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Original poster

Someone I like and respect at work really hurt me at the Christmas party

45 replies

BubblesTheOfficeWorker · 15/12/2019 19:01

And to make it worse, they weren't meaning to do that, but I can't help but feel hurt about it anyway.

I've been working in the same place for 9 years and it is very tight knit. I'm 30 and I've never had a boyfriend. It does quite upset me and this time of year (plus the stupid 'thirtieth' thing) has been really hard.

An older woman I really look up to and respect kept bloody well going on about it and by god it hurt :(

OP posts:

MistyCloud · 15/12/2019 20:11

@BubblesTheOfficeWorker

Oh wow, she sounds like such a PEACH!

I concur with another poster. She sounds jealous.

I am not saying married people/attached people with kids etc should be jealous of singletons, BUT I reckon some are. And anyone who makes remarks about a singleton (like she did) is being bitchy and catty, and yeah I suspect she is jealous. She can dress it up as concern, but she was just being spiteful.

I have been met with bitchiness like this before.... but for me it was the other way around. 2 catty bitches in an office I worked for, scoffing, and deriding me for getting married, 'tying myself down,' and being a slave to a man, and signing up to a life of washing socks, ironing his shirts, and cooking for him. (So THEY thought!)

5 years on, they were both - you guessed it - MARRIED. Silly bints were just jealous!

Hard to rise above it when it hits hard though... like it did with you.

There is someone out there for ya. I wish you happiness whatever you do,

ElfAndSafeKey · 15/12/2019 20:26

We've all worked together for at least 9 years so you do pick up on peoples' lives.
I've worked for 10+ years in the same place, and hardly anybody knows anything about me. They can assume what they like based on the few things they do know/guess/find out somehow. I don't care.

Bebby80 · 15/12/2019 20:48

Uh I think I understand how you feel. My younger sister got married before me. She met her oh at uni, they’ve been together ever since. They got married when I was 29 and all I heard the whole wedding, from almost every single one of my aunties, was so when are you getting married? Have you met anyone yet? Like you, I’m sure some of them thought I was gay and the others thought I had an endless supply of men I liked to cycle through! I laughed it off but inside I was dying. I’d only recently come out of a serious relationship as well and I was not in a good place.

I know they mean well but people don’t think how their words hurt others.

Onceuponatimethen · 15/12/2019 20:51

I totally get it op - I remember when I noticed people had stopped mentioning their kids in front of me as they thought I was past that stage - had missed the boat. It was all meant kindly but stung.

In case it helps at all I now have dp and kids. Everyone is on a different journey and one of my friends literally went straight from years of singledom with no romantic happenings at all to getting together with the oh she’s now married to in her later 20s

FAQs · 15/12/2019 20:57

My boss says this to me all the time, I only see her 2-3 times a year and she is always hoping to get me married/paired up but she says it in a jokey way and if I did met someone she would be more excited than me ! I presume she wasn’t saying it in the same tone?

Savingshoes · 15/12/2019 20:58

Saw something recently about someone being asked why they weren't married.
The answer was "I'm just lucky, I guess" .
She's just jealous that she has to think for two each time she makes a decision.
You're okay just the way you are.

Original poster

BubblesTheOfficeWorker · 15/12/2019 21:05

She was being kind and jokey but it gets very tiresome hearing it over and over again. Every year I hope that it will be the year I get to say 'I've met someone' and it never has been. It's really shit.

I know it's just conversation and I probably wouldn't like it if (when!) they stop asking- never happy!

OP posts:

HazelBite · 15/12/2019 21:10

People never think about what they are saying. I have four Ds's and people assume (due to me being in my 60's) that I have grandchildren, The tragedy is I have had 3 grandchildren, and I don't want to discuss that trauma that DS1 ans DDil have been through and the fact that my heart breaks every day for them, I shrug my shouders, smile, and say that "I'm far too young to be a Grandma!" still hurts though. (Especially at this time of the year)
OP think of a phrase to throw back forcefully at them that will stop it.

Creepster · 15/12/2019 21:14

The trouble with saying outch is that they then go on and on over and over about how they can't talk about your ouch.
So yes, let it slide over you like a warm shower you did not want or need.

Original poster

BubblesTheOfficeWorker · 15/12/2019 21:18

HazelBite I am so, so sorry to hear of your family's losses

OP posts:

CathyorClaire · 15/12/2019 21:19

Work colleagues aren't your friends, OP. Don't give them the ammo.

Less is more.

ssd · 15/12/2019 21:25

After working with you so long, she should know this would hurt you.
I'm sorry op, you deserve better

Iwouldlikesomecake · 15/12/2019 21:28

It's not bloody jealousy.

It's just because people don't think. It is a clumsy way of saying 'I think you are great, really lovely and would be a catch for anyone' but people honestly don't think of the flipside of that which is 'nevertheless... here we are'.

I had it for years and years. Met someone and got married and now I get the 'when are you going to have a baby' questions, particularly as I work in maternity! Never mind that actually they don't know if we have decided not to, or if we can't, or if we are trying and not successful, or whatever. People use it as a conversation starter and don't think of what they are ACTUALLY saying.

It won't have been meant horribly and she would probably be upset to hear that you were upset, but that doesn't make it less reasonable to BE upset, because YANBU to be upset, because it hurts. I get it. It's shit. I hope it is short lived and if you want to find someone that you do

BooFuckingHoo2 · 15/12/2019 21:34

Your time will come OP

I’m in a similar boat, been single for yonks and this is definitely the loneliest time of year!

MindYours · 15/12/2019 21:35

I didn't have a boyfriend all through my twenties and early thirties. Never had a real relationship, just a couple of random shags and on-again-off-again dramas.

I hated it when people would ask have I met anyone "yet" as if I was running a race I hadn't finished.

I know how you feel x

Mistlewoeandwhine · 15/12/2019 21:57

I remember being 30 and someone I worked with sadly saying, “It’s a pity you never got married. You’d have made someone a great wife.”
I went home and cried into my pillow.
I moved to Manchester the next year and met DH aged 31 ❤️

Cherrysoup · 15/12/2019 22:13

Honestly, I wish you’d bloody well asked her to stfu. I hate people talking about your personal life as though it’s up for general consumption. If you wanted to discuss it, you’d raise it yourself.

This may not be what you want at all, OP, so forgive me if I’m way off, but have you considered donor sperm? Sorry, that’s probably very crass of me. 😟

AnFiadhRuaRua · 15/12/2019 22:37

At 30 somebody said that to you @mistlewoeandwhine, that would be hilarious if it hadn't upset you.

Longtalljosie · 17/12/2019 08:10

I think at 30 it’s a bit early to be thinking about donor sperm! As someone who also struggled, I would really recommend psychodynamic psychotherapy to consider what it is that’s holding you back. And it’s not just that people don’t fancy you. Honest.

YahBasic · 17/12/2019 10:40

People feel perfectly entitled to comment on women’s lifestyle choices regardless of marital status.

They assume single women want to be in relationships, those in relationships want to be married and those married want to have children.

We are TTC at the moment and not finding it the smoothest and have had four comments in the last week about not leaving it too late, it will be you soon etc.

My sister is soon to announce that she’s pregnant which will start off another round of it. I’ve avoided holding my 8 week old nephew as that seems to trigger a lot of comments.

People just don’t realise how hurtful their “passing” comments are.

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