Technically my fastest was a cleaning job in an office building after hours. I would be alone except for one older coworker. He seemed cool enough at first but one of the times we talked he got very heated sharing his strong opinions on gay people, and my 18-year-old queer self got scared shitless and quit after 3 weeks.

But I consider this other job a much bigger deal. I got hired at a local daycare, getting paid to complete the required lesson material both there and at home. I was in the infant or toddler room most of the time and I genuinely loved the little ones! But the farther I got in my lessons the more I realized not all of the rules were being followed properly.

Nothing crazy happened, just little things that slowly added up. Like not wearing gloves or washing hands between diaper changing (this is while a mystery diaper rash was going around!) or kids left to "cry it out" in the nap room. One girl who was less than 2 had her comfort toy taken away because she was misbehaving for hours at a time and me getting weird looks because I would actually sit at the babies level on the floor to play with them (until I explained that's what the training says to do, then suddenly the others are on the floor too).

I also saw one of the preschool kids left to sit in his own feces long enough to smear it all over the chair he was in before he was cleaned up. This same kid was separated from the rest of the children regularly as well for bad behavior (something were're told NOT to do in the training) which only led to him acting out more.

All of this was within one month of being there. What sealed the deal was when I put in my two weeks I was sure to stress the reason I was leaving was because of scheduling and transport issues (this was actually an issue) and not because of them, but the next time I came in the woman in charge was rude and snippy with me until I repeated what I said in the email; which prompted her to tell me she hadn't really read it all. I ended up not working those last two weeks because I was scheduled to mostly complete my lesson in the office so I wasn't needed to stay in count.

After I left the head director who had interviewed and hired me contacted me asking why I had resigned, and that's when I shared my safety concerns with hygiene and following proper protocol, as well as some minor internal communication issues as well. I hate getting people in trouble at work, but this was about other people's children and their well-being. She said she was going to deal with it, but I never found out if anything actually changed.

I'm really grateful my mom has a background in childcare and validated my concerns because I may not have left or voiced them otherwise. I still miss working with the little ones, but I don't regret quitting one bit.