You work hard, so you earn to play hard, too. Except when your days off request gets denied.

In a now-deleted post, an anonymous Reddit user described in great detail the lousy Christmas gift they received from their company—a change of plans which forced them to cancel the vacation they had already planned with their family.

However, after having sacrificed their time with their loved ones for long enough, the employee took a stance for what’s important in their life and simply handed in their resignation instead.

The company quickly learned just how valuable this person had been to them.

With deadlines approaching and having nothing to show their clients, their angry manager started bombarding their phone with calls and messages, trying to manipulate the employee to return “for the team.”

The relationship this person had with the company they worked at seem fine for years

Image credits: Jonas Leupe (not the actual photo)

But everything changed when their manager denied their pre-approved vacation request

Career and business coach Ben Fitzgerald told Bored Panda that, generally speaking, acting on impulse isn’t a very good idea.

“While I’d love to say someone should quit their job if they’re simply not happy in it—anyone with a dependent, partner, or ferret to consider should ensure some kind of revenue stream is lined up to avoid becoming a dependent themselves,” Fitzgerald explained. “As the late, great Norm MacDonald once joked, the homeless dog can do that on their own.”

Fitzgerald specializes in career transitions and says working through your decisions with a trained listener who isn’t emotionally affected by your choices or biased from knowing you can be a good idea in these situations.

“However, if you choose a friend, make it clear at the start that you’d like them to simply listen. Not to offer advice or try to solve your problems. If you want their advice after getting everything off your chest, by all means, ask,” he added.

According to the career coach, some helpful questions to hear yourself talk through might be:

• What specific aspect(s) of my job are causing concerns or distress?
• Once the above is listed out, what are all the other ways I could address each of these concerns without quitting?
• If I do quit, what choices will I make to avoid feeling like I feel, somewhere else, in 6 months time?

After the employee quit, the manager started attacking their cell

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But if you carefully work things through over, say, a few days’ time, and you’re still convinced that your job is the central reason why you’re feeling unhealthy, unfulfilled, and/or unhappy, then Fitzgerald suggests putting together a plan.

“As exciting as it may be to quit a job, you don’t want to do it on the spot,” he said. “It’s best to have a plan in place for what comes next. What that plan looks like is far too personal to outline because it has to do with the marketability of your skills, your risk appetite, financial situation, the list goes on.”

The whole ordeal then took an unexpected turn

Sadly, there probably are many people who can—more or less—relate to this story. The American workplace can be grueling and stressful. A 2017 in-depth study of 3,066 U.S. workers by the Rand Corp., Harvard Medical School, and the University of California, Los Angeles, found that nearly 1 in 5 workers—a share the study calls “disturbingly high”—say they face a hostile or threatening environment at work, which can include sexual harassment and bullying. Not surprisingly, workers who have to face customers endure a disproportionate share of abuse.

People can’t believe how greedy and stupid some companies really are

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