Why a toxic job can haunt you long after you quit

If you’ve ever left a bad job, the relief can be immediate from the minute you hit send on the resignation email. But the lasting effects from a toxic workplace aren’t always apparent straight away.

Sometimes, you settle into a new, better job with a lovely boss and supportive colleagues, only to find the effects of your previous job are lingering. Expecting a blow-up over a missed email. Anxiety because you’re 15 minutes late to your desk. Constant worry that you’re not doing enough, and what you’re doing isn’t good enough.

It can take more than a change of job to rewire your brain into recognising that these thoughts aren’t true.

“If work has felt physically or psychologically unsafe, your nervous system may register that as a threat, and that may contribute to being on high alert, feeling distressed or lacking in confidence,” says Dr Sara Schamborg, an HCPC-registered psychologist and trauma therapist, who specialises in working with people who have experienced workplace trauma.

“Although distance may help, handing in your notice and leaving that job does not necessarily process those experiences and, as such, the detrimental impact may be ongoing.”

In a survey of more than 2,000 employees by the employee engagement firm Oak Engage, 75%) of employees said they had experienced a toxic workplace culture. Problems included bullying, harassment, being belittled and being forced to work long hours. A separate poll by  Speak Out Revolution, a non-profit dedicated to breaking the culture of silence surrounding workplace harassment, found 70% of female survey respondents have experienced gaslighting at work – making it one of the most common forms of bullying.

For *Jane, who works in communications, it was her new boss who made her life a nightmare. “He piled work on me from hour one, so within 48 hours I was working late at night. 2am finishes were common, but he was never happy. I got told I was ‘f***ing slow’ and was told I was too corporate. He asked me where my personality was.”

After a few months, her manager outsourced a key part of her role – the reason why she had taken the job in the first place. “I only found out in a team meeting when he told everyone,” she says. “When I queried it, he said it was on me to come up with another way I could bring him value.”

The impact of the stress was almost immediate for Jane. Her hot flushes ramped up to multiple times an hour, as stress can exacerbate menopausal symptoms. She stopped sleeping and her hair started falling out. “I felt nauseous and as if there was a block of concrete on my chest,” she says. She ended up quitting the job after a year.

“Two years on, I am far better and in a good place – self-employed and working with lovely people. In some ways it’s helpful now, as I think if I can walk away from employment I can walk away from anything. But I’m just a tiny bit broken.”

One of the key reasons why these experiences have a lasting effect is because they change our brains. Research suggests that prolonged stress can make the amygdala, the part of the brain that detects threats, more sensitive, while weakening the functioning of the prefrontal cortex, which helps us think rationally and regulate our emotions. So, we’re more likely to become more anxious and hypervigilant – even when we’re no longer in the threatening environment.

Bullying at work can also reinforce deeply-held beliefs about ourselves, too. So if you’ve always struggled with self-confidence, being treated poorly by bosses or colleagues can deepen those insecurities, leading you to internalise the idea that you’re not good enough or worthy of respect.

“Beliefs such as ‘I am unsafe’, ‘I can’t trust others’, ‘I am alone’, or ‘I am not good enough’ may continue to be activated and impact your emotional wellbeing long after the original experience, sometimes for weeks, months or years afterwards,” says Schamborg.

Read more: What are the different types of burnout? The causes, symptoms and how to recover

(Unsplash/Milad Fakurian)

Trauma is often understood as experiencing an event that is severe or life-threatening, but traumatic events in the workplace can also be cumulative. “These are experiences that are not life-threatening per se, however, the build-up of distressing or harmful experiences over a period of time can equally have a detrimental impact on your mental health.”

Part of the problem is that the impact of harmful or traumatic workplace experiences is often downplayed. We’re told ‘it’s only work’ or that we should ‘just get over it’, which can make it harder to acknowledge and process what we’ve been through. So what can you do when the effects of a toxic workplace linger long after you’ve left?

“As a first step, it can be important to recognise and name your experiences for what they are and recognise the impact that these experiences have on you,” says Schamborg. “Trauma responses are commonly described as ‘normal responses to an abnormal situation’, and this statement may help to make sense of your responses and what you have been through.”

It’s also important to support your mind and body to feel safe again. If you find yourself spiralling over something at work – the ‘let’s have a chat’ email with no context – taking a minute to ground yourself can help. 

“Grounding can be done by taking a moment to slow down and connect with your breath, as well as by activating your five senses,” says Schamborg. “Notice what you can see around you, what you can touch or feel, and what you can hear, taste or smell.”

Cognitive behavioural therapy techniques can also help you challenge anxious thoughts. Take a step back and look at the facts of the situation, rather than assuming the worst. For example, nobody has said they're unhappy with your work, your boss has always treated you with respect, and previous catch-ups have been positive. Reminding yourself of this evidence can help you separate what's happening now from what happened in your previous workplace.

Finally, there is no shame in going to therapy to process bad experiences at work. We spend so much of our lives working, and how we are treated by our professional peers has a huge impact on how we see ourselves.

“If you keep feeling distressed or held back by your past experiences, therapy, such as EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing) therapy, may be an effective way to make sense of, and process, those experiences,” says Schamborg. “Therapy can help to reduce the intensity of distressing memories, whilst supporting you to strengthen positive beliefs about yourself.”

*Names have been changed to protect identities.

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