Words by Jane Phipps
When I was little, my dad’s right leg would start to twitch before he started his verbal tirade. It was the warning sign, the split second between safety and storm. I learned to read that twitch like a weather forecast. I learned when to go quiet, when to disappear, when to make myself small.
I didn’t know that wasn’t normal. I thought every child lived on alert, scanning for danger in their own home. I thought walking on eggshells was what families did.
At school I was anxious but determined. If I couldn’t win affection, I could at least win approval. I became the high-achieving child, the perfectionist, the peacemaker. I did everything “right,” hoping to avoid criticism. My dad would take credit for my achievements, telling people he’d helped me with my homework when he hadn’t lifted a finger. What mattered to him was that the light stayed on him. I didn’t realise then that this would become the pattern of my adult life, other people taking credit for my work while I stood quietly in the shadows, grateful just to avoid conflict.
When I entered the workforce, I was competent, driven, and loyal. I was also completely unguarded. I didn’t recognise the signs of narcissism or bullying because they felt so familiar. The controlling boss who rewrote my reports and presented them as his own. The executive who alternated between charm and cruelty. The colleague who used silence as punishment. I told myself these were just “strong personalities.” I’d learned long ago that survival meant appeasement, not confrontation.
Looking back, I can see how I became the perfect employee for a narcissistic workplace. I worked harder than anyone. I said yes when I wanted to say no. I cleaned up other people’s messes and apologised for things that weren’t my fault. I wore my anxiety like invisible armour and called it professionalism.
Yet, underneath the competence was a constant hum of self-doubt. My father had body-shamed me from childhood, telling me I’d never be successful. Those words lingered long after he stopped saying them. In every performance review, every missed promotion, I heard the echo of “not good enough.” I convinced myself that leadership belonged to those who looked the part, not those who quietly held everything together behind the scenes.
The breaking point came in my fifties, when I found myself once again working under a boss who thrived on control and put ego over purpose. By then I was exhausted and questioning everything. I remember sitting on the tram one morning, tears in my eyes, unable to make myself get off at my stop. That’s when I finally sought help.
My new therapist listened quietly as I described my childhood and my work life. When I finished, she said something that changed everything: “Jane, it’s abuse.”
That word landed in my body like truth. Abuse. It was both devastating and freeing. For the first time, the pattern made sense. The fear, perfectionism and people-pleasing weren’t personality flaws; they were survival strategies. My nervous system had been trained to endure emotional warfare.
Naming it allowed me to begin unlearning it. I stopped trying to fix broken systems by working harder. I stopped mistaking control for competence and silence for strength. I began to set boundaries, to speak up, to recognise manipulation for what it was. Slowly, I started to live and lead from the heart, not from fear.
When I think back to that anxious little girl watching her father’s leg twitch, I wish I could tell her this: you are not the cause of other people’s emotional pain. You don’t have to earn love or acceptance by performing or proving. You deserve safety, not because you’re perfect, but because you exist.
Many people carry invisible histories like mine. They move through workplaces believing they’re too sensitive, when in fact they’re simply trauma aware. They sense the danger in narcissistic and toxic cultures long before others do. To them I want to say: your instincts are not weaknesses. They’re wisdom born of survival.
Healing doesn’t mean erasing the past. It means choosing differently, over and over, until peace feels as natural as anxiety once did. I still have moments when my body braces for conflict that isn’t coming, when a raised voice sends me spiralling. However, now I know that it is a memory, not a warning.
My dad never learned to look inward. I did. And that’s how the cycle breaks.
Pain taught me how to survive. Compassion taught me how to live.
