Work anxiety - what to do?

Hi all

First post - sorry for the length. Bit of background, I’ve suffered from anxiety and depression to varying degrees since I was 11. due to a range of problems at previous workplaces such as bullying, fired for made up reasons, sexual harassment etc I have a lot of work place anxiety. When I’m bad I can take a comment from someone the wrong way and end up spiralling and hiding in the toilets crying my eyes out in fear that I will lose my job because I’m not good enough then I will get a bad reference and I will never work again, so I’ll have no income so my husband will leave me and I will be living on the streets (tad dramatic I know... such fun living with this brain)

My current role was amazing for many years. Supportive team and manager who I felt I could speak to about these things. Unfortunately the situation changed and things kept happening to make my anxiety very bad. For example I had pressures to come into the office when I had my CBT so I had to put that on hold and never got to finish addressing my workplace anxiety. Additionally there was increased pressure with no recognition making me feel like I was drowning. There was some other things I don’t want to go into. My husband was adamant I have to leave. And I’m pleased he gave me the strength to realise I could.

So I’ve got a new job lined up I am very excited about. I also have a long break before so I can focus on CBT and recovering my brain. But I have a long notice period to work before then (longer than normal 4 weeks). My concern (and why I’m writing this) is that the environment where I work makes me feel very poorly, so how can I work in this notice period. It’s not a toxic environment. But after what’s happened (without wanting to say too much) I’ve got many negative connotations about the place and leave feeling mentally exhausted. I’ve taken to working from home a lot to avoid it. I’ve got no problem being productive when I’m at home + have been allowed in the past to work from home weeks at a time when my anxiety’s bad. I keep in regular contact with colleagues via calls etc. But now I’m in a spiral of I can’t face being in the office -> I’ll work from home -> wait, now I’m working from home do they think I’m taking the piss -> will this go in my reference? -> if they put this in my reference my job offer will get redacted -> I will never be able to get a job ever again in this field because of my bad reference -> I won’t be able to earn money -> my husband will leave me, my mum will hate me and I’ll be living on the streets.

I know the best thing to do would be to ‘suck it up’ and head into the office. But as we’re all aware ‘sucking it up’ sometimes isn’t possible when you have the blocker of mental illness making simple things like having a shower before work impossible... but then I end up feeling bad anyway scared I’ll lose my new job before I even start. I’m not sure what to do? I know with how I’m feeling I could go to my gp today and get signed off - but I definitely don’t want to do that!!! Should I speak about this to my current manager? What would i even say? Would he think I was lying and being lazy? Has anyone else had to work a notice period at a job which has made them ill?

Hi,
that's a lot of stress you've got going on. Anxiety makes us think about things in ways which aren't always helpful which then leads to more anxiety etc
You've obviously identified your catastrophic thinking, what might be helpful now would be to write these things down but with a more realistic alternative. For example, 'they might this in my reference?' = 'hang on a minute, I don't think previous employers are allowed to give personal opinions about health conditions in references. Even if they did everyone gets ill and if future employers only hired healthy people they would soon have no work force!'

With regards to working the notice period, I don't see any problem with you working this from home unless they've said you can't. It seems to me like you're trying to mind read what your colleagues/bosses think when in actual fact they don't care if you work from home or in the office as long as you get the work done which you seem to do.

Best wishes