So many insane suggestions on this thread.

Here's the one you should take: Hire a reputation defender type company to bury it in the Google Results.

Here are the ones you should DEFINITELY ignore:
1. Starting a site about her.
2. Engage with her legally.
3. Change your name (wtf???)
4. Put any communication with her in writing, like an apology letter. No. Someone this psycho will use it against you.

OP, I also would have been annoyed at you/probably not have given you a good rec under these circumstances, however, for someone to be so hung up on this to create a website speaks more to how crazy they are. Hope ou find an option that works for you.

Anonymous wrote:I don’t have the money for a legal battle. My old boss is the type who would fight if I tried to go the legal route. She hates me. What I did involves her kids. I feel really bad about it and hate that version of myself. But I need to be able to move on from this.

Are there any ideas that don’t involve a lawsuit or pissing her off further? I want to apologize but it’s been so long and she won’t even agree to see me.

Let it go then. Move on. Use your middle name and last name when applying for jobs. Don't talk to her in any form, she could document it and who knows what. It's been a few years. She doesn't control the job market so you may be not getting jobs for other reasons.

I would just start using my middle name. Everything else sounds too difficult.

Anonymous wrote:A few years ago, I messed up badly at a job. I was young and dumb, and I made mistakes. The employer turned out to be a really vengeful person. She blasted what I did all over the internet and actually wrote a blog post about it. She also included screenshots of some text messages that we exchanged. My name is distinctive and that website is the first result in any google search about me. I have no proof, but I think it is costing me jobs.

What can I do? I have thought about suing her for defamation, but she has proof of everything she says. She also has a lot more money than me and hates me enough to fight it out in court. She refuses to take the website down.

Previous advice to create a site about her is spot on. You need negotiating leverage and that site is it.

People love a comeback story and they'll love your site.

If you don't write persuasively, hire someone on a task website to ghost write for you.

You want people reading your website to have the same reaction that just about everyone on this thread did: the old boss is off her rocker and has gone too far.

You can choose different narratives: the web site can be in the third person (never mind that most people will assume it's you). Or it can be you "telling your story". If the former, you can use a service that will register and maintain the web site anonymously, so she'll never know it's you. This will give you big leverage if she wants it taken down - she may think you have $$ money backing you from one of her other enemies. Let her own paranoia work to your advantage here. If the latter, just tell your story -it sounds persuasive and at least people doing the google search will get both sides.

Sounds like you gt what you deserved and actually haven't learned from your mistakes because you're more concerned with making sure no one knows what you did rather than making amends with the person you wronged ( and her children)!

Anonymous wrote:I don’t have the money for a legal battle. My old boss is the type who would fight if I tried to go the legal route. She hates me. What I did involves her kids. I feel really bad about it and hate that version of myself. But I need to be able to move on from this.

Are there any ideas that don’t involve a lawsuit or pissing her off further? I want to apologize but it’s been so long and she won’t even agree to see me.

Yes. They've been posted on this thread. You seem to be ignoring them.

Are you Susan Sarandons daughters old nanny??

I'm thinking you were her kids' caregiver -- did you sleep with her husband? steal from the family? say you were trained as a health nurse for her sick child?

Were you her nanny? That would explain the extreme reaction.

Were you her nanny? Are you trying to find work with kids now?

Anonymous wrote:I don’t have the money for a legal battle. My old boss is the type who would fight if I tried to go the legal route. She hates me. What I did involves her kids. I feel really bad about it and hate that version of myself. But I need to be able to move on from this.

Are there any ideas that don’t involve a lawsuit or pissing her off further? I want to apologize but it’s been so long and she won’t even agree to see me.

Yikes! Did you jeopardize her kids' safety?

I don’t have the money for a legal battle. My old boss is the type who would fight if I tried to go the legal route. She hates me. What I did involves her kids. I feel really bad about it and hate that version of myself. But I need to be able to move on from this.

Are there any ideas that don’t involve a lawsuit or pissing her off further? I want to apologize but it’s been so long and she won’t even agree to see me.

OK, I hired someone to re-do my floors. He told me he'd done lots of floors, but that was a lie. He did a terrible job on my floors and lied to me multiple times about why the floors looked so bad. Then he left and told me he'd fix everything, but didn't. I have his name and the name of his company. I could create a website and post photos of my floors (before and after) and post copies of the emails he sent me saying he'd fix my floors.

If I were to do that, what would that say about ME?

I had the floors redone by someone who knew what he was doing. I'm out several thousand dollars, and I'm pissed off, but I've also let it go. It was 3 years ago!! Life moves on.

I like the idea of creating a website about your former boss, OP, but I don't think stooping to her level makes you look good. If you say you've changed your ways, well that's good.

If the floor guy apologized to me and refunded my money, I'd respect him (he did neither, of course). I would still be mad about my floors, but I wouldn't hold a grudge against him.

Try apologizing, OP, try contacting the web host to see if your former boss's site violates their terms of use (very likely), and as a very last, final resort, change your name if you nothing else works and you can't get a job because of the things your former boss posted about you.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A few years ago, I messed up badly at a job. I was young and dumb, and I made mistakes. The employer turned out to be a really vengeful person. She blasted what I did all over the internet and actually wrote a blog post about it. She also included screenshots of some text messages that we exchanged. My name is distinctive and that website is the first result in any google search about me. I have no proof, but I think it is costing me jobs.

What can I do? I have thought about suing her for defamation, but she has proof of everything she says. She also has a lot more money than me and hates me enough to fight it out in court. She refuses to take the website down.

I agree with the other PP who suggested apologizing. Not only apologizing but owning up to what you did, and recognizing how it negatively affected her.

I know this is going to be difficult to do, and make you feel uncomfortable but you would be surprised how many people will forgive the wrong-doer after a heart-felt apology. And you must do it face to face. it's really hard to maintain that same level of resentment when you're the person who is apologizing to you is sitting 5 feet away from you.

If that doesn't work, then go to Step 2, the legal route. Good luck OP.

Do NOT apologize in writing