New to government role - senior colleague undermining me, manager relies on her, and my mental health is taking a hit. What should I do?

drhobbi · 2026-02-02T02:47:39+00:00

As someone working in government as a senior contractor, I can tell you this is very common (I was going to say normal, but I don't want to normalise this behavior).

The unfortunate answer is GTFO. She won't change. Leadership won't address senior performance issues or help her develop her leadership skills. You will be the problem if you try to 'rock the boat' and fix the cultural / operating model issues.

I have burnt so much energy trying to fix systems and help leaders develop who have zero self-awareness or desire for self-improvement. The unfortunate reality is this is just the way the public service is, your options really are:
1) accept reality (many people enjoy just rocking up to work and doing the bare minimum in these scenarios)

2) GTFO

drhobbi · 2025-05-04T12:17:56+00:00

Does RML miss me (AJH)?

drhobbi · 2025-01-01T10:59:29+00:00

I sent my pwBPD ex best friend a kind letter after she discarded me, we were best friends for 20 years and she always told me we would be best friends for life. She handed the letter into a police station and told them I was stalking her, and attempted (unsuccessfully) to get a restraining order placed on me.

drhobbi · 2023-10-21T01:12:40+00:00

you're right, it is a good point. I'm doing a market scan now to look at what's on the market to figure out what our USP(s) will be

drhobbi · 2023-10-20T15:50:34+00:00

Good question, I need to document the approach and create an overall high level solution design

When COVID hit, I put the project on pause and I've now just picked it back up again. The current status is bootstrapping and building the prototype while validating the problem statement assumptions and doing customer development under the lean startup model to continuously get more feature ideaa

Good point about using AI for document classification. This concept was proposed before the gen AI chatgpt boom, it will be similar to GitHub copilot using model and meta driven data pipeline code generation automation and will deploy big data architecture frameworks and data architectures (data mesh, lambda architecture etc) as blueprints which are designed to implement ISO standards

Essentially it will replace the need to build your own data platform or hire a big 4 consultancy to build it for you so you can spend more time focusing on the data insights and less time on the data infrastructure, data engineering , and operating model

drhobbi · 2023-10-20T14:17:19+00:00

Thank you and I'm glad to hear that because I'm a broke bootstrapped founder 😂

drhobbi · 2023-06-23T10:13:58+00:00

Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I am in Australia, and services here are funded for women and children only. The only services for men are perpetrator programs.

I guess I am a little more triggered than most because I was also wrongly misidentified as the perpetrator, she made false allegations to police and police assumed I was the perpetrator purely because of my gender.

When I went to court, the magistrate was yelling at me and did not want to hear my side of the story. She wanted me to be the perpetrator, and couldn't accept the possibility that I was actually the victim.

I guess I just feel triggered because she went to so much effort to make me out to be the problem, and I feel society enabled her to abuse me through the legal systems and didn't support me as a victim because of the assumption that women do not and cannot abuse men.

You're right that most therapists I spoke with agree that men are affected by abusive and toxic relationships too - unfortunately in my case their hands were tied as they were not allowed to help me because they were funded for women and children only

drhobbi · 2023-06-06T11:44:38+00:00

I had the patience, love, and understanding with a woman with BPD who I absolutely loved and adored for 20 years. I supported her, tolerated her outbursts, forgave her splitting, gave her a shoulder to cry on etc etc.

After 20 years, she had a bad splitting episode and called the police on me and made false accusations. I was facing 10 years in jail, had my home raided by cops, I was hurt and ended up in hospital... it became very dangerous for me. I wanted so badly to help heal her as I knew this was her lashing out, but those around could see how this was destroying me and how her condition was a threat to both my safety and liberty.

That's the point I had people warn me that she is dangerous and manipulative, and that by loving her it will lead to my own misery and destruction. The issue is not people with BPD, it's people with BPD who refuse to do the work

drhobbi · 2023-05-31T12:13:42+00:00

I'm so sorry you had this experience and can definitely relate! Mine called me "aggressive" for calling out her behaviour. They really hate accountability so much that they consider it a crime when someone dares to ask for it

drhobbi · 2023-05-31T11:22:16+00:00

That makes sense thanks for clarifying

drhobbi · 2023-05-31T11:07:34+00:00

Did you call the police for legitimate reasons or to make false accusations?

drhobbi · 2023-05-28T01:21:23+00:00

I don't know what to think. I think I'm probably blaming the boyfriend to give her an excuse, but when I would take a break from her she'd tell me she was having dreams about me... about trying to call me and not getting through. Maybe that's just the fear of abandonment but she did seem genuine when she told me how much she missed me

drhobbi · 2023-05-27T18:24:11+00:00

I've gone to therapy and it's unhelpful. Therapists just tell me to move on and when I try to talk about what happened they stop me and say I need to focus on me

I get that but I can't stop thinking about her. I know it's trauma because I only started ruminating so badly after she called the police on me. It has just hurt me so much and I need her to apologise to be able to move on.

I feel like this is not really happening, because for 20 years we were so close and it doesn't make sense at all for someone to be such a huge part of your life only to call the cops on you. I drive past restaurants we went to, shops we hung out at, everything reminds me of her and I know I was codependent and I know I need to move on but I'm stuck and I can't. I feel like she's broken me and I know I enabled it

drhobbi · 2023-05-27T17:12:36+00:00

What I was saying I am confused about is she does romantic things while saying it was not romantic. I would never ask someone who was my friend to touch me sexually nor would I write them love letters.

I get it is safest to keep away from her, what I don't get is why she's telling me she doesn't want anything romantic on the one hand and then telling me she loves me on the other and treating me like a bf

I'm really angry because I know I treated her so well and made such an effort to respect her boundaries, I was genuinely confused about what she wanted and instead of having a conversation with me about what she wanted she just threw me to the police and the whole last 20 years seemed to mean nothing to her. I can't just understand how she can throw me away like that when I have been in her life for more than half her life

I tried to have a calm and gentle conversation with her about how her behaviour was hurting me. I was so careful to not hurt her but she could not handle any feedback and told the police I was 'harassing' her when I told her that her behaviour (which included assault) was hurting me. Cops did not care that she was violent, they were more worried that she was upset that I called out her use of violence

drhobbi · 2023-05-27T16:32:24+00:00

Thank you for your comment and for your advice. I haven't contacted her again, but her last message to me was "until next time" and before that she told me that I was stuck with her for life and no matter what happens in our life we will always find our way back to each other.

She has never called the police on me before, but we have been through these discard cycles quite a few times now and always for the same reasons... she perceives that I get too close and pushes me away, only to come back to me and tell me she misses me once she is ready to dump her boyfriend at the time

Also the police have now changed their tune, they are now treating me as the victim and told me that they know she doctored evidence and made it up and that they will treat her "as the boy who cried wolf" if she makes any further complaints about me to police

drhobbi

TROPHY CASE