III. What can it (bullying)
do to my head? The short
answer is: Employee abuse can really screw up your head.
When employee-abuse
victims talk to each other about their abusive experiences, they don't
have to explain anything. Their stories are so much the same that one might
say, "I don't think I can ever work in a cubicle again," and the others
will nod their heads knowingly. The speaker doesn't have to explain that
just walking into a business with cubicles causes a panic attack, because
it triggers subconscious, very real memories of the cubicle in which he
worked during the year he was mentally abused. Such reactions may be symptoms
of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) which is not uncommon among mentally-abused
employees.
I'm going to
tell you what the abuse I put up with did to my head, because it seems
to be typical. In my case, both my supervisor, whom I will call "Witch",
and the department manager, "Dastard", were bullies/mental abusers, and
used all the techniques I described in Section II. I ended up with PTSD,
which still causes mild panic attacks at times, even though I quit that
job three and one half years ago.
I'm only going
to give you examples of the abusive incidents, not a list of every mean
thing my abusers did. What's important is that the accumulative stress
they caused reduced me from a reasonably confident, skilled employee and
outgoing, fun loving person to a withdrawn basket case with virtually no
self-respect. That's important, because I want you to know what can happen
to you if you let your abuse continue, and I know victims who have suffered
far more than I.
It can
make you dysfuntional. In January 1996, about a month before the
abuse started to cause serious damage and about six months before I quit,
I witnessed a gang murder and went to a therapist to deal with the affect
it had on me. According to a standard assessment tool used by mental health
providers, the Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF), she rated my ability
to function at that time at 90, the highest possible rating, in spite of
the mental trauma. Two days after I quit my job, my GAF was down to 50,
only
because of the abuse.
After a year of therapy and medication, it was
only back up to 70. I didn't recover enough from the depression,
overcome panic attacks, or regain enough of my self-confidence to even
look for a job until three years after I quit, and I still have to take
an anti depressant.
That's what employee
abuse can do to your head.
The stress
accumulates.Employee abuse victims have a hard time talking about
their experiences, because each incident seems like such a petty grievance
that an adult ought to be able to handle it easily. For instance, being
ignored at a few staff meetings doesn't usually cause depression, and a
session of harsh, undeserved criticism might cause a few sleepless nights,
but not long-term insomnia.
However, each
little put-down causes stress. When there isn't enough time to recover
from the stress of one incident before another occurs, the stress accumulates
and depression is inevitable. A story I call "My 37th Mole" illustrates
what happens.
I had 51 moles
and decided to have them all removed rather than having to keep watching
them for changes that could mean trouble. My doctor assured me the process
would not hurt--just a wee prick of Novocain in each mole, then he'd burn
it off. He was right. I barely felt the first prick and figured it was
going to be a piece of cake.
The 17th prick
didn't hurt any more than the first, but it kind of annoyed me. Numbers
18 - 24 got progressively annoying, and number 27 really got on my nerves.
By the time we got to number 31, I was so up tight I felt like screaming,
so I started to use some relaxation techniques I thought I was pretty good
at.
Then came the
37th mole. The prick felt exactly like the first one, but my voice screamed,
"Stop!" without any direction from me. The doctor leaped back with both
hands in the air as though a mugger had pointed a gun at him and the nurse
froze with her mouth hanging open.
"I just can't
take one more of those #%@$* pricks!" I screamed. The doctor suggested
we save the rest for another day, but I wanted it over with, so he let
me rest and recover for about half an hour before he continued.
I managed to
get through the rest of the pricks without screaming, but I cursed every
one. The tiny bit of stress caused by each prick attached itself to the
stress of all those that went before, until it was such a huge pile of
stress that it squeezed out my sanity for a few hours.
The stress of
each little abusive incident at work accumulates the same way. You don't
even notice when someone taps a pencil on a table once or twice, or even
five times. But how long can you take tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap,
tap, tap, tap, tap, tap...tap, tap... tap...before you holler, "Stop that!"?
Victims
are good employees. Please forgive my ego's need to insert a disclaimer
here, because I don't want you to think I am the incompetent my abusers
accused me of being. I have a lawsuit pending against the company where
my abuse took place and, during the discovery phase, I learned from company
documents that I was almost twice as productive as any of my
co-workers, my work was the most successful, and I received compliments
rather than complaints about my work.
As far as I can
tell so far, that is typical: Abusive bosses select good employees to victimize,
because they are the most threatening. Therefore, if you are a victim of
employee abuse, don't believe you are the inept dummy your abuser wants
you to think you are. In fact, you may be the best employee in your department--maybe
in the whole #$@%& company!
Abuse makes
you crazy a little at a time. When I worked for my abusers, I endured
probably 490 wee, abusive incidents, plus some deep cuts that they kept
picking at and pouring salt into. Their mind games convinced me that I
was stupid and inept, which confused me because I'd been very successful
in my previous jobs. I figured something was so wrong with my brain that
I couldn't even get through an interview for another job and I was getting
close to retirement age, which doesn't make one very hirable, so I felt
I had
to stay where I was as long as they'd let me. I felt trapped,
which, of course, gave them total control over me.
Several times a week,
beginning about my third day on the job, Witch subtly implied I was
not doing a very good job, but she never told me what I did wrong so I
could correct it and improve. For instance, she said I described some products
wrong, but wouldn't tell me what I'd said wrong or even which products;
just that I needed to be more accurate. What can a person do with that?
After about 11
of those kinds of "pricks" I started to fear that I didn't know all I thought
I knew about the work I did and that something was wrong with me because
I couldn't even figure out where I was falling short. So after I finished
each assignment, which always included double-checking my work, I went
back over everything one more time, which was my first step into perfectionism.
Perfectionism
is a destructive trap abuse victims tend to fall into, because we think
if we do everything right our abusers will treat us better. However, it
doesn't work, because what victims do has nothing to do with why abusers
abuse. Besides, a decision to be perfect is a decision to fail. Every
little human error becomes a failure. We stress out over typos on drafts.
Nevertheless,
since I couldn't find out what I supposedly did wrong, I tried to cover
all the bases by doing everything perfectly. Both Witch and Dastard told
me people were complaining about my work, but wouldn't tell me who or what
they complained about, so there wasn't anything I could do about it. That's
a good way to keep a person at your mercy. Then deny them any mercy to
keep them humble and in their place, and you win the game
About an hour
after one of those times, prick no. 63, a photographer came to take pictures
of the people in our department. The company newsletter was featuring a
different department each month, with pictures of the employees and descriptions
of the work they did, and it was our turn. I refused to have my picture
taken, because not many people in the building knew what the "dummy on
the second floor who can't do anything right" looked like and I wanted
to keep it that way. I could hope that when people talked to me in
the lunchroom they didn't know I was the dumb one.
That's the kind
of thing employee abuse can do to your head.
My first annual
review was incident no. 168. I was doing work several levels above what
I'd started doing, but was making a lot less than everyone else
doing the same work, so I naturally expected the promotion and raise that
went with the job I did. Instead, the review was a 30-minute put-down session
in which Dastard provided no information whatsoever to help me know what
I needed to learn or change. He acted as though I were an ingrate for not
being thrilled with a raise that didn't even cover inflation.
Here's an example
of the kinds of things I had to deal with. He told me he'd consider giving
me a raise when I could do a major project like "XYZ". When I told him
I
did "XYZ" he just said, "Oh really?" and dropped the subject. Someone
else
got credit for "XYZ" and he didn't even correct the error after I told
him about it. A lot of my co-workers got credit for my accomplishments.
As I left his
office, my self-esteem so low I walked on it. He did not think I was valuable
at all. How could I have fooled myself into thinking I was doing such a
good job? I felt stupid, personally and professionally.
I went from trying
to avoid contact with other employees to totally isolating myself, except
for business conversations that were absolutely necessary. I didn't want
to take a chance on doing or saying anything that would prove I was as
dumb as everyone probably already knew I was.
About six months
later, Dastard surprised me by giving me the promotion, but with such a
wee raise it wasn't even close to starting pay for the job I'd been doing
for 18 months by then. It was the only promotion I ever got that was an
insult. It was as though he built me up with the promotion so he could
drop me as far down and hard as possible so I would not make the mistake
of thinking I was valuable. He definitely kept me humble and in my place.
I figured my
quest for perfection would eventually pay off, though. I'd get so good
he'd know I deserved the promotion, and maybe even pay me a little more.
Call it what you like: denial; Pollyanna optimism; irrational; nuts. They
all fit, especially "nuts". Employee abuse does drive one nuts.
About then, Witch
got very serious and determined in her little game of "Ha, ha, you screwed
up again, but I'm not going to tell you what you did." What's more, rather
than criticizing me in private, she started coming to my cubicle and talking
in phony stage whispers that could be heard in the cubicles around me,
clear into the next department.
Incident no.
363 was a deep wound that Witch and Dastard picked at until I quit six
months later.
The company upgraded
its computer system and my PC didn't have enough memory to handle the new
programs. It dumped my work at least once a day, sometimes as many as 300
pages. I divided long documents into small files so I wouldn't lose everything
every time, but it was a slow, inefficient way to work and very stressful.
Everyone else got new computers or more memory, but Dastard said the department
budget could not afford to even upgrade mine. That was too phony even for
this Pollyanna. We worked for a multi-billion-dollar, international corporation!
Witch and Dastard
loved it. It gave them all the excuses they needed to gripe at me. From
then on, they complained regularly about all the overtime and help I needed
because I was so slow and unproductive. They even claimed I missed deadlines,
which I never did, in spite of the handicap they inflicted on me. Every
once in a while, just for good measure, they'd throw in an alleged, unspecified
complaint from some unidentified person, somewhere in the U. S.
Between nos.
363 and 500 I deteriorated to basket case level. I was always in trouble.
I felt that my very presence in the building offended everyone. Half of
me would not give up on trying to please Witch and Dastard, while the other
half knew it couldn't be done and that I just had to hang on as long as
I could. I was convinced that I would never be able to work in my field
again and the best I could hope for was a minimum-wage, entry-level job.
My perfectionism
took complete control and nearly drove me crazy all by itself; I became
so mentally isolated that I wasn't aware of anything that happened outside
of my cubicle; a lump lived permanently in my throat and I was never more
than a breath from tears; my work life had bled so deeply into my private
life that I withdrew into agoraphobia (fear of leaving home); none of the
hobbies or recreation I had always enjoyed were any fun; I woke up at least
six times every night and couldn't get out of bed on weekends; I had chronic
diarrhea; I had to force myself to swallow enough nourishment to keep going;
I couldn't concentrate.
No. 501, the
"37th mole", was a 30-day probation letter listing all my alleged shortcomings
and failures, but they were no more specific than before, so I still didn't
know what I had done wrong and could neither improve nor defend myself.
By then I was in such bad shape, mentally and physically, that I knew I
would not survive another month of trying to be perfect and failing, and
not even knowing where I was failing. I was worn out. Might "fight" was
gone".
I didn't know
I'd "graduated" from stressed-out to clinically depressed (with post traumatic
stress syndrome), but I knew I was sick. I figured I'd better get
out while I could still walk, and I did. When I tried to find a slot for
my key card instead of pressing the "down" button to get the elevator,
I knew I was in serious trouble and needed help.
My trouble was
that I was mentally ill. That's what employee abuse does to your head.
