It shouldn't have to be said out loud, but some managers simply forget that we need an untarnished license and a healthy body more than we need any one particular job. With good health and a record untarnished by mishaps, revocations, checkride fails, etc, I can get another job. Any pressure from any company that bumps up against that reality is going to get pushback, up to and including quitting. I had to spell it out for an instructor once when I was being pressured to go to an oral exam without being fully prepared. He kept pushing until I told him I was either getting one day off or I was going to ask HR for a ticket home. You could almost see the lightbulb turn on in his brain when he realized I was dead serious and would walk away over something that cost the company nothing but a phone call, but meant everything in the world to me.

Fatigue, sick, nutrition, all that falls under the same umbrella. With very few exceptions, almost anyone here can take their license and medical to another company and get another job. It sucks if your chief pilot forgets that and needs to be reminded that you need your medical and license more than you need this particular job, but sometimes it just has to be laid out using short words and direct statements.