I’ll start off by indicating that I don’t get any kind of help for my anxiety disorder. I prefer to manage it on my own with meditation, exercise, and yoga. I get by, but these techniques don’t work 100% of the time.
Other background: I am a scientist, a chemist specifically, and I frequently work in proprietary information.
Today, I was discussing an upcoming project with my manager, and it was something I had done work on at my previous job (albeit in a different context). I said something like, “Yeah, I’ve worked with these types of materials before,” and indicated some of the issues that came up. My manager asked if I remembered the material compositions or the company we sourced them from, and I said no, but my previous boss would probably be able to point us in the right direction. It was decided that I would give my old boss a call and see if there was anything he could provide in terms of information. Keep in mind, here, I’m not looking for proprietary info. I just wanted to know companies that could help us and, if it could be disclosed, what the material compositions were.
So I call, and when he picks up, we exchange greetings, talk a little about how things have been since I left, and I ask him about the materials compositions. He told me the company we had used, indicated we used some listed on their website and had them make custom ones, which we proprietary. I told him I understood and thanked him for pointing me towards the company, wished him well, and hung up.
Since the call, I am having these insane visions of him deciding to take legal action against me for asking about it (even though I didn’t ask him to disclose anything sensitive), or of him saying, “Huh, I just got off the phone with Andrea, and she asked about ____” and the person I worked with under him laughing about it and telling stories about how much she thought I sucked at the position and that, by the end of the day, I’m going to be the laughing stock of this company I left just over a year ago for asking a question of a former boss.
When I write it out like this, I realize the whole thing sounds super stupid; the things I’m worried about are fantastical in nature, and are unlikely to occur, but I can’t un-convince myself that they’re going to happen.
Sorry for the exceedingly long rant. I just needed to write this somewhere.