Yes this guy sounds very disturbed (and disturbing) and you should completely disregard what he said but that’s not easy to do! I wouldn’t be surprised if he singled you out and lashed out more at you specifically bc he was jealous of and/or threatened by you (bc he knows you are more well respected in your job or bc he knows he’ll never be as successful as you are) and of course I’m totally just speculating here since I don’t know you or him but maybe also because you were actually kind to him. Sometimes people with mental health issues lash out more at those who are kind, friendly, pleasant and actually seem to care about them as kind of a defense mechanism. It doesn’t make sense to someone who is more logical/practical and not suffering from mental illness but I have seen that dynamic several times in my life, including w a family member I have who suffered a psychotic break and lashed out at others: he lashed out the most at people who were kindest/most understanding to him and didn’t really bother saying anything mean to those who are more standoffish and distant.

Anonymous wrote:If it keeps bugging you contact your employee assistance program to make a few appointments with a therapist to work through it.

New poster, came to say exactly this to the OP.

OP, it sounds like there are actually larger issues at play for you, totally apart from this guy and this email -- issues you admit you've been experiencing, like social issues since Covid isolation, getting older, etc. It's all right there in your post. Please talk to someone professional and objective! This sad, sick man's breakdown is causing collateral damage in you, but the issues you mention are ones about which many of us are concerned. If you don't have an EAP or don't want to use an EAP if there is one, get some counseling or therapy to work through this. It doesn't have to be years of therapy, just enough to get you back on an even keel after he knocked you sideways. Remember, you are getting help to talk about things you knew were in your mind before he wrote that email--this isn't really about him or his words at all.

I get it, OP. Like others here, I have a relative with mental illness who has at times written letters containing total fabrications of negative things I've said and done. No matter how much any of us says, "That's not true" to ourselves, it can still sting and cause us to doubt ourselves; that's just a normal human response, I think.

You are not alone in being this guy's target at your office; others reached out quickly to you out of concern for you, too, which is a GREAT positive on which you can focus.

OP here. Just wanted to say thank you for the responses. It really helped. I do think he might have felt specifically threatened by me for some reason, though it's hard to know why. My DH thinks the guy probably has an issue with women and was bothered by my level of seniority (even though I'm not his boss) at the company -- I am among the most senior members of the team and he was a relatively new hire, and there was likely something about that dynamic that bothered him.

I do think it came at an unusually vulnerable time for me -- I'm mid-40s, I've been juggling working and parenting young kids for the last 8 years, Covid threw me for a loop, and I've just been kind of trying to get my mojo back. So this isn't what I needed. But maybe if I can find a way to work through the feelings it's brought up, it will help me break through.

Anonymous wrote:OP, my sister has schizophrenia and she has said the most bizarre, hateful, vulgar things about people, sometimes to their face. This from someone who used to be kind and intelligent. She hears voices that say awful things about people and thinks people are conspiring against her. She has been fired from every job she's had because, at some point, she can't keep it bottled up inside and lashes out. Their brains are diseased. Please do not take it personally.

Pp again. Also, her memory and ability to reason is defective. She cannot tell the difference between truth and falsehoods. She might be telling the truth, partial truth, or a complete fabrication.

OP, my sister has schizophrenia and she has said the most bizarre, hateful, vulgar things about people, sometimes to their face. This from someone who used to be kind and intelligent. She hears voices that say awful things about people and thinks people are conspiring against her. She has been fired from every job she's had because, at some point, she can't keep it bottled up inside and lashes out. Their brains are diseased. Please do not take it personally.

Honey, he's crazy and everyone knows it. Move on! And be glad he doesn't find you attractice and isn't hitting on you!!

OP, sorry you went through this. What a disturbing and awful experience with a former colleague.

I was harassed by a client and my company had to cut ties. It was exhausting and hurtful.

I think it helps you talk it through in therapy and deal with the trauma. Know that his actions were hurtful and your other colleagues are supportive, but it is hard to move on because you feel violated and hurt. It will help me to move forward.

OP, I’ve been through this with both a mentally ill SIL and a former boss who, if mentally ill, kept it under wraps except to lash out at my appearance (she was a few years older than me and criticized my hair, skin, and fashion sense- it was a startup so I didn’t have a safe place to report this behavior).

It’s ok to admit that you are hurt, and it’s also ok to say you’re hurt even if you know someone is mentally ill and “it doesn’t count.” That part is a challenge for me, because everyone insisting that it’s just the rant of a mentally ill person invalidated my hurt feelings and the heightened sense of vulnerability these insults gave me. In some ways it hurts more, because the person with limited capacity for sanity used a bit of it to target you.

I don’t want you to feel like you have to run away, but in my case I did end up leaving my company. I realized that a place that could make space for my boss and her behavior was unhealthy in a lot of other ways and it helped me feel motivated to find a better situation. Haven’t managed to escape my SIL, though.

OP - I'll tell you what I've told my kids when they've been bullied: bullies attack the people that most threaten them and they are good at using language that hurts. In many cases, it's because the things they are saying are things they worry about themselves, and are just throwing their own insecurities at confident, capable people (that, in some weird way, make them feel smallest). Is that possible? This is not about YOU. This is about the BULLY.

"...many colleagues reached out to me directly to check on me and tell me they thought the email was crazy. My director and the COO met with me several times to tell me that they don't agree with anything he said and that I'm a valued member of the team."

When you are ruminating over this incident, re-read this. Their response to the crazy guy should be the only memory you maintain.

OP, this sounds like classic singling you out like that because he felt you were MORE appreciated by your co-workers and he was jealous of that. So he says a bunch of cr*p about you in some delusional hope he could make you less highly thought of. Because you are more highly thought of, HE hated being around you, dealing with, listening to you, BECAUSE he was jealous.

Remind yourself of that each time it pops into your head. "I'm so highly thought of that he focused on attacking me!" Take it as a compliment. F**k him.

My previous company had a similar employee who had a breakdown and posted a bunch of horrible stuff, some of it on a public slack channel. Some of it was terrible accusations HR was obligated to investigate.

Please don't take this person seriously and hold your head high. I assure you people dont think those things about you and recognize the other person is the crazy one.

OP, he was trying to hurt you and knew what to say to do it. It doesn’t make his words about you valid. I mean there are internet bloggers/influencers out there who are literally gorgeous and people in the comments will call them ugly. It’s such an easy insult to throw at any woman regardless of how she looks. And you know he was off base on so many comments because you have multiple coworkers coming to your defense to say they do value you and you are an important team member. That right there should be enough to confirm that his ramblings are without merit.

The only thing I would reflect on is that he somehow singled you out because you must have seemed like someone easy to pick on. Is there something about you that makes you vulnerable (I know age/sex discrimination is a thing and you can’t really change those characteristics about yourself). But if you think maybe you project low confidence in general or something else that made for easy pickings, perhaps you could explore that I therapy and find a way to rebuild confidence.

And I will add that even the most resilient person would be shaken by this. It sucks because presumably you need your job, so this attack is entertwined with your literal livelihood. You can’t just run away from it. I’m so sorry.

I recently saw some movie star talking about how she used to get so upset about awful stuff people said on line about her. Then she sort of came to a realization that these people had negativity that they are putting out for reasons that are unrelated to her (and are mostly very sad) but that isn’t her burden to carry. So she decided she was just not gojng to pick that up. She said “that’s not for me so I’m not accepting it.” Like a lousy gift someone tries to give you — you just leave it there and don’t take it. It’s not yours.

I don’t know if thinking about it this way will help at all.i can’t even remember which star it was but it was somebody that seems to attract a lot of really nasty online trolls.

Honestly I think the fact that he targeted you specifically, if anything, suggests you are not a non-entity at work. Think about it this way—no one gets more of that online sh-t than Taylor Swift. Or Oprah. Or Michelle Obama. Anne Hathaway at the top of career. For some reason these mentally ill men like to attack women that are beautiful and powerful and popular and say that they are ugly and bad at their jobs and no one really likes them. It is very predictable and very sad.

I’m really sorry that you had to go through this.

OP, what do you have control over in this situation? Definitely not the former co-worker or his crazy emails.

On a piece of paper:
List three things that you do well.
List three goals.
List three CONCRETE steps that you can do to meet those goals.

It doesn't have to be related to anything the crazy person said. Just get yourself moving forward and focusing that.