There is a bully next to me

Last week I found myself in a very dark place. I haven’t been in that space since December 2005, 3 months after losing my dear father. When I cry, I cry silently. I don’t make much noise. This time I was crying uncontrollably for four days straight. The pain cut so deep I could no longer hold it in. Even Oprah Winfrey Podcasts and India Arie music could not soothe my soul. All my black girl magic had left town. Anxiety and panic attacks became my best friends for those few days. Anyone who asked me what was wrong, my answer was simple I can’t do this anymore. No one could get through to me. Was I depressed?- Maybe. On Monday I tried to get my doctor to prescribe anti-anxiety pills and she suggested meditation. Now you can imagine my disappointment when she told me this. My therapist had suggested the same the previous weekend. My career coach suggested that I needed to find my executive voice. I listened to these well-meaning women but didn't quite agree with their suggested prescriptions. Meditation is the last thing you want to do when in crisis, let alone listen to Oprah and Brene Brown.

In my abyss of darkness, I started asking myself a few questions. I had to ask myself why I am unhappy, why am I dissatisfied at work? The answer was, I am unhappy because I have been silent about the bully who sits next to me. We will call this character Jacob. Bullies are master manipulators. They are charming and convincing. Bullies are narcissists. Most of us are conditioned that bullying is limited to the playground. This is could not be further from the truth. The reality is bullying is rampant in the workplace. First things first, lets define bullying in the workplace. The Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety describes bullying in the workplace as, “as the assertion of power through aggression”. Something to note though is that the aggression can be both overt and covert. Jacob uses both strategies on me depending on the audience. His super powers are gaslighting, excluding me from conversations that affect me claiming he forgot to invite me, publicly humiliating me when our shared boss is not there or speaking to external stakeholders as if I don't exist. He has recruited three puppets to take part in his puppet show. We will call them Kim, John and Melinda. If I had to go into detail of this never ending puppet show, I would spend the whole day writing this piece.

I will share a few anecdotes to support the puppet show theory. When I started at this firm sometime ago, one of my colleagues invited me to a meeting where we had to review some agreements. It was a great session. I was barely 3 weeks in my role. One of the agreements had expired and needed to be updated urgently. I raised a concern that was noted. My concern did not come from malice. My colleague distributed the notes to the colleagues that were invited to the meeting. Jacob did not attend but was an invitee. He saw the e-mail and the concern then attacked me. Jacob is a master at what he does, he never addresses the issue at hand but finds other things to pick on. This time he picked on a report that I distribute daily. He pretended to be seeking clarity. The good thing though is that all the questions were pertaining to issues that he should have been addressing. To think of it, the man is ridiculous. That was the first of many incidents. On one occasion he told me that he forgot to invite for system training that affects my performance directly. He gave access to John. Now John is an interesting character. I’m sure he thinks is a public speaking and sales God. Everything that comes out of his mouth is a half baked sales pitch riddled with incoherent facts. He is a disaster to say the least. One thing about John is that he believes that he can talk himself out of any situation. Long story short, on one occasion since John is the only one with access to this secret system he needed to capture some numbers that are used for reporting. It was quite urgent. Me being the person that I am, I prepared everything for John and handed it over. Teamwork right. Oh man was I a fool to think that the man understands the concept. Not only did he take credit for capturing my work, he captured the numbers incorrectly. For months we had been receiving negative reviews on this issue. When I eventually got access to the system, I learnt that John had been making gravely mistakes. I corrected the mistakes quietly and moved on. If I had raised it, I would seem petty. John and I have had many run ins. He never answers any question. In fact I have opted to distance myself from his antics.

Now let’s talk about Kim. Kim is Jacob’s muse. She is a manipulative piece of work. Kim is a deadly serpent, deadlier than a saw-scaled viper. Her aggression is both overt and covert (again depending on the audience). Her overt aggression ranges from yelling at the top of her voice that she and I will fight in full view of my colleagues to her and Jacob talking about me in my presence in a meeting room full of other people. I once worked with Kim on a project where she would turn her whole back on me and look at all the people in the room except me. I once asked her for a report and she gave me a blank page and asked me to refer to e-mails. Her covert aggression ranges from excluding me to duplicating my efforts. The nail to coffin for me was the day she and Jacob interrupted a training session that was arranged by the company specifically for my role where Jacob introduced Kim and indicated that Kim was studying to write the exams to qualify for my role and would need training too. Kim was smiling a mad smile. I have never experienced such in my life, all I could do was look at my phone while the performance was on. I keep my interactions with Kim brief because God knows my peace matters more than her shenanigans and stunts. Lately she pretends to be nice, but I keep her at arms length because I know who she is. What I find interesting about Kim is that not only does she underestimate my intelligence, she disregards my existence completely.

Melinda is a hot mess. Her allegiance shifts on a quarterly basis. Melinda is sloppy, which makes her easy to read. She is a hustler and a victim. She always complains about Jacob and her workload. She lives in a mental bubble where she is under appreciated. Melinda pretends to be nice but she is a user. Well all of them are users but Melinda’s antics are subtle. She is always a damsel in distress. Get close to Melinda and you will spend all your days either fixing her mistakes or simply doing her work. Melinda bends the truth. In fact they are all economical with the truth. Melinda is the type of person that will provoke you ever so subtly then pretend like you attacked her. Like John and Kim, Melinda exaggerates her efforts and workload. Its unbelievable that supposedly professional adults can fabricate statistics. Their antics not only stall progress but are damaging to businesses reputation but what I say its not my fathers company.

The next question is: where to from here? It’s simple I don’t know for now. I know where I am is toxic. I know that I am tired of dodging bullets and being sabotaged. I also know that I am in not in a position to make drastic decisions and changes. When the time is right, I will know what to do. As for Jacob, Kim, John and Melinda— God bless their miserable, evil souls. It must be sad to be an underachiever and over 40 . On the bright side, I took my therapists advice and I’m slowly getting back into meditation. Some days are better than others, just taking each moment as its comes. I’m coming out of the abyss. Writing this piece has been therapeutic. Grateful for this gift.

Disclaimer: This piece is my way of releasing pain. Most information contained in this piece is my personal experience. For more information on workplace bullying visit: https://www.ccohs.ca/oshanswers/psychosocial/bullying.html