Hi, I wonder if anyone might have some advice.
I've had my job for a few years and I am happy in my work. But since the start I have found it difficult to get on with my manager. He is superficially agreeable but he is also very controlling towards me. I don't know why but from reading up about this sort of behaviour it seems as though he might see me as a threat, so I have been excluded from important meetings, denied training, given far less access to the office than my closest colleague (literally half the number of shifts with the manager over the years) and excluded from countless social activities.
I've tried to discuss this with him numerous times and have got very upset about it. His usual thing is to encourage me to confide in him about how I feel and then laugh gently while I sit there in tears and suggest that my perception is flawed and I'm misreading the situation. The evidence suggests otherwise. I even began keeping a spreadsheet of how many shifts I was given. Sometimes he will make an effort to include me but this is never sustained. He will also do things like ignoring me when I am at the office or at a social event (on the extremely rare occasion I've attended one), so other people don't notice but it feels very much like a punishment to me.
I have been offered the chance to move to another role by a very good friend who is willing to take me on so I don't have to leave the organisation. But my manager insisted this go through HR and the higher ups, though he knows the reason why I want to move. He has even made a big deal of encouraging me to tell them. I don't know why. I wonder if he thinks they will share his view that I'm unhinged. But he did think he would be included in that meeting initially, when he set it up, and then the (very lovely) higher up said no, we will meet without him as it sounds like something is wrong. I tried to say can I please just move over and not go into this as it can't be reconciled, but they insisted I tell them everything.
And now it's all kicked off. I tried to work with him after that and he refused to answer my messages. He did in the end but I lost it a bit and then was sent home and told not to contact him about it again, as though I was harassing him. I was absolutely devastated.
I'm currently on leave which I'd booked ages ago, but next week I have to work with him again. And I don't know how to do that. He will never show a flicker of emotion and will act like nothing is wrong, but I am conscious of the hostility and I feel like I'm working next to an electric fence, continually waiting for the next shock. I'm not even sure if they believe me or they have spoken to him and think I'm the one causing the problem. My anxiety level is high, and I don't know what to do.
I can't request leave as they probably won't be able to get cover, and besides, I love my job and feel so isolated when I'm not working. But there's also no visible end point to this situation so I'm going to have to work with him for at least another month I think until things are sorted (if they let me move).
Any advice very gratefully received.