Brazil toxic workplace erodes worker self-confidence

The author, Dr. Sarah Davies, a counseling psychologist based in London, describes how a toxic workplace environment led her to doubt her own abilities and self-worth. She recounts feeling anxious every Sunday evening before the work week began and experiencing physical reactions, such as a tight chest, when certain emails arrived. Before meetings, she would rehearse her words repeatedly to avoid saying something wrong.

At the time, she blamed herself for these reactions, believing she needed to be tougher and more resilient. She assumed that because others seemed to manage the environment, the problem was her. She did not immediately recognize how deeply the workplace was affecting her sense of self.

From the outside, the organization appeared respected, and the leadership was admired. The person at the center of her stress was charismatic and highly regarded by others, which made it harder for her to trust her own experience. There was no obvious bullying or shouting. Instead, the harm came from a slow accumulation of smaller incidents: conversations that left her feeling ashamed, criticism disguised as advice, and moments of confusion where she questioned her own understanding.

She describes an inconsistent environment where she was sometimes praised warmly and other times ignored or subtly undermined. Team dynamics left her feeling paranoid and excluded. She became more careful, accommodating, and self-critical, believing that if she communicated perfectly and performed well enough, things would improve.

Eventually, she lost trust in herself. She second-guessed simple decisions, apologized constantly, and became emotionally exhausted from monitoring others’ moods to avoid conflict. During a team meeting, she had a realization that her work environment replicated her home environment growing up. She saw the charismatic boss as a narcissist surrounded by enablers who minimized or excused the toxic behavior. She identified this as narcissistic abuse in the workplace.

Looking back, she observes that unhealthy environments condition people to disconnect from their own instincts. People become focused on keeping the peace, pleasing others, or avoiding criticism. The turning point for her came when a friend asked if she felt safe at work. She was surprised by the question because she had never considered emotional safety at work before. She had assumed professionalism meant tolerating discomfort and pushing through.

She realized she did not feel able to speak openly without consequences, did not feel comfortable making mistakes, and did not feel calm or secure. Everyone competed for the approval of the boss, which she now sees was used strategically. Admitting this was painful, but it was the beginning of change. She stopped seeing her anxiety as a personal failure and started recognizing it as a response to an environment that kept her in self-doubt.

Healing took time. She worked to rebuild confidence and reconnect with her own voice. She stopped minimizing her experience and stopped blaming herself for being affected by it. After she left the job, she felt almost instant relief and a quick return of her confidence and self-trust. She understood that her reaction was an understandable response to a toxic situation with narcissistic dynamics.

Dr. Davies notes that many people carry workplace experiences they have not fully acknowledged because the harm does not always look dramatic from the outside. Sometimes it looks like slowly becoming smaller, quieter, and more uncertain of yourself. Professional experience should increase confidence, not diminish it. She adds that it is not uncommon for people to find themselves in familiar dynamics at work, but what feels familiar is not necessarily healthy.

She offers a message to those who recognize themselves in this experience: being affected by an unhealthy environment does not make a person weak. Humans are deeply impacted by the spaces and relationships they spend their lives in. The first step toward healing can be allowing yourself to tell the truth about what those spaces or situations have done to you.

Dr. Sarah Davies is a chartered counseling psychologist and trauma therapist based in London, UK. She is the author of several self-help guides for recovery from narcissistic abuse and toxic relationships, including “How to Leave A Narcissist… For Good,” “Raised By Narcissists,” and “Narcissists At Work.”