Remember the letter-writer who had ghosted his long-term girlfriend 10 years earlier and just learned she was about to become his new boss? Given the outrage of much of the internet over the letter, I didn’t expect to receive an update, and I’m grateful that he sent one in. Here it is.
I admit I wrote my original email in a state of panic. I was on my holidays when I found out and a friend of mine gave me your email. I did not realize my message would be fully replicated on your blog. I am sure you get tons of requests and I thought I would be lucky to get a reply within one of those short scenarios at max. By the time the blog was posted and I was returning to Philippines, my initial panic started to dissipate as I found out more about Sylvia’s situation. Just in time to discover the story going viral, both online and offline. I can say that in no way I expected that writing to a very popular but a niche professional blog would result in such Internet s*t storm. I am sorry for not engaging with your readers, but given the toxicity of many commentators, I did not seem much sense in doing it. I am still very much freaked out about the whole experience but since I promised to give you my update, here it is.
Those who blamed me for ruining Sylvia’s life for good were wrong. She has done very well for herself. She is married, with kids and her husband is originally from here. They relocated because of his business opportunity, not because she would be stalking me or would orchestrate this in some elaborate vendetta. It is a crazy coincidence but as some readers pointed out, our professional world can be very small.
I immediately reached out to Sylvia, along the lines of your kind advice and also offered to discuss the way forward in person. Here, I appreciate many useful comments from your readers on what to write. She did not get back to me. I was not sure she was still using her old email address and with a return to school day fast approaching, I re-sent the email to her new work email. I also dropped a short message to the HR, without providing full details. Next morning (Sunday!) I got a call from the chair of our board of overseers, asking me to meet him as soon as possible.
I met with him, together with Sylvia, the same day. As you can imagine, this meeting was incredibly embarrassing for me, personally and professionally. Fortunately, unlike some of your readers hope, they did not think the past failed relationship was a sackable offence. At the end, there is not that much interaction between the director and employees on daily basis. The chair was more worried about possible gossip and related implications for the organisation. Ours is an expensive enterprise, this is a conservative place and nobody wants any scandal. At the same time, they considered it was necessary – as they framed it – to put some measures in place to avoid possible problems in the future. I was also told in no uncertain terms that although the schedule for the year was already set, it was far more difficult to replace the director than an employee (me). I do not want to go into too much details but I found the proposed measures rather excessive. It would make my position unattainable, even in a short run. Therefore I resigned on the spot. My resignation was later accepted.
In a summary, as many of those self-righteous people on the Internet hoped, I came out of this with no job, no severance and no prospect for another job in this city. Obviously, I have to leave as I need to make a living. I will be shortly moving back home for several months to work as a substitute teacher, with an agency. I will see what next later. So I had my comeuppance. I am most certainly not asking for pity. I only wish there were not other individuals bearing the blunt of my immaturity in the past. (My partner cannot join me due to visa issue and family situation.)
I wrote back and asked if he’d share how Sylvia seemed, as well as what measures they’d proposed. He said:
I do not know how it was for Sylvia. I have not seen her since. She seemed fine. She was not gleeful, very matter of fact, saying it was possible to work together and etc. The chair did most of the talking. I found out later that her husband comes from a prominent family here, everyone knows them. Nepotism is prevalent in this culture and family status really matters. The chair knows them. I just do not understand why she had to get him involved. We could have tried to sort this out between us first, no need to go to the top immediately.
The measures included things like we are never to talk to each other without a third person present, all meetings documented, no discussion about her and the management with my colleagues, not even in watercooler chat, limit our interactions beyond the school, meaning no socialising for me. I do not understand how this could work. It would be very much out of character for me and my colleagues and friends would get suspicious. Although not presented at such, it felt very punitive.
As you said in your initial response, it was unlikely it would somehow work out. It is very difficult to come to terms with it. The Internet craze just added an extra bizzare layer to it.