Oversharing, Part 1 – Dealing with Insanity & Manipulation

I once knew someone who liked to talk about her life a lot. It was interesting, because her life was crazy. She would tell me things that I would never dream of telling another person, but I was a captive audience and really had no choice. What this woman did was very different though. It took me a little while to figure it out, but she would bait you with her life. Give you just enough to make any normal person ask, “And then what?” She wanted people to be interested and ask her about things. It made her feel important and needed and I know now that those were things she was desperate for.

But, like I said, it took me a while to figure this all out. Along with her need to share she had a need to know. Just as much as she could. Because (never forget it) knowledge is power. Or can be if you know how to wield it. (However, knowledge does NOT = wisdom. I think that’s important to note.) She was a keen manipulator and almost brilliant at what she was doing. Or maybe I just keep telling myself that because I fell into her trap and couldn’t pull myself out for months. Either way, she managed to manipulate me into sharing just enough of my life with her that she began playing all kinds of mind games. Asking backhanded questions to try and make me doubt myself and my decisions. I will admit that I gave her too much to work with. In the beginning of our working relationship I imagined that I would be making a new “work friend.” You know, the kind that you wouldn’t necessarily hang out with outside of work, but that you can be nice and friendly with from 8 to 5. I’ve had plenty of those. Some of them turned into great outside-of-work friendships. Not all, and I wasn’t expecting it with this person. It was easy to see from the start that her life was too chaotic (and sometimes dangerous) to invite into my own, but you’d better believe that she tried. Over and over to edge her way in. Hinting at being invited over. Asking me if I had any plans on a certain day before telling me why she wanted to know.

Her behavior became more and more erratic, to the point that I dreaded going to work every day. One day in February my nervous system decided it had had enough. I had a full-blown panic attack at work. It was awful. The most frightening thing that has ever happened to me. And when the people I was close to found out what had happened that day, they all had the same reaction — it was her. It was no secret that she’d been driving me crazy for months at this point, but I had been trying to keep quiet and not let things get to me. I never went to a supervisor about this person when I should have. Because the behavior she exhibited was inappropriate for a place of business at the very least. And some of it was downright insane.

To this day, I am pretty certain that she believes I am the reason she lost her job. She never asked me and I have not spoken to her since that day, but if she had asked I would be able to tell her that I had nothing to do with it. It was surprising, actually. I had reached the point where I thought I might have to quit my job to preserve my nerves (I was getting married in 4 months and the work situation was only making things worse). I was glad it didn’t come to that. Though I don’t feel like it’s appropriate to talk about the details surrounding what happened then, what I can tell you is that it wasn’t me. And for that I was so grateful.

Still, that didn’t stop her from blogging that she would “have the last laugh.” I’m not sure if it’s connected, but I would not be surprised…a few days after that blog post went up, my car and house were egged at close range. We took pictures and after discussing it with my dad (whose first reaction was to think that it was her) called the police. Points to note: 1) No one else in the neighborhood was vandalized, 2) It was done with some pretty extreme stealth (I wake at the smallest sound), 3) The person was at very close range, 4) The eggs that hit the house were thrown from the small area between the front of my car at the garage door. The police officer told us that it did not look like the work of kids because of all those reasons. It wasn’t done from a car. Someone got out of their car (in all likelihood, parked away from the  house and walked up to our yard), walked into our yard and within a few feet of my car, and started pelting.

The first thing she asked was if there was anyone who was angry at me. I immediately told her about the former co-worker and what I had seen on her blog. She instructed me to print that off and keep it, then to watch and see if she ever posted anything else about it. Something about those two things being bookends around what had happened — one a threatening message and, if it ever followed, a post indicating she had exacted her revenge. After that, it would be up to her to prove that she hadn’t done it. I had no idea it would work that way. The officer asked for her name, description, address…all that jazz. And I gave her what I knew. It’s on record. There’s a police report. I was not going to lie down and let this person, whoever did it, walk all over me.

Maybe she’s reading this. I don’t know. I had most of the IP addresses she had visited my blog from flagged and I should know whenever she comes by. But I’m pretty sure now that she is using her phone to access it, which is ridiculously troublesome to try to figure out. Maybe this wasn’t the wisest thing to post. It could cause me more problems. I guess we’ll see.

And maybe you don’t see how this relates to oversharing on blogs. Let me explain. This experience taught me everything I know about oversharing and its dangers. I shared more with an unstable individual than I ever should have. I should have known better. The whole experience brought light to what I had heard people complain about others doing on their blogs. The point is that you don’t know who you are giving the information to. You don’t know what they are capable of doing with it. You don’t know what their intentions are or how something you may view as an innocent aspect of your life or personality can fuel their insanity. You don’t know what it can spark in them. What you have to decide for yourself is how much is too much? What parts of your life are you willing to turn over to the wolfpack? What we do as bloggers is serve up our lives, opinions, sometimes even our families (bad move) for dinner. You can dish it up however you please, make it pretty with pictures and flowery language, contests and prizes and all kinds of table decorations like that. But the truth of the matter is that it’s a free-for-all. You aren’t sending out personal invitations to your dinner party. You’re opening up the front door and yelling, “Come on in!”

Part 2 coming soon.

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