No air conditioning in the office, panic attacks

[darlene85]

I started working at new job and all was good but on two occasions when there were hot days I suffered badly from panic attacks but today it wasn't just a panic attack, I was seriously sick, exhausted and I thought that I will pass out. I don't know what to do, I suffered a trauma today and I don't want to go back to that job. I am very afraid what it will happen when the temperature rises even more.
Boss doesn't allow air conditioning, we have it but we can't use it.

[.Poppy.]

Is it the full office A/C that your boss won't let you use? Would it be possible to get a desktop A/C unit or fan for personal use? I have a small rechargeable fan unit that you put water in and it keeps just the immediate area cool, and it works pretty well.

[darlene85]

Fan wouldn't help, my collegue has it and it does very little because there is no air in the office. Portable AC is not an option. It's a very small and crowded office. I've never had this feeling that I will die and I had many many panic attacks in my life, this was weakness in whole body and it was horrible.

[alpacagirl]

As someone who doesn't cope well with the heat ( I have low blood pressure and extreme heat makes me feel faint/weak) my go to is adding electrolytes to my water. My son does the same thing when he works in the heat all day ( he's a tradie). I just use the hydralite or gastrolyte tablets and my son often has some sort of sports electrolyte powder. Not sure what's available where you live. It's worth a try though as it keeps you hydrated better than plain water when it's really hot.

[darlene85]

That won't help because I now have a fear of rooms without AC (except my home which is naturally colder), that two events where I was very bad and had a bad panic attack made me so weak and threw all my progress out of the window. I can't go to the store now. I was at the store earlier today and I've noticed that it doesn't have an AC and I had a vertigo and a panic attack. This job ruined my mental health in just three weeks. I am heart broken.

I haven't blown this out of proportion because my colleagues said that they are going to pass out so it was really horrible. It's just that with my history of panic attacks, I am at the beginning now and unemployable because I can't go outside for five minutes AGAIN. I want to scream, I am so angry. And so helpless. I am on meds and I was completely fine until that happened.

[WiredIncorrectly]

As someone who doesn't cope well with the heat ( I have low blood pressure and extreme heat makes me feel faint/weak) my go to is adding electrolytes to my water. My son does the same thing when he works in the heat all day ( he's a tradie). I just use the hydralite or gastrolyte tablets and my son often has some sort of sports electrolyte powder. Not sure what's available where you live. It's worth a try though as it keeps you hydrated better than plain water when it's really hot.

I hate the heat. It feels like I am dying. I didn't even consider the electrolyte tablets. Thank you, will try this!

[Lencoboy]

Darlene, it sounds like your boss is being a right obstinate power-mad control freak, especially as some of your fellow work colleagues are also feeling the same discomfort as you right now. Also sounds like he was caught napping during the recent Covid pandemic by seemingly failing to look into attempting to provide more adequate ventilation within your workplace, if practicable.

Perhaps both yourself and your other fellow colleagues who are having similar issues right now could try to organise some kind of group meeting in order to attempt to resolve the issue, as if your boss happens to eventually get wind of very similar complaints from other employees of his, it might with a bit of luck persuade him to back down over his draconian air-con prohibition policy in your workplace.

[darlene85]

I quit because other colleagues didn't want to stand up and I was new so I couldn't. They saw that we don't feel good and we tried to get them to turn on the air conditioning but they were yelling that we have to shut it down. I was never so scared for my life like that time and I couldn't go back. I am looking for a new job now.
It was also a toxic enviroment, workers in constant fear of being fired and constantly micromanaged.