Fired!

by Dean Kramer 
July, 2003


I got fired. I have to admit that when my boss told me, my initial response was to feel relief. I had been terribly anxious during the few months I was employed there, despite enjoying what I was doing. I have heard others with MS express the same anxieties. Even though we are trying our best, MS gets in the way of our doing as well as we'd like. In my case there were several issues. I worked in a mobility equipment store and one of my duties was to be aware of customers as they came into the showroom, greet them, and then proceed to sell them something, using my boss's spiel and demonstrating equipment as required.

I was seated behind a partition and the signal that a customer was entering was a beep as the door opened clear on the other side of the room. But if I was concentrating deeply on my paperwork (another duty) that and the ever-present ringing in my ears might cause me to miss hearing the beep. Then, too, I had to stand to see over the partition and the constant popping up and dropping down was tiring. I felt (and probably looked) like a demented gopher and 97% of the time it was one of the other employees coming through the door and not a customer at all.

Once I was aware of a customer I was to dash energetically across the showroom to greet them. I tried using a scooter. It allowed me to dash and greet but prevented me from demonstrating much of anything except the scooter itself. In addition, customers often initially thought I was a customer, too and they looked right over me for a "real" sales person. I began using a 4-wheeled walker with brakes and a seat. This put me at eye level but I could not dash energetically across the room. To make up for that failing I took to staggering across the room humming the "William Tell Overture" (or the Lone Ranger theme song, depending on your cultural background). I hummed energetically.

Once I'd engaged a customer it was time to sell them something. I believe in the products sold there. I have many of them myself. So I had no trouble extolling the benefits to be derived from their use. But I also cared about the well-being of the customers. If they had financial constraints or were in denial and unready to commit themselves I empathized. I listened to their concerns. Some of them, elderly and lonely, had many, many concerns as well as memories of concerns going back thirty years or more. I didn’t know how to cut them loose if they were (in my boss’s words) "a waste of time." I wasn't sure I wanted to cut them loose, especially if there were no others awaiting my energetic dashing. I suppose customers too often left empty of hand though perhaps less troubled in mind. Physically the job was too taxing for me.

Then there were the cognitive problems. I had trouble remembering my boss’s sales pitches. I could remember the gist of them but not always the exact words. When speaking of the fibers used to stuff a lift-chair, for example, I said "mushed down" instead of "compressed" and "fluffed up" instead of "restored"- not very professional. Often when I did remember the right words my boss would come along and break in, taking over the sale and repeating all I’d said while I stood there feeling like an idiot and the customer's eyes glazed over in boredom at the repetition.

My boss had a very critical nature, as he freely admitted, and his constant fault finding and correcting soon had me stressed enough to forget everything I knew whenever he interacted with me.

In addition to direct sales, I handled incoming calls, much of the stamping and labeling of literature, some filing, and some scheduling. I maintained the mailing list, the insurance forms, wrote correspondence, and input invoices. Sometimes I was doing many of these things at the same time.

I made a few filing errors and a few typing errors. Because my duties were constantly being tinkered with, added to, or deleted, I sometimes forgot which tasks were mine to do from one day to the next. My boss landed on these mistakes like a duck on a June bug. I began to feel like Butters on Southpark, always hanging my head, admitting my error, apologizing ("I’m sorry, Mom. I promise not to wear my balls on my chin anymore"), and then doggedly making the same mistake the next time without even realizing it. I think that had I been able to set a slower pace for myself, with less multi-tasking, the cognitive deficits would have had less of an impact on my performance. As it was, I watched with incomprehension as the errors mounted in number.

In coming to terms with MS I have become something of a Pollyanna tending to look on the positive side of things. When I pulled into work that last Friday my boss was putting some of our products on display outside the store. Since this was one of my duties I quickly looked at my watch to see if I was late, but I’d arrived at my usual time. I had the dark, bitter thought that for some reason this guy was trying to show me up and I quickly squashed that impulse saying to myself, "Oh, come on! Don't be so nasty-minded. It's very thoughtful of him to do this for you. You should appreciate this and tell him so." So I got out of the car and thanked him for giving me a hand. "Well, there’s a good side and a bad side to it." he said. Then, I got fired.

So, I’m taking this month to recuperate here at Cripple Creek. The weather is gorgeous and the wide natural world beckons. I have another position lined up for August. It's position in which the pace is set by a machine and can’t be improved upon by screaming imprecation, a position which allows me to work alone in a quiet, cool room with no need for expenditures of manic energy. I can look forward to using my creativity in this position as it calls on my experience in graphic design. The best part is that I'll be working with a close friend and former employer who knows me, loves me, and truly understands my MS. Stay tuned.