While you’re assigned a task at work, it is generally good to stay focused on it, but if someone is having a medical emergency, that changes everything.

What would you do if you were bagging groceries at your job when an older man came in with obvious signs of heat stroke?

That is what happened in this story, so the young woman went over to help him and sit with him until the ambulance arrived. Unfortunately, her manager got upset and tried to tell her that she should be bagging.

It is hard to believe that someone would be this heartless. Read through the full story below and see what you think.

(L) Help a man suffering heatstroke supervisor said I should continue bagging!

Backstory: I worked in a grocery store in the southern USA, for those who haven’t lived there it can be really hot during the summer, or in my state very humid. At the time I was a bagger/cashier/janitor so I wore many hats… the stories I could tell…

Let’s get to the real story.

That day we were starting to get closer to the lunch rush and as this store also had meals, it was a popular destination. I’m baggin when a customer called to us and she asked us to help cause she noticed a man looking ready to faint sitting in the chair across from the pharmacy.

I stopped everything I was doing and rushed over, he looked to be in his 60’s maybe 70’s, so I didn’t take any chances I went and got him some water and talked to him while a manager was dialing 911.

This certainly seems like an emergency.

The reason he got heatstroke was by walking several miles without water in the summer heat!. (Which was 90 degrees F while feeling like 100 F if I remember correctly)

I told him my name after he told me his and even asked me to call someone, apparently he normally has a driver who he’d call, but often joke about the ambulance so he wanted me to talk to her to ask her to pick him up and clarify it was a real emergency.

Her manager needs different priorities.

Since I got to know him at this point, and knew that if I was in his situation, I’d wish there was someone who I met and I’m scared, I’d be grateful, so I stayed with him till they took him away speaking calmly and trying my best to make him feel comfortable.

The thing that was annoying was while in the middle of helping this man. One of my supervisors called for me to come over and help bagging when clearly this man needed someone by his side.

Anyone could have done the bagging.

And after the event he told me “you should have come over to continue bagging” now this guy already thought he was a know it all, so it was even more annoying.

I mean, Dude! Seriously!? Bagging is such an easy task people can do for themselves that other countries only use cashiers! And even then I wasn’t going to leave a scared man like that!

It is good that the man was able to thank her.

Luckily, my actual store manager agreed with me and thanked me for staying by the mans side. And the man was calling to complement and tell them how grateful he was.

Wholesome ending: apparently the man came back every night for a couple weeks to find me and thank me personally and told me my calm voice was soothing and helpful.

Things weren’t all good at that store.

Glad I could be of help

Even though I don’t work there anymore I enjoy good memories like that, but trust me another story I may post would get you so sick to the stomach you’d see why I left…

We’ll have to wait for the other stories, but at least this one had a happy ending, and the guy was ok.

Let’s see what the people in the comments have to say.

Apparently it could be illegal if she didn’t stay with him.

It was good that she was there to help.

Something similar happened to this person.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about an accountant who sticks to 40-hour weeks after overtime guidance, and finds he likes it.

Here is someone who thinks bagging groceries isn’t an important job.

This commenter says that she did the right thing.

She did the right thing, and I’m glad that it ended up working out for everyone.