I have a service dog due to an invisible medical condition. She wears a beige and red coat and has a bright blue collar, leash and head harness that read SERVICE DOG in two-inch letters all over them. Because she is a very large dog and an unconventional breed, she gets a lot of attention when we go out and it’s usual to have questions about her role and training. On this day, it was only our third outing in public and I was feeling confident because I hadn’t been challenged all day. I was in a pharmacy to pick up my medication.
Sales assistant: *running down the corridor* Excuse me!
Me: Yes?
Sales assistant: I don’t want to be mean, but next time you come you need to leave your dog outside.
(I look at [dog] standing beside me in all her gear, then at the door which is fifty meters away, then at my medication held plainly in my hands)
Me: Um, no. I’m not going to do that.
Sales assistant: It’s fine this time, but next time you really need to leave her outside. We can’t have dogs in here.
Me: I can’t leave her behind. She’s an assistance dog. MY assistance dog. I need her.
Sales assistant *nastily*: Well I wasn’t aware of that! And we don’t let dogs in here.
(I look at [dog] again to be sure – she is still clearly marked. Literally the only parts of her that don’t have some kind of identifying equipment are her tail and her paws. I’m confused by the hostility in the woman’s tone, and starting to feel anxious because I’d never faced being sent out of a store before. I really need my medicine, so I stand my ground.)
Me: But she is a service dog. She’s legally allowed to go anywhere I can go. It’s not safe for me to leave her behind.
Sales assistant: *throwing her hands up* Ugh! I know that! I wasn’t aware that she was an assistance dog! *glares*
Me: I – I don’t know what you want me to say here. She is one.
Sales assistant: Ugh! *storms away*
(I completed the rest of my shopping and left as soon as possible. It wasn’t a big deal but for someone relatively new to my condition and just learning to be independent again with the help of a dog, it was a devastating thing. It was very difficult to be brave enough to go into the next shop that I needed to, although the people working there were totally kind and absolutely appalled at the behaviour when I asked if there would be a problem bringing my dog inside.)

I go to my pharmacy’s drive-up window to pick up a prescription. I give the pharmacy technician my information and put my HSA card — medical debit card — in a cup in the slide-out drawer provided for that purpose.

A few minutes later, she hands me a small bag.

Technician: “Here is your prescription; your card is in the bag.”

Me: “Thank you.”

I start to drive away.

Technician: “WAIT! YOUR CARD IS IN THE CUP!”

Me: *Stops* “I thought you said my card was in the bag?”

Technician: “I made that up.”

I have had vertigo on and off since I caught a bug in 2017. I usually bed rest and it goes away after a few hours. I have a bout of it in May 2019; it’s just not going after two days and my anxiety over it is making it worse.

I call the doctor and his receptionist says as it’s an existing condition I can have a telephone consult. Two minutes after I put the phone down, the doctor calls back and says he’ll send an electronic prescription to the local pharmacy. I can’t drive. I can only just stand, but the pharmacy is seven minutes’ walk, so I figure I’ll stagger up to the pharmacy, get the meds, and then stagger next door to the tea room, take the tablets with a drink there, and wait for them to kick in so I can walk home. My friend runs the tea room and will let me sit quietly in the corner.

So, the plan is made, and after fifteen minutes of stumbling up the road with the world spinning, I get to the pharmacy and hang off a display unit for another ten minutes until it’s my turn.

Assistant: “How can I help you?”

Me: “I’ve come to collect a prescription that the doctor has just sent through electronically as urgent for me.”

Assistant: “I’ll go look.”

She disappears for ten minutes. By the time she returns, I’m almost lying on the counter as my head is spinning so much.

Assistant: “No, there’s no prescription for you.”

Me: “Can you check, please? The doctor said he would send it through as urgent.”

Assistant: “Well, if you insist.”

Me: *Through gritted teeth* “Yes, I do!”

She goes away again and comes back after another ten minutes, by which time I’m starting to feel nauseous.

Assistant: “No prescription. When did the doctor send it through?”

Me: “As I said, he has just sent it through as urgent. Just now.”

Assistant: “Why didn’t you say?”

Me: “I did.”

Assistant: “Oh, we don’t look at the electronic ones until the afternoon. Can you come back in two days?”

Me: “I have chronic vertigo. I can’t see too well, and I can’t stand up, walk, or lie down. The doctor has prescribed these as urgent. No, I can’t come back in two days!”

Assistant: “Are you insisting that you have your prescription made up now?”

Me: “You think?”

She looks blankly at me.

Me: “Yes, I am. Please make it up now or I will throw up and collapse here.”

Assistant: *Sighs* “If you insist. Can you go sit over there?” *Points at a chair behind a pillar* “You are stopping other people getting their prescriptions.”

I looked at her as if she had lost the plot and went to sit in the chair and lean on the pillar which was nice and cold on my head.

After another thirty minutes, still no prescription. I staggered over and asked the assistant how much longer it would be as it was now nearly an hour since I’d gotten there. She told me to go sit down and wait.

I stumbled back. After another thirty minutes, a different assistant came over with a clipboard and asked me to fill out a customer satisfaction surgery. I must have looked shocked and possibly homicidal at this point, as she said in a caring way, “Are you okay, love?”. I explained that I’d been there all morning waiting for my urgent prescription. She grabbed the clipboard out of my hands and dashed off. She came straight back with my prescription made up.

She explained that the pharmacist had started to make it up but had been called to the telephone. Then, it was given to the assistant pharmacist who started it, too, and then went to early lunch. The assistant I’d been dealing with had gone out on her break and it had been forgotten, and because I was behind the pillar, they had forgotten me.

This different assistant had been filling a display up, saw what looked like a dead woman on the chair, and brought over the survey as a way to talk to me. I dry-swallowed two of the tablets as she spoke, staggered home hours after I had left, and finally collapsed in bed. About thirty minutes later, the tablets kicked in and I filled the survey out in line with very honest replies.

Two days later, I moved to having my prescriptions filled by post — they come three days after you request them — and for urgent, I now send my husband.

(A young man in his late teens or early twenties came to the pharmacy to pick up his prescription. He didn’t have enough money for them, so he called his mom, who called our store and I picked up. It should be noted that the pharmacy I work in is inside a chain of grocery stores.)

Woman: Okay, so first of all, can you take payment over the phone?

Me: No, it’s corporate policy to not do that.

Woman: Well, here’s my problem. I’m down in [City about 40 miles away], and he needs to get those. Your stores are all linked, right? Can I find a [Store Name] down here and pay for them and then have him pick them up?

Me: You mean you pay for them at a different store and he picks them up here?

Woman: Yeah!

Me: …No. You can’t pay for them at one [Store Name] and pick them up at another.

(I am waiting to pick up a prescription at a pharmacy. As I’m waiting, I hear this very loud, very off key singing. From the sound of it, it’s some kind of country love song. Looking up, I see an overweight man with ear buds walking towards me.)

Man: *unintelligible, very loud, off key singing* . . .OH MANDY!

Me: *stares, thinking this kind of thing only happened in the stories I read on the internet, and trying very hard not to laugh*

Me: *sits down and continues singing, oblivious to the stares. He continued to sing for a couple minutes before he left.*