5 Minutes Free Writing - The Pear of Despair

Good morning all, doing my 5 minutes free writing with prompt - The Pear of Despair. Hope you enjoy the story.

Source

The pear of despair, in older times we know it is a form of torture, probably similar to the Chinese chamber of torture which is used while interrogation of suspects, criminals or prisoners of war.

As the name suggest, a pear shape device is inserted to body parts and expanded causing extreme suffering, all these items are meant to extract confession or critical intelligence from the subject and eventually killing or permanently disabled the subject. Very cruel and inhumane of course.

While physical torture is illegal today, are there other forms of pear of despair? I do think there are some form of pear of despair hidden in the workplace.
Imagine we are the subject, my physical and mental tolerance is put to the test when your leader is constantly tasking you with job or instructions and you are already packed till the brim of despair when you stare at your to do list and the follow up needed to complete them.

Now your leader walks to you with a file (the pear) and tells you he needs it done by tomorrow together with 3 other earlier tasks, swallowing the pear will effectively kills you but your plea for reallocation of resources is ignored.

Do you agree this is also a form of pear of despair that is slowly torturing you and eventually driving you out?