Hello,
I'm new here and awaiting my second assessment. I am currently off for work related stress now for nearly 3 months. I have had to build a grievance against my line manager for bullying, disability discrimination and harassment.
At the moment the stress is so high that i no longer eat properly (I have to put reminders on my phone) and I'm medicated to help control the physical symptoms of anxiety and stress.
The problem is I think my rep (unison) aren't aligned with me and doesn't see the significance of my occ health report which says I'm not well enough to return until the fix the reporting line. He believes that I want retribution rather than a solution to the workplace problem. I am not safe to return under my line manager and they have tried every tactic and delay to keep me off sick. I have launched a subject access request which they are legally in breach with the law for not giving me everything I've asked for.
Basically the problem is I overshare and talk in circles and I bring everything I've lived through these few years into my conversation with him and with HR. Because I'm re-living it over and over. The presumption is in either lying about my health or I'm lying it's taken its toll on me. It feels like a waking nightmare that I'm not believed and it's really hard to express how it affects me or it's really easy to by being blunt with it but it comes across like I'm listing things and therefore I'm lying.
I have depression and my anxiety is made so bad that I've lost friends,a partner and my own self in all of this. The worst of the bullying happened while my dad's health declined (dementia) and death in 2023. I feel like since his death the proverbial mask has slipped and I'm just a mess. I can't seem to find my old sense of self and strength anymore that since then work mates and family have mentioned I must be on the spectrum (I've fought my family over this long ago before this job). It's like everyone has come to the conclusion I'm autistic that in a way validates the treatment I went through. Which causes more pain and trauma.
I'm in therapy but it's talking therapy (been with him for over a year now) and instead of pointers or advice I'm left to talk it out with no real solution or end.
I guess what I'm saying is - I'm alone now. I live alone and have no one who understands the real psychological and physical toll of feeling like no one really understands the mental cage of your own issues with unresolved conflict, of feeling radioactive and made the 'problem' at work. Especially when my own rep doesn't understand the law and I'm literally reading up on it and know my rights and my protections and it doesn't seem to get through that work is not only breaking the law but they are pushing me to leave and to the brink of another meltdown.
Sorry for the rant. But I have only myself to go through this and hope someone in this community can on a level understand what I'm going through.
And I can't quit. I've gone too far now to just leave without at least some kind of resolution (and I have cats and a mortgage to pay!)
