I made a huge life move and quit a management job that went bad this week. I say “went bad” because it was actually going really well until my department was sucked up into Corporate. I think the worst part of it was realizing that I had wasted eight months hoping it would “get good”.

Look, I am an equal opportunity hater of all jobs and think that working 40 hours a week for The Man is a fucking abomination and the biggest scam of the modern world, down with the machine, etc etc. But I loved my little team and I think they loved me. I tried to advocate for them in everything I ever did. However, this has been the most miserable time in my entire career, and I did what any self-respecting person being taken MAD advantage of would do – I GTFO’d as soon as I got another solid offer.

A non-management offer. Because I don’t know that I was ever manager material in the first place. I’m way more workers’ rights than “please don’t discuss your salary with others” (ILLEGAL!!) – I am AGAINST the corporate lip-service that goes out of its mealy-mouthed way to falsely goad people into thinking that the company cares. It doesn’t. Ever. Unless you are Costco.

All this to say that I gave my notice and today was my last working day of this gig. I cried because I feel like I’m abandoning my people, which I am. But it was either that or keep sliding into insanity, trying to tread water with zero guidance. I’m great at what I do, but I have learned that I really dislike being the one that has to make every decision all the time.

I had a thought tonight as I was bittersweetly celebrating my newfound lack of responsibilities: Do we ever lose the feeling of disappointing our parents? My parents are dead, and still I can hear my mother saying “but can you really afford to do this? Haven’t they been so good to you? Just stick it out, honey, it will get better.” I can see the look of whatever-ness on my father’s face as he sees his offspring go yet again to another job. When do we let that go? I’m 53. Way past the point of being a young person who makes shit decisions. Now I’m just an advanced-middle-aged person trying not to be angry and sad all the time. I think my parents didn’t think they had that luxury.

I suppose I will consider myself lucky in that I only hear their clicking tongues or see their crestfallen faces in my head, and maybe I’m making it up; maybe I’m piling on all the child-years of continuous disappointment I caused them. Which, I know, is just a story I still tell myself – in the end, I know they were proud.

The question then, the deeper one, is why that still matters at all. The longer I carry all my shame around, the less I honor myself as I truly am. So here was my act of defiance, self-care, whatever you want to call it. I quit a job that was making me an absolute wreck mentally and emotionally. And if that’s not something to be proud of, I’m not sure what is.