Here’s how I see it, and I’ll go from the standpoint of someone who has a health issue (diabetes) and who has worked in a large corporate environment for a female supervisor who was always digging for dirt on her employees. This was a large company and a VERY political work environment, and I am not a political person…I’m a roll up my sleeves and get the work done, mind your own business and don’t try to cause trouble person. In these political environments it’s less about what you know than who you know…it’s about finding the right people to do your work through, it’s about using the right people as resources to accomplish your personal goals. I’ve preferred smaller companies where you do the work because it needs to be done, you figure it out as you go along, you look for better ways, and don’t necessarily follow the process or the path because it’s there. So, I was CONSTANTLY at odds with my supervisor. I felt as though she’d communicate her objectives to me for what she’d want me to do in a way that I’d go into it thinking, I need to get from point a to point b, and when I’d deliver point b, I’d find out that she had this complex ideal of how things should have been done, who should have been involved at what steps, etc…like she was very specific in her desires for how to do things, but not specific enough to actually try to communicate them to me, and therefore I never lived up to her expectations. She actually made me doubt my own abilities, and I at one point pretty much decided to reveal to her that I was diabetic, and that perhaps some of my problems in not necessarily understanding her direction might be due to a sort of mind fog, in hopes that maybe I’d be able to persuade her to be more specific about things if they were of great importance to her because this “condition” maybe made it harder for me to read between the lines. In a way, I kind of used it, because I know that a large company like that would not terminate me because I have a disease…that would be crazy.
Long and short, I think in that setting, I did not have one major concern that I do have when I work for smaller employers. You see, with a smaller employer, it’s a pretty big financial burden to offer health care to their employees. And often they are going to go with age tiered plans and the goal is for the insurer to make money. If you have a person who has diabetes, who is going to the doctor 4 times a year, and is on several expensive medications, I am getting my money’s worth out of my insurance plan, but it’s making the plan less profitable for the insurance company…so they have to raise their rates, or offer a different type of plan to compensate. And a smaller employer which has to keep a tight reign on the bottom line can see a person like me as a liability, someone who is costing them several thousand extra dollars per year over and above my salary because of the health care piece of the puzzle. So that’s one reason, particularly in a smaller employer why I would NEVER confide this to any co-worker, even one I trusted.
I guess however, in a setting like what you describe, it’s not necessarily a mistake. However you should tell yourself two things. #1, it doesn’t matter IF this other person shares your malady, you HAVE to assume that she told your boss…she may not have, but you HAVE to assume she did, it’s just a fact of life, particularly in the type of environment where there are enough politics to allow a person to be on the lookout for dirt on her employees, that any employee will share whatever information they have which might be of use to the person who can give them (or recommend them for) a promotion (or at least see that they keep their jobs when others don’t in this economic circumstance). #2, you can assume that now that they know you have BPD, they will not use that as a cause to get rid of you, but if they want to get rid of you, regardless, they will find a way. In most states now, employment is considered “at will” which means you can quit and they can let you go for basically any reason as long as it doesn’t violate some law (such as the Americans with Disabilities Act). Basically though, if you have any performance issues, or if there is ANY reason your boss may simply wish to get rid of you, learning that you have BPD could be the straw for her. It could be that one thing that she sees as a liability, perhaps she’ll be able to construct in her head a hypothetical about how this could impact your performance in a way that is not in line with the corporate objectives. And if that’s the case, your supervisor will make sure she has dotted all her i’s and crossed all her t’s before she makes her move.
Now maybe she doesn’t hate you, but doesn’t want you in her department, such was the situation I encountered. She might work to get you transferred to a different department if you work for a company which has a large enough structure to do so. In my case however my supervisor (even though I had take a HUGE pay cut and title cut from my previous position and made a huge leap afterwards to an environment where my boss and the owner of the company thought I did a magnificent job) felt that maybe I was “under-qualified” and would have perhaps looked into demoting me or getting me transferred to a lower level position, which was not feasible and was insulting. I firmly contend that she was the problem, not I but she would not accept or act on the things I told her where were sabotaging my ability to succeed, instead she chose to point fingers and place blame and take actions which just made the situation worse. In my case, when they restructured the department, my position was eliminated…this way she did not have to find a way to let me go without me being able to claim discrimination. Had I not said something, it is POSSIBLE that she might have decided to terminate me or demote me or something else…maybe not, maybe it never entered into it, and I have no idea if she felt more or less like trying to “coach” me in the right direction after I confided in her…I could never really read her.
But I do know this….because people can be prejudiced, because chronic diseases can cost companies money through lowered performance and higher insurance costs, and because an employer can get rid of you at any time, it’s best NOT to share these details with your employer. There’s a reason there are privacy acts in place to keep insurers from sharing your medical records with your employer after all. But on the flipside, if it comes up that your employer does find out, that is where the ADA comes in. Now, if your employer fires you for what they say is poor performance or “lays you off” as part of a “restructuring”, it’s a pretty hard thing to prove that the “real reason” you were let go was because of your illness. And the only thing you really can do is gather as much data as you can.
What I would do if I were you is this. First I would educate myself as much as possible on the ADA, try to really understand it so that you can discuss it. Next I would work on documenting examples of ways in which your boss has gathered intel and ways in which she has used it against you and co-workers who also work for her. Then schedule a CONFIDENTIAL meeting with HR when you have enough information so that you can create a narrative which touches on the main points…1) your boss gathers and uses intel against her employees as evidenced by the following examples, 2) you have reason to believe that she has been made aware of a chronic condition you have, and 3) it makes you uncomfortable knowing 1 and 2 in light of what the ADA has to say about this type of situation, so you wanted to make sure to document your concerns, in case it should ever come up. In this way, you can make the guardians of policy and human actions in your company aware of the fact that you will not be a person who simply rolls over if you are wronged. Do not approach it in an accusatory, but rather a cautious manner, making clear that you are simply trying to make sure you document your concerns in case it should ever become necessary for you to do so.
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