not not only for a certain select few and people shouldn’t get priority. I get what this girl might be thinking (of her kids and blahblahblah), but you need to live too, what does it matter if you don’t have kids? Most people can’t just breeze by not working and still magically have money to survive. It definitely will come to back to bite her in the butt if you keep being professional and she doesn’t.

Look, it’s eating you up, and the more it simmers, the more easily she can provoke you into a conflict and you could suffer from that. Like when a kid picks a fight with a sibling, the sibling fights back, gets caught, and is punished more than the kid who provoked it (and knew that would be the outcome.)
The more you wait for your boss to have to come to you to deal with it, the longer you will be unhappy in the job you love and do well. From the boss’ perspective, he (she?) may hear this crap, know it isn’t true, and dismiss it as the mouth of a lousy dishwasher who he needs to clean up but would never consider giving any more responsibility to, ie. your job, because he has her number already. But now it is effecting your work and upsetting you.
Again, you can very pleasantly broach the subject with the boss, just ask if you’re doing a good job in his eyes because you really need this job (and don’t go into details about why UNLESS the boss asks you) and love it there, but a coworker is spreading lies about you. Ask the boss how he would like you to handle it?
Because frankly, once you hand it over to the boss, he can take less than 5 minutes, tell that girl that she better pay attention to her work and not worry about anyone else, and if she gossips she can fiind another job elsewhere. It will be her warning, shut her up or get her out, and he won’t have to give it another thought. But he will know what’s happening in his workplace and will lay down the law. 2 minutes for him to handle, big relief for you.

RP and others have some good suggestions.     She may be frustrated cuz she is a single mother.   Doesn’t she get child support or alimony.

Lies are a terrible thing to pass around about people.  

You’re going to run into a lot of people like that in life unfortunately. When other ways don’t work, and you can keep a straight face, try killing her with kindness.

Like, talk to her about how you’ve heard this nasty rumor going around (giving all the details so she knows you know exactly what she did and said) with a smile on your face and tell her that you know she’s so nice that she couldn’t possibly have said such things and laugh about it.

One, you get the satisfaction of having it out in the open that she knows you know what she did and two, you don’t look like the bad guy sulking, and three, it drives someone like that crazy when you’re nice to them about it and four, you look like an even nicer person!