About 15 years ago, I left one of only two jobs I ever had that offered a living wage and benefits. I didn’t choose to leave. My boss had a political agenda, and I became a target.
I was the office manager for a Fairfax County, Virginia, district supervisor. My position required work that others could not or would not do — such as serving as the interface between the office and the county IT team — and I consistently delivered results. Despite that, the supervisor fired me so he could hire the relative of a political supporter. I knew when I accepted the job offer that employment was “at the pleasure of the supervisor,” which meant he could send me on my way at any time, for any reason. I didn’t have an issue with why he terminated me, but how. It showed his true character when he justified his decision by making me the problem.
Instead of saying something like, “I owe a political favor, so I need to give your job to someone else. I’ll put in a good word for you at another county office,” he targeted me in a degrading and threatening way. This was apparently to make himself feel better about putting a single mother in such a bad position in the aftermath of the Great Recession.
The man ignored his chief of staff’s advice and turned what was supposed to be my positive annual review into a forty-minute fusillade of criticisms. These included retroactive rules, improvised grievances, and even blaming me for his marital problems. All the while, his chief of staff, sitting at the opposite end of the table, repeatedly signaled, “stop.” When our boss finally paused and noticed the time, he became angry that he was late for his next meeting. That was my fault, too. The upshot was that my employment would terminate in 4 months. I left the office shell-shocked.
When the new employee arrived, I was relegated to a desk in the back of the conference room, borrowed from the Department of Sanitation. After years of serving in the front office, I was banished to a punishment space.
I did not speak about this in my social circles at the time. The environment included people connected to politics, and the risk of being labeled a problem or a tattler was high. Sharing the truth would likely have jeopardized future opportunities in that and the adjacent county, or any in the political system. The relational context created a high probability that disclosure would trigger social and professional consequences, not resolution or justice.
The pattern of abuse extended beyond one individual. The supervisor’s actions signaled that performance and effort offered no protection. Anyone entering the same system would encounter similar risks because the environment rewarded loyalty to connections above all.
Despite the supervisor’s ill treatment, the staff gave me an extraordinary farewell. It showed me that they cared, and that pushed back against his abuse. They organized a party, pooled money to purchase a very generous gift certificate to a high-quality garden nursery, a carefully chosen potted azalea, and two bottles of expensive champagne. Most sipped politely and returned to work, but the staffer who received my position insisted we share the rest. In that tiny alcove, we laughed, cried, and hugged.
Although my boss never said another word about it, failed to thank me for my service, and was absent on the day of termination, the former district supervisor met with me. Dana apologized for his successor’s behavior, acknowledging that the office had tried to help him be a better human in the role.
From a Relational Neuroscience perspective, someone who behaves like my former boss—displacing blame, vilifying a competent employee to justify unethical decisions, and avoiding accountability—likely operates from a pattern rather than a one-time lapse. Patterns like these often reflect deeply ingrained relational strategies shaped by past experiences, power dynamics, and nervous system regulation. Recognition of this pattern is important. It is not the individuals subjected to these dynamics who are at fault, but the system itself and the way power is exercised within it.
I am now speaking about this experience because the immediate personal risk no longer exists, and because telling the truth of my lived experience is the only justice I have known. The goal is to highlight the recurring patterns and the structure of domination within this system. Observing the pattern allows others who were subjected to similar treatment to recognize that the behavior reflects the system, not personal failure.
Helping others see these patterns serves a function of accountability. It shifts attention from self-blame to understanding how relational and structural dynamics operate. The pattern includes arbitrary enforcement of authority, prioritization of personal networks, and systematic marginalization of those who demonstrate competence or independence. Observing and describing these dynamics contributes to clarity about risk and reduces the likelihood that people will internalize responsibility for personalized systemic harm.
