Woman Fired for “Calling Out Sick," but Some on TikTok Thinks It’s Her Own Fault

Even though there is a labor shortage that is prompting many companies to raise base pay for workers, many Americans are still very much concerned about job security. Which only makes sense considering that inflation rates are so high that it was actually easier to purchase a home during the great depression than it is in 2022 (nice one, government.)

And because the value of our money seems to just decrease more and more over time, especially if you rely on gas to commute to and from work, or want to, you know, own a home or rent an apartment instead of just living off the grid and seeing how much money you can save by being homeless for a while, losing out on a single paycheck is disastrous for many Americans.

In fact it's been reported that 64% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck, so losing out on a job, or even one of your jobs could mean that you'll find yourself in a financial hole that'll be very difficult to ever recover from.

So there were a lot of commenters who felt this TikToker's pain when she received a text from her boss that led her to believe she was fired after calling out sick.

In the now-viral clip, the woman, who goes by "D" writes: "I called out today bc I wasn't feeling good at all last night and this morning and my boss texted me saying this."

She then posted a screenshot of a text exchange between her and her boss.

"Hey I think I got food poisoning or something. I can't come in I'm sorry."

"Ok no problem. Don't came back more is slow."

The TikToker and several other users on the platform did their best to try and decipher what the text message meant.

OP, who goes by D, thought that her boss was telling her not to come back to work. She wanted to clarify whether or not this was his intention, so she decided to follow up with him.

She followed up with another text asking him, "Do you still need me to come in tomorrow or do you think it'll be slow?"

To which her boss replied: "No came back. No problem."

It appears that her boss is telling her to not come back to work, but it's no problem that she isn't able to work and it could be his way of indicating that there are no hard feelings.

D did say that English isn't her boss' first language, which could be the reason behind the communication confusion between the two.

The TikToker went on to say that she intended on going in person to pick up her last pay stub and to find out if she was indeed fired and what led to her being let go if she did. However, she concedes that she probably already knows the issue: she called out several times in the past and generally didn't care about the position as it is a second job for her.

"I definitely do not give this job my all like I should. I kind of like, feel so disconnected from my co-workers and this job in general," she said.

Some commenters criticized D's attitude towards the job and the way she went about discovering if she was fired or not. Commenters asked why she didn't call her employer instead of sending texts, while others who said they were managers at their own jobs would be infuriated by her "super unprofessional" behavior of constantly calling out sick.

Some TikTok users sympathized with D, stating that they two have been in positions at work where they were either expected to work while sick or just simply couldn't afford it.