Unemployment diary: I’m a 36-year-old specialty line cook in Nevada who’s been out of work since May

• The Unemployed States of America takes readers deep inside the decimated American workforce.
• Lorenzo Steele is a 36-year-old specialty line cook based in Las Vegas, Nevada.
• He worked full-time at a casino that was getting ready to reopen in May, but was let go when he broke the training attendance policy by going to get a COVID-19 test, since he’d been feeling sick and wanted to protect his coworkers.
• Steele says the casino didn’t even give him a chance to save his job, and now he’s worried he’ll be evicted or lose his car because he’s running out of savings to make ends meet.
• This is his story, as told to Business Insider.
• Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.

I was working full-time for a casino in Las Vegas for the past 11 months, and had been furloughed up until May, when we were called back for sessions on training and testing before the casino reopened. I attended every session until I became ill about a week before reopening, which caused me to be terminated — because I violated the attendance policy by trying to get a COVID-19 test.

My position was taken by another employee from another property that had shut down. They treated me like I was nobody and didn’t even give me time to take the steps to save my job, and now my unemployment benefits are being held up because of it.

I blame myself for getting sick and trying to do the right thing — which was protecting myself from other people getting sick.

I found out later that I did not have the virus anyway.

I’m broke. I don’t have any income coming in. I filed for unemployment benefits and have been waiting 10 weeks with no communication from the agency. I call every day; the line is always busy. I’ve called the governor’s office; no response. They’ve abandoned us all and no plan has been enacted or announced — just silence.

Bills are overdue, and jobs are scarce.

I’ve had to sacrifice being able to buy food and gas for my car to go and look for employment. I moved to Las Vegas a year-and-a-half ago and have been working toward my two-week paid vacation and saving money to go back home to Jackson, Michigan, to visit my family. Now, since I lost my job, all that progress is gone. 

I'm worried that I'll face eviction and lose my car because I can't make payments. I find myself blaming myself for everything that's happened, even though I know it's not my fault.

I look for jobs daily and apply in a timely manner. If I get any response at all, it usually takes about a week to hear back, but always ends in them moving forward with other applicants or no response.

I'm going to continue to look for suitable jobs to get by until I can find another permanent job to build back up what I had before the pandemic. I want to make sure the company I work for next cares about me as much as I care for their business and customers. I know that if I'm not appreciated, I should move on and find better.