My coworker is insane
I started working this job about a year ago. I made friends with my coworker (who we will call Stephanie) and she seemed pretty normal. She is in her 40s, with 4 kids. I’m in my early 20’s, no kids, and I’m a pretty adventurous person. She was ranting to me how she doesn’t really have friends and she’s always with her husband (we’ll call him David) and kids. Recently, I invited her to come to my house for a small party of about 20 of my friends, ages 23-40. I figured she could meet some really great people and make friends.
My house is considered the “safe space” for everyone. I’ve had friends show up at 3am after a breakup or a fight looking for somewhere to go. I always wanted people to feel welcome as our group is extremely diverse, and there is absolutely no room for hate.
Stephanie and David both came and we were all sitting outside on my patio, playing games and drinking quite a bit. The first issue that arose was David making comments about wanting to see me soaking wet in a white t-shirt, as well as other inappropriate things about me. My fiancé told him that it wasn’t cool, and he told Stephanie, which she replied that she didn’t care. I was already uncomfortable, but it wasn’t that serious at that point. Everyone seemed to be having a great time, so I brushed it off and just said he was drunk.
My friend group is pretty competitive when it comes to games, but not super serious if someone wins. One of my girls won and started celebrating by dancing and singing, and everyone was cheering her on. Except for Stephanie. She got upset and called my friend the hard R. Before I could even get words out, my fiance stood up to defend my friend, and David got into his face. I got up and pushed them apart. Stephanie grabbed my arm and started calling my fiancé racial slurs. I just snapped. We got into a physical altercation, which I don’t remember at all, just my fiancé pulling me off of her. My friend collected all of her things and nicely told her she needed to leave, which they did.
Fast forward to Monday, I clock into work and Stephanie’s waiting for me. I ignored her the whole day. She decided to let our supervisor know that I was not being communicative with her. I had a meeting with HR, which I tried to explain the situation to them, and they told me to separate work from home. She acted like she had no idea what happened and said that she was really drunk, and didn’t mean to say what she did. All I kept repeating to her was “drunk words are sober thoughts”.
She’s been following me around while I’m working, talking to me. When I go out to my car on break, she goes out to her car. If I’m walking across the job site to go to another building, she will too, right behind me. She even texts me and calls me all the time, even outside of work, which I never respond. I don’t know what to do, and feel like I’m being harassed by her. My supervisor won’t do anything until a position opens up on the other shift.