Catharsis

I was not actually employed by the company that belongs to the richest person in the world, according to the media. I got there through a recruiting agency, the type of entity that does not exists anywhere else on the old continent, as far as I am aware. To sign an actual contract with Amazon takes a lot of things that I don’t know, since I never got one.

Still, working there changed me more than I wanted to admit. I met so many interesting people from all over the world and with such different backgrounds. I have never even dreamed of learning about the mountains of Kashmiri, of how cheap is the gold in Ghana. Or, that I am a workaholic, for that matter.

There, with the help of the same ops manager, I understood that men and women are treated differently. My partner and I rebelled against a task, motivating with back pain and, respectively, period related pain. He was asked to bring a note from a doctor, while my offer of proving with a bloody tampon was decline. Needless to say that short after this lovely conversation, we resigned. It was not in anyone’s best interest to continue a toxic relationship.

We both came from different worlds and I took things way more serious than I should have. At the beginning I was grateful to give my mind a bit of rest and for the amazing sky in the morning. Nowhere in Europe I have seen more colours in the morning sky, but to be fair I have not seen the northern lights. Probably the green mixed in a sky that we are used to see blue are a wonderful spectacle.

In the same place I’ve met people wearing designer clothes and people carelessly bringing almost the same outfit to work. I’ve met an area manager just as obsessed with work as I am – we suspected that one travelled by conveyer belt to check the time people left the company. Teleportation was out of the question.

Working in this environment made me bitter, but also made me aware that doctors are not the worst thing in the world, although I am not very happy about having a stable relationship with any of them. I suspect I had a miscarriage while working there, but I have not seen a specialist to confirm that. I ended getting treatment for anxiety, which later lead me to the conclusion that I am workaholic.

Since I jumped to miscarriages, and long after terminating my love affair with Amazon, I had one that was confirmed. The pain and suffering that follows is one of the best kept secrets. Mostly it is discussed in the privacy of a doctor’s office, on dedicated forums, or sporadically in the intimacy of the couple in question. And this is in Britain, a place where mental health is a very serious thing, debated on national television and promoted by most famous and privileged people in the world.

Some people just pretend they did not hear you saying you had a loss, some try to take advantage of your vulnerability, some offer help with a future pregnancy, some understand and do not talk about it, most of them make fun of the peculiar behaviour generated by the grief and depression that follows.

It is hard to explain to fellow men and women you lost something that is not visible with the naked eye, although the statistics say one in 5 (five) pregnancies is lost involuntarily. One can get more support and understanding for losing a laptop.

Some say it takes years or even decades for women to get over the excruciating pain of losing, literally, a part of yourself, and not much is said about men. Regarding my personal experience, things are not easier for men, either. I dare to say it might be harder, since the tools for healing are handed almost exclusively to women, while men are turned into support during such horrifying events.

But I digress. The lolly pop that I was offered was a real one, not a metaphor as I maliciously suggested. Before the magical time of Christmas, Amazon has probably the biggest sales, and of course, an insane volume of work for its employees. In exchange for overtime, the company offers more money than other companies in the same area of business, and sweets.