Hotel cook constantly trauma dumps and complains to her 32-year-old coworker, whom she barely knows: 'I'm truly sorry that you've had so much tragedy in your life, but I do not have the tools to help.'

3 hours ago 3

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  • O Espiral

    A hotel chef cooks breakfast after telling her coworker all about her terribly tragic life. 

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • Am I the bad guy for telling a coworker to stop trauma dumping on me?

    I (32F) have a new coworker of about three weeks. We'll call her Kate (~late 40s/early 50sF). I just recently had an tone-based miscommunication with another coworker, so I really want to know if I'll be out of line for this.

  • Happy young receptionist in uniform standing by counter

    A hotel clerk greets her new coworker, not knowing that she will soon become the bane of her existence.

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • I work the night shift at a hotel, working at the front desk. Kate was hired to work breakfast. The first day I met her, the usual breakfast person sent me a text ahead of time that she would be late, and if I could please show Kate around the kitchen while we wait. I'm cross-trained

  • on breakfast for emergencies, so when Kate arrived, I introduced myself, told her the situation, and started showing her the equipment. I had spoken to this woman for maybe 2 minutes total, and then she just completely unprompted told me

  • about the dea of her husband and child. I was completely caught off guard, and had nothing really to say aside from, "Oh my god, I'm so sorry. That's awful." She then continued to tell me more details about her losses when the usual breakfast person arrived, and my was able to escape.

  • As breakfast overlaps with the last couple of hours of night shift, I've seen Kate many times since, and every time, she opens with telling me everything that's ever gone wrong in her life. First, recent grievances, then she'll get into deeper trauma if I let her continue talking. It's

  • exhausting. There was one day when I was asked to help out with laundry, and I deliberately left it for late in my shift so I could essentially hide in the laundry room and make myself unavailable. Twice Kate tracked me down in there, first to complain that she had to make scrambled eggs instead of fried, and

  • A pan filled with eggs on top of a table

    Scrambled eggs, which according to this cook, are so much more annoying to make than fried eggs. 

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • second to give me a play- by-play of how she was almost late because her alarm didn't go off, but thankfully her roommate has such a loud alarm (and it sounds like a fire alarm) that it woke her up anyway.

  • Yesterday was particularly frustrating. I have a brand new tattoo, like still- healing new. It's brightly colored, large, and very visible on my arm. Kate noticed it right away and asked, "Is that a new tattoo?" and I excitedly said, "Yeah, it's for my D&D charac--" and she

  • cut me off and was like, "Well you don't need to guess the meaning of my tattoo." and shows me a semicolon and proceeds to tell me about the dths within her family for probably the 5th or 6th time. I was not able to escape quickly, and somehow we managed to also get on the recent

  • expiration of some old felony misdemeanor charges she had, and how she can now apply to another job because of it. I have never heard Kate say one single word to me that was not a complaint or a traumadump. I'm so tired.

  • Reminder, I don't know this woman. I want to tell her to stop, and phrase it like, "Hey, Kate, I'm truly sorry that you've had so much tragedy in your life, but I do not have the tools to help you through it, and we do not have that kind of relationship. You should really talk to a therapist about it, not me." WIBTA if I said that?

  • Pyjama365 I had one of those people at my last work, although most of what she would complain about was due to decisions she had made. She would talk for 40 minutes straight, sparked by something small that happened in the last day or so, but then veer back into historic stuff we had all heard before. We had four main offices on one corridor for one team, so she would pop around to say hi to everyone and then end up regularly reciting her current complaints (and background) four separate times.

  • We got to a point where all we could do was say, "sorry, I really don't have time to chat right now, there's something urgent I need to finish" and put our headphones back on and start typing frantically until she left the room and went to bore someone else. You really have to say something early on, like, "I'm sorry that you've faced a lot of hardships in your life, but you don't really know me very well, and perhaps haven't considered that some of these topics are really hard for me to hear ab

  • Do it in front of witnesses if you need to. If anyone seems to think similarly to you, perhaps if you see her coming, quietly ask one of these other people to hover nearby, so they can overhear and confirm that you didn't say anything inappropriate or unreasonable if she responds badly.

  • rael1hp OP Yeah, that's very similar to what she's like. Unfortunately, I am the only employee in the building until she arrives, and the next person to arrive after the breakfast staff member is my relief, so witnesses are in short supply. The cameras do have audio tho if it comes to that. I like what you've added about her not considering what might be triggers for me. Thank you!

  • xkatxellex I worked with someone like this... we worked in the same department together (10 years ago) so if we had a shift together, it was on. She would also complain about ALL the "other" coworkers, but never me? Right... anyways, I'll go to that store even after I stopped working there and I've tried everything in me to avoid her or the departments she manages. I saw her the other day at a completely different store and walked the other way. It's hard. Definitely set boundaries because if yo

  • PulsarPersonality NTA. Oh my goodness some people are like this and are very exhausting and it's . It's also super unprofessional of her. Work is not the time or place, even if the workplace is somewhat casual. Is this new trauma and she just hasn't processed it yet? That she has no clue what she's doing? I personally think it'd be appropriate for you to say something like that, although I'm sure there are people here who could help you finesse it even more. Just because you don't have the bandw

  • TheGardenNymph I think she just preys on people's politeness and not enough people have actually asked her to stop. It's hard to draw and hold a boundary, especially when there's grief and trauma involved and Kate probably doesn't have the emotional intelligence to realise its so inappropriate or she doesnt care

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