Feeling embarrassed after leaving a job
Istarted working at a very successful corporate company 3 months ago. After masking and being a people pleaser for years, I finally stopped doing so, and it’s been very liberating as I am my authentic self. I physically cannot mask anymore. I don’t do small talk, corporate speak or brown-nosing. My intention was to go to work, do my job and go home. Because of this I knew within the first week my manager did not like me. She was constantly passive aggressive towards me, I never knew what mood she would be in, and I walked on eggshells as I was being micromanaged. I also did not receive sufficient onboarding at the beginning of the job, which led to her constantly criticising my work, writing me up for asking questions and basically just picking on me.
My ADHD gets worse when I am stressed and in this case I was not only stressed but my mental health was getting progressively worse. The constant criticism and never feeling good enough really took a toll on me. I made a decision last week that I was going to send in my resignation. However, today I was called in by HR and they suggested a mutual separation (which clearly was something my manager wanted). I agreed immediately as I was on the same page. I was not upset at all. Perhaps a bit blindsided. I went back into the office to go collect my things, and there was a weird energy in the room. Everyone was dead quiet but I put it down to maybe overthinking. I cleared my desk and as I stood up to let everyone know I was leaving, it was apparent everyone on the team already knew. So my manager had told them prior without my knowledge. This spun me a bit and I was already feeling anxious. As I was packing my things, my manager was standing close behind me - almost watching to see that I left everything that belonged to the company (laptop, laptop charger) I have never in my life stolen anything so this is not something that would ever happen. Because I could feel her staring me down, I accidentally put the laptop in my bag and then realised what I was doing and apologised because my this point I felt panicked and anxious. This was a complete absent minded mistake. I had headache tablets in my bag which made noise as I lifted by bag up, this immediately made me feel like my manager and team thought I had drugs on me or whatever. I said my goodbyes to the team as my manager basically could not wait for me to get out of the door. The whole experience left me feeling completely anxiety ridden as I already struggle with OCD so things like this can make me struggle.
I drove home feeling upset about how my last interaction went before I left. As it is, the whole experience of working at the company left me feeling burnt out and depressed. But I did not show this when leaving, I was amicable and polite with everyone. I have reflected on why this interaction has affected me so much, and I think it’s because I wanted to seem strong and confident in that moment but my clumsiness and absent mindedness made me look weak and exposed. I’ve been feeling so embarrassed. How do I stop overthinking this?
Apologies if this post is really long, I am not in a great headspace but writing this down has already helped a bit.