This is my first retail job, and so far I've just not had a great experience. It's been about 3 weeks now and my anxiety, instead of improving, seems to be getting much more severe as each shift goes by. This is ironic, since the whole point of me getting a retail job was to improve my anxiety. Not to degrade it further to the point where I'm not having frequent panic attacks before my shifts, and savouring every moment I get at home religiously.
I feel like I'm constantly clueless as to what's going on, and I'm starting to get really severe brain fog while at work that stops me from focusing and just generally dissociating while on shift. I'm also the least sociable employee there, mostly because socializing takes a lot of energy away, energy I can't spare while at work. What's really been the last straw is that they have given me extra shifts (without consulting me first) as the sale is coming up. Shifts eating up both weekend days first thing in the morning. Oh, and another thing – I am missing two pay cheques now. I get paid weekly, and both have had my entire wage deducted, leaving me with £0 for my hard work. I've contacted my store manager, but they don't see, to be solving the issue. And every time I try to chase them up about it, I get dismissed. That was one of the final nails in the coffin on top of my extra shifts and social anxiety, and now I just want to quit. Any advice? I've known retail was a poor option for me, but with a gap-year, I haven't had much of a choice.