I am sueing my employer for negligence, why do I feel so bad about it
Okay, this is a long one so buckle up!
I am sueing my employer for negligence, some of the details of this story won't be exact in fear of anyone from work seeing this and it affecting the lawsuit somehow.
In 2025 I was assaulted at work, I am a manager for a company who provides care in the community to adults with learning disabilities and mental health conditions etc I've done this for 10 years plus. The assualt was brutal, I was targetted by an individual (who had mental capacity) in my office space, a space where service users shouldn't have access due to a locked door policy. A staff member had left the main front door unlocked and he simply walked in and it escalated from there. I had my shirt ripped exposing me, punched repeatedly in the head and face, I was kicked in the knee and fell to the floor as I heard a crunch and my leg gave way, whilst on the floor he also tried to stomp on my face, I luckily deflected this with my arms and he stomped on my shoulder. There were 3 other staff present, one other was assaulted after me and the other two were not properly trained in appropriate physical intervention techniques for our site (they were agency staff). The 3 staff couldn't get him off me and I believe it's partly due to incorrect techniques being attempted during the assualt. Domt get me wrong, I'm forever grateful they were there and tried to get him off me but I do strongly believe that if the correct techniques were used the degree of injury caused may have been much less. The police were called and he was arrested, remanded and removed from our services entirely. He was found guilty this year following court attendance (but not criminally responsible) following a further psychiatry assessment being done whilst remanded. We are awaiting sentencing which is this month and likely to be a hospital treatment order.
I've been absent from work since the assault. I have significant damage in my knee, I've had a distal femoral osteotomy and lateral and medial meniscal repair surgery so far this year and I'm on a wait list for a second surgery to do acl reconstruction in the next 3-6 months which will be followed up with months of intense physiotherapy. I've suffered with PTSD, anxiety and depression since, ive been on long wait lists to start therapy, then once it started my therapist went absent for 2 month, I was given a new round of appointments with a new therapist this month. I additionally done another therapy (EMDR) for processing the assualt, this had to stop abruptly due to it destabilising my mental health further. So my physical and mental health are still not stable to allow me to work.
In the beginning my employer was supportive having regular well-being check in meetings, they did initially offer psychological therapies but nothing came of this so I pursued this myself. The second highest manager of the company said in his lifetime career it's the worst assault he's ever heard oof (and he worked in mental health hospitals). The support I was getting suddenly changed and the meetings were rephrased as capability meetings, I challenged this due to the policy being they could only pursue capability under a performance track not sickness and their own policy stated they should use the sickness absence policy for long term sickness. They then rephrased it as medical capability which I now feel they are trying to dismiss me under. I've had 3 occupational health assessments, the most recent being a month ago and stated no definitive return date due to how complex mental health is, but he estimated on physical injuries alone I'm looking at mid 2027 before a return is feasible.
Now, where the sueing comes in stems back to earlier this year where I had a meeting with my manager and his senior manager. This meeting was an opportunity for me to get feedback around the incident and lessons learned, as well as me express what I think needs to change as a result of it.
Im the meeting I essentially received no feedback, they simply said nothing I did was wrong and that I followed the protocols (call the police as he refused to leave upon request due to confidential information breaches from him being in there). I gave suggestions of various things to change such as 1. Changing the locking system for the door to the building to be more secure, 2. A plan to be implemented should someone enter again in future that involved locks being put on rooms that hold confidential information (files, paperwork, medications, finances etc ) and 3. All regular agency staff to be trained appropriatly.
The response I received was that they wouldn't be implementing anything I suggested and gave me the reason of we have to dynamically risk assess every situation and every situation is different. They also basically said I needed to decide if I could return to the job following what happened and if not it might be best to look at a different job.
I was extremely emotional in this meeting and tearful, I think more so at the disbelief of their response.
I came away feeling really down and upset feeling the whole thing was very unjust. This has affected my life massively, I've had reduced pay which overtime now stopped due to going past ssp 28 weeks, now claim benefits that aren't covering our monthly expenses with husbands wage so we've had to drastically change our outgoings and adjust best we can, my 3 year son probably wonders why mammy doesn't play the same anymore and why mammy is always sad, I try my hardest not to be and to be as normal as possible for him but it's hard. I reflected on the impact of it all, how it wasn't my fault and felt my employer was liable for negligence due to untrained staff present and also the staff member leaving the door unlocked (vicarious liability).
I also was frustrated at the responses in the last meeting and couldn't wrap my head around the fact that they just wont change anything. I asked for the minutes for the meeting to be told that there were none. I was livid. Every meeting is minuted normally by my manager and general good practice is for any meeting to be minuted. I know why they haven't, because of their response and kick myself every single time I think back to why I. didn't just minute it myself word for word.
So I pursued a lawsuit against them and got in touch with a law firm.
Since this, they've made my life hell. They've been trying their hardest to get me dismissed under medical capability (likely to reduce potential future payout of loss of earnings). They created issues with pay,.giving me huge anxiety month to month not knowing what was coming in. They've been tape recording meetings, using bullying and intimidation tactics and made false allegations toward me. Its an awful situation to be in and has only made my mental health worse.
I also have since found out that whilst I was on maternity leave the year prior to the assault a similar incident happened (to a lesser degree but still an assault) which shows there was forseeability of this type of incident happening with the same service user. There's also a long standing history of him trying to gain access to the building to protest his frustrations. My employer told me that what happened to me was unexpected, no one saw it coming and that it couldn't have been prevented. I completely disagree now I know more about what happened the year prior and they failed to implement anything after the first time it happened.
I have felt so bad and guilty since the day I pursued the lawsuit. Feeling like I've been somehow disloyal to a company I work for.
But still at the same time, non of this was my fault and I know I shouldn't feel bad for it. But I'm angry, I'm angry at how much it's disrupted my life, my well-being and my peace. I had fantastic work relationships with everyone, I was a well respected but approachable manager at work and felt I had good relationships with my senior managers too. After every thing thats happened I feel like the trust is gone, the relationships are soured and I don't know if il ever even work for them again.
So Reddit, should I feel bad about sueing my employer?