When I look back at what I wrote on March 18, 2022, I can see so clearly now that this was the beginning where empowerment began to take root again. I was emotional, yes — but not because I was breaking down. I was emotional because I was finally breaking through.

Writing became the place where everything started to make sense. Every sentence loosened the grip that the bullying, the betrayal, and the silence of others had on my mental state. Putting my thoughts on paper helped me reclaim the narrative that had been twisted by other people’s actions and inactions.

In that piece, I was trying to understand how the words of my bullies had managed to get inside my head in a way nothing ever had before. I had faced danger, intimidation, even violence in my career — and yet none of that ever shook my confidence. What made this situation different was the combination of vulnerability, lack of support, and the toxic narcissistic tactics used against me. I was left to defend myself while others looked away, and that silence created a wound deeper than the bullying itself.

I wrote about rumination — how my thoughts looped like a rollercoaster I couldn’t get off. There is even a share Psychcentral.com: Blog – How to stop obsessive thoughts down below. I described the resentment that built up when the owners ignored the tenants’ letter in 2016, and how that single act of dismissal snowballed into years of fallout. I can still feel the sting of being pressured to “let it go,” as if doing the right thing was somehow the problem.

But even in that early writing, I can see the shift beginning. I was starting to name what happened. I was starting to understand the dynamics. I was learning…. I was starting to see that the issue wasn’t my strength — it was the lack of support around me.

I wrote:

“Yes, it is all about ME now.”

And that was the turning point.

That was the moment I stopped apologizing for protecting myself. That was the moment I started losing the toxic shame that never belonged to me. That was the moment I began to separate who I was from what had been done to me.

Looking back now, I can see that March 18, 2022, was the beginning of my mental and emotional reset. I was still tangled in the aftermath, still trying to understand the cognitive distortions, the obsessive thoughts, the anticipatory anxiety — but I was also starting to reclaim my voice.

I was learning that healing doesn’t begin when the situation ends. Healing begins when you finally allow yourself to tell the truth about it.

And that’s exactly what I was doing.

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From March 18, 2022

I have been very emotional lately because I have been feeling very empowered these days. The more I write, the more everything starts to make sense, and the more I release the hold this situation has on my mental state. 

Making sense of this Bullying is important to me. I have become determined to work out as much as I can to protect myself in the future. Yes, it is all about ME now. 

I am sure a lot of you know what I mean. Writing out your thoughts and putting them on paper is a release, whether it’s happy, sad, or in between. Making sense of your inner thoughts and making sense of where it all went wrong to get you in this terrible state is a release. Even positive thoughts are reinforced after writing them out!

Rumination is an important part of Mental Health Recovery, but not when these thoughts get stuck in your head. I had obsessive thoughts, and they got stuck like a rollercoaster in my head and were the hardest thing to stop. I still, at times, find my head spinning, but it is easier to get off when it does. It was terrible for a long time… but so many things helped me get out of it!

For some reason, the words of my Bullies got into my head and played on my psyche to the point where it damaged it. I need to understand what it was about myself at that time, which also worked in allowing this to get to me as it did. No one person has control over me and my thoughts; there had to be other things going on as well. I never gave power to anyone else to get to my emotions before.

There had to be something different about this to be so effective, and I came to see it as the Narcissism of the Bully, the many tactics they used to undermine me at a time I was vulnerable anyway, over my health and pressured by the owners.

I had every confidence in my ability to do my job, even knowing I was a good and fair person to the tenants living in the properties. I followed the rules, and to me, there is nothing safer. There is security in knowing that the property you live in is up to par, and it is safe to live in. If I worked for a company that didn’t want to follow the rules of various agencies we answered to, I would have reported them and filed complaints against them, which was the right thing to do, and I quit my job and moved on. I refused to work for anyone who would put a tenant or property at risk because of sloppy repairs or refusals to do what they had to do with Fire or Property safety. My diligence paid off in the end, for all concerned.

I did what was right, and I stood my ground. I probably mentioned before that there were other properties where I had issues with tenants, due to my refusal to give in to their Bullying of me, and I have been pushed, shoved, had my car stolen, and even shot at once, all because I followed the rules and stuck to them.

At my very first property, I learned to carry around a baseball bat when I made my rounds. So, no, fear of tenants’ actions against me, even fear of tenants themselves, got to me but didn’t stop me; I was that confident in myself and my actions, even in my job. There was a big difference with all these other properties; all the times I got into situations like that with tenants abusing me, I was supported by the Management and Property Owners. It made all the difference in the world!

I had to learn where it all went wrong. I haven’t worked it all out, but I know a lot more than I did. It was an accumulation of many things, but in the end, the start was the refusals of everyone else around me accepting that the letter sent by these Adult Tenant Bullies on August 31, 2016, should have been addressed and not ignored like it was.

This act of ignoring this letter, and what could occur as a result, festered within me, as I knew it was wrong, and I ended up feeling very resentful towards them for all I felt manipulated into letting go of. I felt a lot of resentment towards everyone, even more so when all the shit started up again in August 2017, leading to the hearing and their eviction. I knew it wasn’t the end, and this played on me for that quiet year.

When I got the Work Order from them on August 22, 2017, I made sure to give them 2 days’ notice and follow procedures to the letter for entry, yet I knew when I knocked on that door that day that it would start all over again, and I was right.

The lack of action in 2016 was wrong, and this played on me, built resentment within me, and I became filled with fatalism, as I knew it would not be the end of it with these tenants. I had enough experience with tenants to know this would not be the end of it, and I do recall taking great pleasure in telling the owners, “I told you so” when the shit hit the fan a year later in 2017.

Why do you think I went straight home on August 24, 2017, and completed an online application with Human Rights against these tenants, WITHOUT notifying the owners until it was too late?

I knew they would complain about my actions and try to talk me out of it, as they wanted me to ignore them and bury my head in the sand, hoping it would all go away like they did the year before, and I refused to do that anymore. I was determined to fight for my rights, even if no one else was willing to support me. 

You know, these owners later started taking what I say about tenant and building situations more seriously, as my experience taught me what could happen. They came to rely on me too much in the end, and I also resented that. I was not “the boss” they tried to say I was, they were.

When it came down to actually allowing me to follow the rules and respond to their antics, they tied my hands and wouldn’t let me. They pressured me to drop it in 2016; I would not allow them to do it again. This is also partly why it got so hard on me; I felt alone in my defence, as no one else wanted the “drama” of dealing with it the right way.

Why the hell should I be made to feel bad for doing the right thing? That is just what happened here! You see the response of everyone once the hearing was over…

Look at this email string below between one of the owners and me over the letter sent on August 31, 2016, at 3:55 am to us all by these Tenant Bullies. The very first email was sent to me by the owner at 6:36 am when I wasn’t even up yet, and office hours didn’t yet start either! With this email, I felt attacked, like I knew why these tenants sent this letter. How was I to know that?

I felt really put on the spot by this email from the owner, especially seeing it in my personal email so early in the morning. Personal email now, not work.

My response was a result of this feeling of being put on the spot. It is a trauma response where you overshare and talk too much. I talked too much as I felt uncomfortable with this person’s reaction upon getting this email, like I was responsible for it all when I was not. I had no control over what these tenants did, but it was responses like this below from the owners that made me feel like I was. This was the beginning. It just snowballed from this and is so easy to see now.

Stella.

Can you please explain to me why I am receiving this letter & why I am needing to deal with this upon my return please?

Thank you

> On Sep 1, 2016, at 3:55 AM, a

> I have attached a letter addressed to the owners and Stella to this email.

> A R

> <Letter To the owners Stella August 31, 2016.pdf>

> Morning ,

 I just got up, haven’t had the chance to read the letter she sent yet, as I just saw it, and I have no idea what it says.  This is out of the blue to me, to be honest. I had received a work order from 302 telling me they had roaches last week. I scheduled for treatment on Monday, the 29th, between 11 and 3 pm. I gave out the 24-hour notice and the Pest Control prep form to the unit and the block of 301, 303, 202, and 402.  The next day, I received a work order from 502 telling me they had roaches, so I spoke to Terminex and was told they could do it on Tuesday, the 30th, between 1-5. I sent out the 24-hour notice again with the prep form for 502, 501, and 503. Monday came, and I waited for Terminex to show. I called them at 1:30 pm to find out where the tech is to be told by Sophia at the serve dept that she screwed up, as she has put all units for treatment on Tuesday, the 30th. I flipped, but nothing I could do. I do have emails from Terminex about this. I called all tenants affected, and they were frustrated with the change but understood it was out of my control and worked with me. I called 303 on the number I have, and there was no answer, and no vm is set up, so I emailed her, let her know what happened and that it was changed to the next morning and asked if it was ok. I even mentioned in the email that I tried calling her.

> After a couple of hours, I didn’t receive a response, so I texted her, as the number I have is a cell, and I asked if she received my email. I apologized for the delay and asked if it was ok and she said it was ok. When Terminex was here, we knocked on the door, but there was no answer, and their dog went mad with barking and growling, so we didn’t enter. If she had an issue with the change, why didn’t she say something rather than telling me it was ok? So, yes, as per what I do, I sent a Form N5 about the lack of entry after she said it was ok to do so. I still have all communications. I would have rescheduled it for her, or anyone, who had an issue with the change.

> Tuesday afternoon, I get a letter in the office from A, as she says she noticed the camera in the elevator picks up her apartment door when the elevator door is open, and she told me to remove it. She thought it was in a video and was always running. I explained in an email that it wasn’t a video, just pictures to catch vandalism of the elevator door, and the angle does not show into her apt if the apt door is open. She responded that night that either I remove it, or she was calling the police. I didn’t have a chance to respond to that yet, as yesterday was a nightmare with cleaning 204 for the new move-in today, as the tenant leaving left a mess, and I helped R clean it out. Took us most of the day to clean it, and we also ended up having to call the plumber as Rl couldn’t clear the bathtub after the tenant threw fish tank rocks down the drain and clogged it up. I got up this morning to her email and yours.

> I am going to go get a coffee, wake up a bit and read this letter.

> I see it’s 7 pages long.

> Stella

Hi.

I am so sorry that you had to deal with this today. It isn’t fair…I read the letter, and yes, I am in a bit of a shock as a lot of it is outright lies.

I don’t even know the word she used, and at no time did I ask any of that or talk about her children. Wow.. nice to wake up to this morning. Seems she is on a vendetta.

That’s ok.. I have everything on paper, and this is the reason why I do things that way.

I am here. Talk soon

Best Regards,

Stella Reddy

—–Original Message—–

From:

Sent: September 1, 2016 7:17 AM

To: Alto Properties 

Subject: Re: 

7 pages, its like a novel.

No problem, will try and give you a call within the next hour or so.

Chat soon,

Thank you

> —–Original Message—–

https://psychcentral.com/anxiety/rumination-replay-conversations-in-my-head

“Rumination can develop as a result of traumatic experiences or the false belief that repeatedly thinking about this one thing can help solve the problem,” says Natalie Bernstein, a psychologist and therapeutic life coach in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. “There’s an idea that forcing ourselves to think about a situation will lead to a solution.”

Rumination is often you replaying an event in your mind.

What’s anticipatory anxiety?

Anticipatory anxiety is when you experience gloom, dread, or stress when you think about something that hasn’t happened yet.

“Anticipatory anxiety lends itself to rumination quite easily,” says Bernstein. “Our brain can’t solve problems when we don’t know the issue, so we think that by considering all possible options, we will be prepared to handle any of them.”

Rumination can sometimes cause anxiety, though. Using the same example, you may experience a panic attack only from repeatedly anticipating it may happen. Your rumination may cause high levels of anxiety, which in turn may trigger a panic attack.

https://psychcentral.com/blog/how-to-stop-obsessive-thoughts

Out of all the issues I have, this one is the worst and hardest to change. It isn’t so much about negative thinking about myself that I do, but the negative thinking about the world around the people in it and me. I have a lot of resentment over this situation. I feel like so many people betrayed me, and it is a hard one to get over. It will take time, but I WILL get there, I have no doubts anymore. 

https://psychcentral.com/lib/cognitive-distortions-negative-thinking

What are cognitive distortions?

A cognitive distortion — and there are many — is an exaggerated pattern of thought that’s not based on facts. It consequently leads you to view things more negatively than they really are.

In other words, cognitive distortions are your mind convincing you to believe negative things about yourself and your world that are not necessarily true.

Everyone falls into cognitive distortions on occasion. It’s part of the human experience. This happens particularly when we’re feeling down.

But if you engage too frequently in negative thoughts, your mental health can take a hit.

Our thoughts have a great impact on how we feel and how we behave. When you treat these negative thoughts as facts, you may see yourself and act in a way based on faulty assumptions.

This could contribute to mental health conditions such as depression and anxiety.

Reversing cognitive distortions is often at the heart of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), among other types of psychotherapy.

You can learn to identify cognitive distortions so that you’ll know when your mind is playing tricks on you. Then you can reframe and redirect your thoughts so that they have less of a negative impact on your mood and behaviors.