Hi Everyone, I’m starting a full-time one-year post bacc in May. I going to continue working until the first week of May for $$$ reasons. But now that I know I’m going…I’m so excited and nervous that I can’t seem to concentrate or think about anything else at work. I literally sit here all day and jump back and forth between this website, MomMd, and SDN. It’s crazy. I have absolutely no fear of retribution or termination at work, so I don’t do any work even when I have work, like right now. It’s really bad. I’m not afraid that they’ll fire me bc frankly this firm really doesn’t fire anyone (unless there is GROSS misconduct) bc they don’t want to pay severance…and, anyway, I’m 110% sure I will never want to practice law again so it will never affect me, plus, their lawyers they don’t say anything bad for fear of a defamation suit. But still, I don’t like this feeling of being an incompetent sloth…can someone help me please? How can pretend or act interested in this life that am itching to leave behind?
I see lots of people checking out this thread and not replying! 
Hard to know what to say. Of course you have a short-timer attitude, who wouldn’t? When I was preparing to leave my job I had various tasks to complete just so I wouldn’t be bequeathing a big mess to my successor. It wasn’t fun, but I was able to keep a task-oriented mentality of checking things off a list and just did what I could. But I definitely had a bad attitude about it!
Others have said it best. People tend to remember you for your last few weeks. I would crank it up and go out with a bang rather than a whimper, because you never know; recommendations are useful, and your former employers might be able to offer you a part-time or temporary job later during periods when you are not busy. Believe me, I’ve burned enough bridges in the past to know whereof I speak.
Thanks everyone for the advice. I’m going to try to ACT interested and be kind. Part of the problem is that I have been in this particular office for a short time - I recently transferred to this office after being another branch for over a year bc I knew this career wasn’t doing it for me and I wanted to come home, save money, and weigh my options. Anyhow, I haven’t really connected with any senior people in my office. In the other branch, I cried before I left bc we were really like our own dysfunctional family. It’s really tough bc there seems to be a mass exodus going on here and I think the higher-ups know that the junior people are not happy, so they’ll ask me things like “how are you doing?” “do you like it here?” “do you want to be involved in this project long term?” - and of course, I have to say yes to all of these, knowing that in a few weeks I will come back to give notice. Also, they’ve worked me so hard and basically bled me dry for the past 2 years that I don’t want to spend my last month here putting in 12 hours day - I’ve done that enough - so I aim to get out of here at 7p.m, which doesn’t equate to impressing anyone here. I know getting reacquainted with sciences and my post-bacc is going to be one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, and I don’t feel like sapping my energy to just give more money to this firm. Truly, I’m not worried about recommendations bc the policy of this firm is not to reveal any other information other than than verifying the dates of employment. I also never intend to work here again…and I am certain they will feel no use for an attorney with a doctor-complex.
But, you’re all right, I must fight these urges…and continue to play the part for just one month longer. UGGHHH!
I just read this thread, and it’s so funny, since just this morning I pulled out my calendar and numbered my remaining days at this job (98)!
Here, it’s even more challenging, since I will be attending school at my current place of employment. SO I REALLY don’t want to burn any bridges or annoy someone who may be grading my tests next year! And everyone knows I am leaving work to attend school, so I feel like everyone knows that I am just marking time until my last day.
And I’m helping to orient/train a person who got hired to do a job which I was going to get until I turned it down to try for med school…who is essentially one of my supervisors…it’s a unique situation, one in which I am happy to be but very stressful as well.
So I sympathize with you and offer my support…
Hey! I know how you feel. A couple years after I finished college, I had this computer consulting job. They lured me in by saying they were planning to expand their European operations and needed me to help them with that. So where did they send me for my first project? To Zurich or Stockholm, you say? Nope–to the outer suburbs of Pittsburgh! I lived there for 6 months of pure corporate misery, during which my boss made me do things like work consecutive 24-hour shifts, take the blame for mistakes made by one of my coworkers (who was my boss’s friend), and “socialize” with him and the rest of our group in my meager off-time (i.e. have boring Friday night meetings over bad beer and listen to my boss, who was a “writing consultant,” mangle the English language with his pathetic malapropisms).
It was embarrasing and miserable to work for this company! Still, I did my job as best I could, and I got some smug satisfaction out of knowing that in our team of consultants, only a couple of us were getting any respect from the client company where we were working at that time. After about three or four months, I gave up on the company and started making some summer plans that were more to my liking. A friend of mine and decided to go to go backpacking around Central America. And there were lots of arrangements to be made, I can tell you that–airfares to compare and such!
So it was pretty hard to concentrate…and I know how you probably feel. But that’s normal when you’re leaving a job you’re not too excited about. Still, I guess you just gotta get the necessary work done, and act enthusiastic. Just think of it as a dramatic arts project or something, with you as the star. Also, you’ll be glad when you look back later that you departed gracefully rather than leaving behind a cloud of chaos and unfinished work. Oh, and watch the movie “Office Space” for some entertainment.
And don’t forget to avail yourself of some office supplies! 
I understand how you feel too, it’s hard to be split in such different directions. Remember, however, that you’re currently in one professional field, and you’re aiming to become a member of another professional field. A med school applicant interview question that seems to come up frequently is, “what does it mean to be a professional?” I’ve been thinking about this a lot as I’ve been juggling full time work and full time school. It’s hard to maintain the quality of work I did before I started school, and at times I’ve gotten really resentful of my job (I’m a bookkeeper), but it’s meaningful to me to evaluate my performance even when I know “it doesn’t count.” You’ll be impressed with yourself if you end this stage of your life on a high note. Don’t get sucked into feeling like you’ve wasted the temporal and energetic and financial investment you’ve put into this field. Your past choices were valid, don’t undermine yourself!
Hi,
As hard as it is for you right now, you need to some how get out of the slump you are in right now. Even if they don’t fire people, you should not burn bridges anywhere you work. You don’t want to leave them with the impression that you are a lazy sloth. You never know in this world if you will meet these people again in a different setting or you don’t know if they know someone that you may meet in the future.
Always leave a job on the most positive note you can leave. I know that is easier said than done, but you owe it to your self and to them. It sounds like what a lot of us went through when taking our final classes to get our undergrad degrees. I had such horrible senioritis that I almost got a C in a 5 credit embryology class, which would have played havoc with my GPA. I had to literally make a concious effort each day to fight the urge to ignore my classes for my dreams of the future.
Fight the urge, TURN OFF THE COMPUTER SITES and do your best in the 1 month you have to stay there before your classes start.
It sounds like you are not respecting yourself for what you are doing, so change what you are doing and you will earn your respect back. Good luck!!!
This was my situation exactly 24 hours ago!I had given my jobs 3 weeks notice 3 weeks ago, and my last day was supposed to be April 2nd. I hated that job soo much, I just surfed the internet all day basically.I kept thinking, what are they gonna do, fire me? (smirk). It was one of those admin type jobs that don’t pay much and everyone else thinks you’re their little secretary. Well, when the announcement was made about my leaving to begin my journey to med school, some people there all of a sudden couldn’t look me in the face or stopped talking to me! One woman even ducked her head when she saw me walking in the hallway towards her! I guess they feel sheepish, or didn’t expect a
person like me to even have a degree, let alone be preparing for med school. Anyways, my lack of interest in the job and lack of committment (I asked for days off to take care of things) became apparent yesterday. Late in the afternoon, my boss called me into her office and told me that although my resgnation was officially for April 2, they decided that it would be today.Which is what I’ve been hoping for, so I think it all worked out! I can’t help but think that they just wanted that satisfaction, the last word, but who cares? Now I am free and have 1 week to relax before my classes begin!
Wow, are they going to pay you for the remaining week that you won’t be working? If everytime someone gave notice, the bosses asked them to leave somewhere before or within that notice period…people would stop giving notice and simply leave with a days notice. A lot of when you give notice depends on when you can afford to get your last paycheck.
I wonder if now you can claim that they asked you to leave…I’d love it if I was asked to leave bc then I’d get severance or at the very least, unemployment. But alas, that won’t happen, these people try as hard as they can to hold out so that they don’t have to pay severance. Anyhow, one week is not a big deal one way or the other. Good luck with your studies.
Well, I’m trying my hardest to stay motivated here…A big problem or good thing is that all of the projects I’ve been working on tied themselves up last week, so I don’t really have anything coming up due…but I don’t want to ask for more bc I really don’t want to placed on a project/case - knowing that in 3 weeks, I’ll give my notice. Another problem is that there is a mass exodus going on here - one guy in particular is leaving, and I have a good feeling that they are going to dump his work on me since a) I have the time and b) I have experience in the specialty. It would really be wasteful to do one turn over to me and then weeks later another to someone else.
They were nice enough to pay me the rest of the week! Which made me feel a little bad…but not for long, because I warned them 3 weeks ago that I was leaving, yet whenever I asked for a few hours off to take care of things re: school, they gave me a hard time. Yesterday was the last straw, because I told them I had to be away for 2 hours in
the morning to do something (I had to go and sign for my loan proceeds)and they complained that I should have asked for permission sooner, blah blah. They asked if it could wait, since we were short staffed by 1 person. I told them no, what I had to do was very important. So I guess they realized then that I wasn’t committed. Why would I be?
Some people just don’t get it! I wish I could apply for unemployment, but they have a copy of my resignation letter, so I’d get denied, I’m sure.
Hello. I totally feel your pain! I’m right there with you and I still have several more months here! I still haven’t decided where I am going in the fall, but 2 schools accepted me: UNCG and ODU. I went to visit UNCG about a month ago and loved the campus and the town and met with the admissions people, FA office, and premed advisor. But, it’s out of state tuition. UNCG is very proactive and I’ve already got my FA package, which isn’t much. I saw ODU briefly in the fall for the official campus tour and didn’t like the campus much but I went down on a Sat. and students weren’t there so I’m going back again next week to see it with “life” and meet with FA office/housing/admissions. Also, ODU has the added bonus of being next door to a medical school (EVMS) and 2 hospitals, including one peds hospital and I think it would be fun to volunteer or work in peds hospital.
But, anyways, fall term at either ODU or UNCG won’t start until August so I have several more months at my job. I continue to work as hard as usual–although it may not seem like it judging by the colossal amount of time I spend on OPM and other boards –because I don’t do anything half-assed, even jobs I hate such as this one. I may need a LOR from my current boss, and in fact, my last boss who is no longer here wrote me LORs for the post-bac programs I applied to (and was rejected at–bastards).
Try to leave your job on a high note. Even if you hate law and never plan on seeing these people again, you never know when you’ll run onto someone. Also, some of them may end up as your patients someday. It’s hard to beat “senioritis” but try to do something work-related. Ask for projects if you don’t have enough to do. Good luck!
Love,
Stacy
Another thing is that no one ever REALLY knows when they’re going to need someone they’re currently working with as a reference, no matter how unlikely it might seem at the time. Like this spring, I applied for a summer chemistry research program. Well, I wasn’t going to ask my FAVORITE profs for recommendations for that, because I know I’ll need them to write letters for my med school application, and I didn’t want to bug them twice. So I had to go ask some people I otherwise wouldn’t have thought I’d need to talk to again, like my p-chem prof. He was surprisingly nice about doing it. But now that he’s supported me in applying for that program, he thinks I should apply to chem grad school, not med school! So I know I can’t get a med school letter from him.
This seems to happen a lot–when I’m applying for things, the need for references can suddenly spiral! It’s good to have a wide, diverse network of contacts at that time. (And preferably not involving my mom!) I may still have to go back and ask some of those former employers of mine, because I’ve heard some med schools require a non-academic letter. Or say some new volunteer program comes up… you need letters for those things too, up to 3 at a time. I dare say it’s even nice to be able to call upon some people I feel quite neutral about from time to time, because then I don’t feel so guilty asking them!
Anyway, that’s just been my experience. Well, hang in there!