Previous employer caused extreme mental health issues

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(TLDR; Company used my personal text message against me which led to serious mental health decline).

I spent years as a residential youth worker. Anyone who has done this job knows that you are in for some extraordinarily difficult times.

On one very challegning shift I sent a quick text to a co-worker from my personal phone to his personal phone expressing a small amount of frustration about the youths I was looking after.

I did not swear, threaten the kids, or anything crazy. It was literally just a very minor vent to my co-worker stating, "These kids are stressing me out".

A short time after this text message I made a minor breach of the Code of Conduct by leaving the work PC on and a youth gained access.

The next worker on shift was the co-worker I sent the venting text message to. The youth told my co-worker he got on the work PC, so my co-worker reported me, which is fair enough. I was called in for a meeting and I 100% accepted that I made a mistake by accidentally leaving the PC on.

The HR lady proceeded to ask me what my text message was about. I was quite stunned since the message had absolutely nothing to do with PC being left unlocked, wasn't in any way a breach of the Code of Conduct, and was from my personal phone and sent to a co-workers personal phone. This shows me that my co-worker gave my message to HR.

Very shortly after this incident my mental health rapidly declined as I felt the company and my co-worker breached my privacy and I'd forever have to "look over my shoulder". I talked about it to my boss and he immediately dismissed it by simply stating, "I don't know anything about a message".

I felt I could no longer trust my boss, the company or my co-workers and I became quite paranoid. Trust is everything is this line of work. My mental health began to deeply affect myself and my family, so I quit a job I loved. I remained unemployed by choice for 2 years after I developed severe trust issues with other people.

Are there any legal grounds for this kind of behaviour from a company? It may feel like I'm clutching at straws to get some kind of payback or something, but it's just really hard to put into words how much this has affected my life.

I have recently gotten back on my feet and have been accepted a new job, but I worry that any kind of similar privacy betrayal in this new job will bring back the depression in my mind and I don't know how I would take it.