Not doing what was needed cost company $450,000

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
April 16, 2022

The headline on WLKY News "Kentucky man sues employer for throwing him birthday party, and now they owe him $450K" was a bad choice. Given the fact that an employee told his supervisor he needed her to skip honoring his birthday, she decided to do it anyway. Why? Why would someone want to do something for someone that was clearly going to hurt them? Was she so oblivious to the fact that even telling her he had a problem with it was not enough to get her to change her mind?

The employee found out about the party and was so stressed out about it that he went to his car instead of going to the lunchroom. He ended up being fired!
 

A Kentucky man took his employer to court after they threw him a birthday party he didn't want, and the jurors sided with him.

Now, his employer owes him $450,000.

The verdict was handed down this week in Kenton County Circuit Court in Northern Kentucky. The plaintiff, an employee of Gravity Diagnostics, sued his employer after he was fired following a birthday party they threw for him in August.

The employee asked the office manager days before his birthday in August to not arrange a birthday celebration as they did for other employees.

Then on Aug. 7, the employee's birthday, the office arranged for a lunchtime birthday party in the lunchroom, according to the lawsuit. The employee said that he found out about the party as he was headed to his lunch break, which triggered a panic attack.
read more here

This goes to show that not doing what was needed was not intended to be a good thing to the recipient. How many times have you told someone what you needed help with, but they ignored what you needed and did only what they wanted to do "for you" that you didn't want or need in the first place?

It happens all the time. It means they are doing it to make themselves feel good about themselves and not making your life any easier.

When you have a mental illness, you know what your triggers are and you do all you can to avoid them. You know what they will cause you to go through. This employee was caused to suffer for this "gift" given to him he didn't want. He must have had to explain it to his coworkers, causing even more emotional pain, and then had to face more with his supervisor, topped off with higher-ups who then fired him.

All the avoidable distress caused should be a lesson to everyone out there, especially in the workplace. How many of us have been in a forced situation like that? You tell family you don't want parties but they do it anyone because they think you deserve to have some fun. You tell them you don't want to go to a party or movie or in large crowds, and then they get angry because you won't go with them. 

You need to be left out of it without being punished for it. It is a no-win situation for you. Most of us cringe when it comes to the approaching event someone is talking about because we know it will cause us pain to go and more pain if we don't because the people who are supposed to know us don't understand us.

If you are going through something like this and need to let people know how much harm they are doing by doing what they want instead of what you need, show them this article so they will understand how much pain they can inflict instead of making you feel the way they want you to feel.