To wish I’d said something to this charity shop worker?

[lostalil]

I was in a charity shop today with stepson aged 5. We spent about 10 minutes looking in the children’s section at books then wandered round to the clothing. He wasn’t being a nuisance at all, I’m genuinely the first to pull him up on any misbehaviour or cheekiness.

He’d sat on a dinner style chair, not one for sale, and I looked down for about ten seconds at a clothes rail but he was still in my line of sight. The till was behind me and I glanced back to see the shop assistant giving him daggers, a real dirty look. Glanced back and DSS is just sat on the chair. I walked over to the lady working and the conversation went like this:

Me: Is everything alright?
Her: What’s the matter?
Me: I’m asking if you are alright?

She’s just glaring at me, giving me daggers.

I ended up just walking out, I’ve encountered her before whilst shopping alone and she’d been very abrupt with me at the till to the point I come home and complained to DP. I was expecting her to tell me what he’d done.

I hadn’t let him run riot, he was about a metre in front of me but I’d taken my eyes off him to glance down for no more than 10 seconds.

I heard another assistant turning away a donation, saying they’ve just got no one buying at the moment and they’re overrun with stock. I don’t really feel like returning either to be honest.

Was I unreasonable or was she?

because she may have been looking at her DSS a bit grumpily

There it is again, gaslighting the OP and calling her a liar. The OP knows the woman. She knows what she looks like. She said she glared angrily at her ss.

Were you there? No. She was. This is her experience. Why are you calling her a liar? Why not believe her???

She doesn’t “know” the woman at all

Please remember that many charity shop staff are volunteers, and often have SEN, and are building their skills to enable applying for paid employment.
Could that be the case?

It is NOT gaslighting, for a start, disagreeing with someone online isn't gaslighting

It's also not calling OP a liar, it's asking her to reconsider whether maybe, just maybe, she was misjudging this woman she's seen precisely ONCE before and had taken a disliking to

She doesn't KNOW the woman.

Please shut up. And look up the word "subjective."

Complete Non Event 🙄

Volunteer. That's the word you're most likely looking for. Not worker.

Anyway, it's you being unreasonable. Whether she was scowling or not, you escalated by confronting her when you could have just left it. Not everything in life has to be a battle.

So in other words nothing happened.
I have terrible resting bitch face when I’m thinking which could be misinterpreted by someone whose direction I was was generally looking in as a scowl.
Given the child was apparently doing nothing and she said nothing was wrong I fail to see what the issue is and why you would assume there was an issue.

To be honest, I work in a charity and we hate turning donations away
It's so generous of people to give things to us, but sometimes we just have to.We always apologise though and explain why.
As to the volunteer behind the till, maybe she was bored or didn't want to be there.
Believe it or not it's hard work, and I'm wiped out by the time I get home.
I am 74 though.
I love it, and find it easy to be chatty and friendly but we're all different.
I do agree with you though that she should try to have a better attitude.

Exactly what I was thinking as I read it... additional needs.

This is the second non issue thread I have read in a short time...
How do you know the chair was not for sale or going up for sale? A charity shop near me oftern sells settees, regularly I see customers stopping on them for a rest. Thease are normally settees which have the sold sign on them. I would never buy one from there due to the many customers who plonk themselves down even though they are sold. Yes, I know they are already used items of furniture, but something about countless random people putting their backsides on them irks me.

No, I'd ignore it.

I’ve had things like this a couple of times years ago. I just thought maybe charity shops sometimes let people volunteer who are a bit ‘vulnerable’.

Sounds like a resting bitch face to me. She might not know that she looks like she is giving you daggers .

😂😂😂
the woman was thinking of her soon to be ex-husband. She will probably have no clue of why you are so annoyed!!!

Be the bigger person, go in, be nicethen look the other way, woman may have problems going on,so dont judge, maybe yr right and shes not a nice person, but show her how nice folk can be by being happy and pleasant,sounds like you thats being antagonistic, people are people are people x

If you like going don’t let her stop you she might just be a miserable person or her face looks like that. Don’t forget not all people like kids I wouldn’t take it too personal but maybe ask the nice staff what days she in so you can try and avoid those days. Remember there not getting paid and she might all sort going on in her life. If it was a paid employee that would be different.

Daft to not tell her why you were asking.

Sounds to me like you’re looking for problems.

This all sounds like a bit of a non event really 🥱

Maybe she has mental health issues or learning disabilities or is neurodivergent? Charity shops often employ staff with these issues. I'd cut her some slack

Because her entire "experience" rests on assumption she made about someone else's face- a face that is actually none of her business. She has no right to police people's facial expressions or make judgements about what she thinks they mean.

As an ND person, I HATE when people try to tell me what I must be feeling based on my face. They are invariably wrong and if I wanted them to know how I felt at that particular moment, I'd tell them.

You’re right about the overpricing! I haven’t been in charity shops for years but, since retiring, I have browsed in a few. I was shocked at how expensive everything was. Eg little glass dishes ( for serving nuts etc) £4/£5. You can pick up new stuff that’s cheaper. No wonder stock isn’t shifting.
Maybe the volunteer is just a scowly person? But you were there and I wasn’t. Does seem odd to keep scowling at a child.

I’d go in when the other staff are there and make a point of saying the other lady isn’t very friendly and makes you avoid the shop when she’s working there!