To not want this friendship (I think i'm a bitch!)

[Putyourclotheson]

So i have worked at my job two years. Just recently a newish younger employee has seemingly 'adopted' me.

I had to go to her floor to use something down there and ever since I met her that day she has been stuck to my side with glue. She is absolutely driving me nuts.

I am about 10 years older than her and since the day we met she has come to find me on my floor about 4-6 times per day each of which time she stays for best part of 45 minutes. We do the same job so she just follows me round telling me all about her life and problems in life.

She has recently got out of a (what i can tell, abusive) relationship and she does not stop going on about how in love she is with this person and how they have done all this bad stuff to her but she loves them anyway. Any advice I give is met with a ' but i love them' kind of response.

It has now got to the stage that I am hiding from her and all my work colleagues think it is highly amusing and are referring to her as my 'girlfriend'.

I hate to say it but she is literally driving me nuts and has a seemingly thick skin as i have been fairly sharp sometimes in order to try and deflect the conversation away from her love life. This may sound horrible but I don't particularly even like her, she is not someone who i would choose as a mate and i actually feel uncomfortable a lot of the time in her company.

She has however, told me so is really lonely, (despite me knowing she has lots of friends) and that is why she keeps going back to this toxic relationship.

She now wants me phone number, but I absolutely don't want to let her have it!

I'm a horrible bitch aren't I?!

No. I think you need to continue being short but sharp. I'm all for supporting colleagues through tough situations and some former colleagues have become good friends but how does she manage to get any work done when she's with you for 45mins-odd 4/5 times of the day.
That alone would ring alarm bells for me as a manager. Can you speak to her direct line manager. You don't owe anyone 'friendship'.

You're not a bitch...but...why is she doing this at work?

It seems like a lot of time to take off for chatting, has her manager not noticed? She's distracting you from your job, as well. Can't you just pass on the number for a helpline & tell her it's inappropriate for you to give out your personal number?

She seems to get all her work done in the shortest amount of time, god knows how.

One day it was driving me to the point of crazy, I actually called our supervisor and asked for her to come up and remove this girl from my work area.

Supervisor came up and 'caught her out' told her to get back to her own floor. Girl tried to say she was helping but obviously i'd already given my supervisor the heads up.

Off she went but this made absolutely no difference to her coming up to my floor and she just came straight back up again.

Infuriating isn't the word.

Two separate issues. She is interfering with your work effectively for one. The other is that she wants a friendship outside work. I would be inclined to say you don't tend to have work friendships as a reason for not giving her your number, and you need to get on with your work, or you will both potentially be in trouble. Not unreasonable to not want to be her friend. That's one of the few things in life we get to choose!

I think I know your work colleague if it's her or anyone like her the only way you will ever get her to piss off is to sack her never give your number out and everyone else is covering her work for her 😂

Hopefully she's just settling in and this is a phase which she'll tire of. But obviously in the meantime it's very annoying, of course. More than that, she's clearly not working and she's stopping you from getting on with your work as well.

If she's new, is she still in her probation period? It's much easier for her to be sacked if that's the case. And if she goes on like this, that's what needs to happen.

No, I actually think you need to be quite a bit "bitchier," that is assertive and short.

It sounds like this relationship is all one way, is she actually interested in you at all? I'm guessing not, just what you can do for her, which is be her emotional dumping ground.

She isn't being remotely considerate of you, remember that when you feel you're being mean when you have to repeatedly tell her you are too busy to talk.

We had a girl like this at work . She had ASD .

Can her supervisor tell her to stop? She's affecting you and your work.

You have to be utterly straight with her and say that you've had enough of hearing about her relationship and to not mention it any more.

Just tell her. As in, "I can't talk now as I have work to do" then turn away. And repeat. When she starts talking about her personal life, "sorry to hear that. Now do excuse me I have work to do." and repeat. She's getting something back from your interaction, you need to stop it. No advice, no prolonged listening sessions.

Or say you've been told you're not getting enough done, so you can't talk now?

I used to be a legal secretary and audio typing was a very good way to be anti social at work. I could put my headphones on and just pretend to be too busy to talk. (I usually did have a lot to do so it wasn't all a pretence!£