I’m a manager at a gym, and yesterday I had the night shift. I had two other coworkers and surprisingly it was busier than anticipated. I was behind the counter checking in members, when a lady had a question. So I was answering her, and what I didn’t see was the very angry lady behind her. While I was finishing up with my first customer, the other lady had stormed away. I shrugged it off and went about my evening.

A couple minutes later the lady that stormed out came back in, but this time she made a beeline for me. She was waving her hands in my face, and screamed at me, “I SAID, I ASKED YOU A QUESTION, BITCH!!” And everyone around me, including myself, was absolutely stunned into silence. Before I could even react, she turned around and ran out (probably to avoid her membership being cancelled or police being called).

I had SO many thoughts running through my head, when did this lady ask me a question?! I was talking to someone before her, and she must have asked then, but I didn’t hear it and obviously I wasn’t going to be rude and cut off the person I was talking to. And that’s when the rage set in. It felt like electricity ran from my head all the way down to my toes. My stomach felt like a pinball was bouncing around. I went around the counter and suddenly found myself at the front door. I could see that lady outside, walking to her car, and I could hear my coworker saying “come on it’s not worth it! Don’t go out there!” And I got SO close to going after her. Before therapy and medication I would have probably smacked her hands away from my face and served it right back to her. Who knows what I would have done if I would have gone out there. All I could think of was losing my job, losing my respect for myself, losing my dignity, and doing something I’ll regret for the rest of my life. It made me think of when I would fight my sister, and I would be so mad I wouldn’t stop. I’ve left scars on her from fighting her.

I’m just so proud of myself that I let it go, and I didn’t take the bait. I was shook from it, but not broken.