Why would I cry leaving a job I hated?

Regardless of the circumstances, rejection is painful. Even if you disliked a job, nobody wants to hear, ‘we don’t need you’. It hurts. Plus, I think we often are sad more about what could have or should have been as opposed to the actual separation.

Either way, it’s all a type of mourning and that comes in a variety of forms — even crying on Zoom.

In this case, they let you go which took away your opportunity to choose to leave. In & of itself, the rejection was NOT pleasant!!!

I had one job years ago that I despised with ALL my heart…almost as much as you said you hated this job. I chose to quit & was thrilled on my last day that it would really be my LAST day of putting up with the crap. Yet, as I walked out the door & headed for my car, the tears began to flow & I sobbed all the way home. To this day, I do NOT understand WHY I cried because I knew that I had made the right decision!!!

You didn’t cry for leaving the job. You cried for the shock and humiliation of being let go. The message was: we’re better off without you than with you. That’s tough to swallow.

The initiative was taken away from you. Your options were taken away from you. You couldn’t leave proudly, as you wanted to. Of course you were indignant.

But never mind. These days, it’s happened to a lot of people who’ve never had to face it before. You’ve got plenty going for you, and you’ll land in a better place.

Had you quit without having secured another job you might cry.

Being laid off is always a shock to the ego whether you liked the job or not. Just realize these are the times we’re leaving in.

@Jeruba great way to think of that way

@LadyMarissa, did you ever find yourself in tears when you broke up with someone?—when it was you who did the breaking up, and you really wanted it to be over, but you cried anyway? I think it’s a lot like that.

Seems to me that one big explanation is sheer disappointment: I had such high hopes for this, and now look how it’s turned out. A job could feel like that just as much as a romance or any other thing that you’ve invested yourself in. In the gap between the ideal and the real, there’s room for a lot of pain.

We pick ourselves up and we go on, or we don’t. Mostly we do.

So odd how it is almost comparable to a relationship and break up. On the plus side, in the mail today I received my details outlining my severance package. I’m okay for 5 months of salary, so I see it as getting paid to find a new job lol.

Did they know you were unhappy and looking for a new job? That may have made it easier for them to choose you when they need to cut heads.

@jca2 No, they had major lay offs. A lot of key people and people there for several years had been let go. It’s at a private non profit university so we were already in bad shape to begin with and then the pandemic came along. Students wanted refunds, people aren’t attending, classes going remote, less faculty, hiring freezes, etc.

I understand that, @chelle21689. I’m asking that in addition to that, did they know you were unhappy and looking for a new job?