The unfortunate reality is most people believe only what they see. Sadly, they become all-knowing and speak loudly about things and people. Worse still, when a pack of them starts to enable each other, there’s no end to their toxicity. These people really make me sick in the stomach. Meanwhile, only few recognise that they don’t know what they don’t know and exercise restrain on their mouths.

And as I mentioned in an entry before, it’s not that we are incapable of hurting people. The tough part is knowing that we can and choosing not to do it. We were forced to remind ourselves that again today.

Since my diagnosis, I have had no issues working or leading in a team. While there have been occasional challenges, I have always maintained control and professionalism. But I was put to test a couple of months ago.

The company I am working with was undergoing restructuring. There was shuffling of manpower. People were getting promoted. People were tendering. People were getting transferred. We had to cope with many changes in operations, work directions and deal with the management level’s power struggle. Emotions were high, people were sensitive and workload was plenty.

Before this, I was working well with the team (so she thought. Faith can be quite naive sometimes. She’s gonna learn that time will tell in a hard way). But really, you won’t know the strength of a team until they have been tested in dark times. One of the greatest misfortune in life is having to navigate a ship on the ocean in a stormy weather with a captain who has poor leadership skills and a deck of crew looking out only for themselves. Nothing wrong to be frank. It is what it is. Worst case scenario? Everyone sink together.

Honestly, till today, I have no idea where all the shit started from. I’ve never gotten any apologies nor explanations. I was simply thrown under the bus and hit by a truck on repeat. The first time I almost lost my cool was when my former reporting officer disrespected me in front of the team. Out of nowhere, he spoke to me rudely about something which I had informed him previously and when I tried to explain to him again, he raised his voice talking over me, gaslighted me and said things that were unkind and unprofessional.

Later I learnt on eye witnesses’ recount that he also violently slammed the door. (How we wish there was a cctv or the usual nosy people videoing this shit because these eye witnesses turned out to be cowards who do not have a fucking spine to stand up for their teammates.) I remembered this was the day he received news that somebody younger was gonna get promoted instead of him. Like I mentioned, I try not to fall into the trap of assumption. He may be going through PMS for all we know but regardlessly, the fact was he had disrespected me and it’s a line one shouldn’t cross, not even if you’re family.

Victoria was ready to knee him in the back (because he was having this stupid back injury, pretty sure the pain will shut him up and send him to the hospital crying), and Yolanda was ready to tear him in pieces with words as sharp as a stack of razor blades. The emotions I felt were intense af. It was pure rage and our rage scares me. It really does. I knew that instance I had to remove myself from the space, immediately because I won’t be able to hold Vicky and Yolanda back if I stayed for any moment longer. Yes, I was afraid I’d hurt someone but I was more afraid they were going to pin his actions on my mental health condition.

I WILL NEVER GIVE THEM THAT CHANCE TO MAKE ME BE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR ILL MANNER AND LACK OF SELF CONTROL.

I was shaking when I pulled myself away. I was constantly doing grounding techniques and desperately persuading Vic and Yolanda, hoping they’d find empathy for the man and cool their heads off. I recalled Phyllis giving many possible reasons to justify for his behaviour. Guess what? They didn’t take it too well. The heat got redirected inwards and my mental space was just fucked then. I was like a ticking time bomb. I could care less if it was knock off time or not. I grabbed my bag and I dragged myself home.

That day marked the beginning of a months-long experience of workplace bullying that I had to endure. The way my former reporting officer treated me seemed to set a tone—some of my former teammates (his favourite pets really) began to treat me in a similar manner.

I did my best to understand them, to show up and deliver on my responsibilities, and to reach out in hopes of resolving things amicably. But in return, I was met with passive-aggressiveness, cold shoulders, hurtful remarks, and a lack of appreciation.

If you’ve read my previous entries, you’ve known that I’ve been progressing well in my recovery. But I dissociated so much during this month. It felt like all our past efforts came undone. My selves were fighting so much even though our intentions were the same which was to protect ourselves but our methods were so different. Some believed that people need to be set in their place, be taught a lesson. Some believed a lesson isn’t enough, we need to scar them. Some believed we should fall back on praying for our happiness and other’s happiness. Others believed we should keep trying for opened communication to address misunderstandings etc. Our arguments could sometimes get very personal at times too. So much pain, so much rage till there was one day, Drew fronted and we plunged right into depression. We were back on having suicidal thoughts. Thankfully, I had my hubby around to keep an eye over me.

I knew that something had to change. We needed to get off this emotion roller coaster as fast as we can. That was when we came to a few conclusions:

1. Enough is enough.
2. The team no longer deserves me and my best.
3. I should have some self respect to walk away and it’s important to do it the wise way. I thought of quitting my job at first but why should I? (The people who need to quit are the toxic idiots.) Again, I refused to pay for their actions.

So I decided to request for a transfer and I began to collect a deck of evidences. I knew this move was as good as declaring war with the team. It was a ballsy move but it was necessary. This was where Vic’s strength played an important part. She’s ballsy haha. Thereafter, I calculated and planned my subsequent steps with care because as I mentioned, I will not allow anyone to take advantage of my mental health condition. That, till this day, remains as my resolve.

(Part 2 coming up next! On a side note, I’ve exercised heavy self censorship for this entry because Vicky and Yolanda have a lot to express. The italics are their input. But don’t worry, we are all good. No alters were harmed during the process of writing this entry haha.)