Since the end of may I have been working in a Microbiology Lab as a Research Assistant and if all goes well I will be joint Lab Manager/Research Assistant for 2 laboratories starting January 2017 and with the support of the Lab Heads I will be taught as much as possible so I can RPL the majority of an Advanced Diploma in Laboratory Operations.
My salary has gone back up, I'm not stuck in some dingy animal facility wasting my skills on some menial low paid job I hated.
I now assist an intelligent woman with her experiments and I am in a bright lab surrounded by intelligent, smart, good and kind people willing and wanting to teach me how to do lab based work and run the lab.
I enjoy work so much, some days I lose track of time and find I'm leaving later than my finish time. Other days I have needed to stay back for 30mins to one hour and still enjoy it.
I also gained my qualification as a VET teacher at local TAFEs and other RTOs. Another reason for the department being willing to teach me as much as possible so I can pick up a few night classes teaching to supplement my income.
We run on grant funding so there is no overtime and everyone esp the PhD's are encouraged to take up teaching when possible.
This is a vast contrast to where I was one year ago.
1 year and 2 weeks ago I resigned from a very well paying job and the 1st of September is the 1 year anniversary of starting at the university I now work at.
I had been there for 14 years and I had been wanting to leave for probably half that but the money was too good to give up and the fear of the unknown held me back.
I stupidly let myself be treated like shit where and now I know I could have pushed back and gone to someone higher to get better treatment. In 2013/2014 watched as my career path into embryology that was ahead of me disappear when my previous manager left due to the bullying from another manager.
I was miserable, on the edge, hated life and myself.
I was already struggling with depression and anxiety issues then things truly went to shit due to dealing with narcissistic management and in my last year a bullying supervisor. I wont go into detail other than saying things kept going to hell.
So I regrettably took a lower paying job and $300 per week pay cut at what I thought would be a well run and high level facility within a well known University. Sadly I was mistaken and thought I had fucked up monumentally. I had gone from a well paid job at a relatively well run and prestigious facility to working for a sub par department on well below my pay grade in some menial shitty job and thought I would be filling for bankruptcy sometime this year.
In a way I still regret the massive pay cut but I can't complain about where I am. Sure I don't have heaps of money but I have 2 new possible careers ahead. I work with a great group of people from 2 labs and can see a bright future ahead. Most of all I am happy and have my own desk and bench space.
