This evening a message popped up on my LinkedIn. I jumped out of my skin. It was from my old boss, in my first ever job 19 years ago. A man that bullied me senselessly. That experience changed the trajectory of my life.
I haven’t thought about him in almost 2 decades. His message is breezy and a general hello, and commenting on my ‘glittering’ career; as if he’s forgotten.
I remember before he joined I had absolutely loved my job, I was confident and learning. When he arrived, he made me his whipping boy. He set me up for failure. He deliberately embarrassed me in front of clients. Instead of identifying my obvious gaps as a junior and working with me to train me, he took me to task on them all. He told me my accent was too strong. That I wouldn’t make it because “daddy wasn’t rich”. That I was a stupid, foolish little girl for having a relationship in the office (a guy who’s now my husband)
I’ll never forget the day he took me to a café, told me I was incompetent and fired me. I had to leave my apartment and we ended up moving cities. Because my confidence was shot, I fumbled through the next 2 to 3 jobs and didn’t stay very long. I had a lot of therapy.
I don’t know what to say. I haven’t thought about him in almost 2 decades. Part of me wants to delete the message. Another part of me wants to message back with some hard truths. And another part of me is tempted to meet up with him and look him in the eye. Because guess what – we traded places. I worked my ass off in my 30s and I’m now in a much better, more successful position than he. Looks like he went backwards. I want to say look at me now you stupid, silly little man.
But I think I should probably delete it…