One of my coworkers [F/late 30s] is way too interested in me [M/26], has constantly bugged me and confronted and swore at me about my secret life because I don’t share my personal life. This has to end, what do I do?

There’s one lady at my office, from the moment that I met her I knew that she was quirky and it soon became apparent that she was somewhat unprofessional, but she’s good at her actualjob and has been there for years, so the boss and our coworkers let her get away with it. Most of the people at this office have been there for years and there is a real blurring of personal and professional, they’re all one another’s best friends and call our office a family. I’m not into that, I like my job but I like to keep a strong wall between what I do at work and the rest of my life, I get that from my dad who also took his work home and his entire friend’s group was his coworkers and it ultimately made him miserable until he retired and he and my mom moved away and started over.

Anyway, since I started working here in January they’ve all tried to get me to “be a part of the family” which I’ve mostly politely declined, don’t talk about my personal life, don’t hang out with them outside of work etc. Everyone else seemed to get the hint after awhile and stopped, but this lady has been persistent and it’s bizarre. She’s gone from being really friendly and basically flirting with me to accusing me of trying to be enigmatic and mysterious and back to friendly again. She apparently thinks that it’s cute but even if she were in high school it would be weird. She switched her tactic for the last month and has acted all quiet and hurt around me like she’s trying to tell me that I’ve hurt her feelings and wants me to apologize. This whole time my approach to her has been the same, cordial and polite but tight lipped about my personal life, I just refuse to engage with her antics and histrionics because that would be encouragement.

This morning after church I went into the office to finish up some stuff because I’m going on vacation and don’t believe in bringing work home. She was also there and this is one of the first times we’ve been alone for more than a few minutes and she decided to confront me about how I have some sort of secret life that I’m keeping from her and the rest of the team and that if something is wrong she wants to known because “we’re a family” and she wants to help. I sort of went off, I told her that there is nothing wrong and I don’t have a secret life, I just keep my personal life separate from my professional life because it’s nobody’s business, and that furthermore she and the rest of the office aren’t my family and never will be, they're just my coworkers and I told her to back off.

She started crying, called me evil, questioned my religious beliefs (which she knows nothing about aside from the cross on my neck) because no real Christian could be so cold, swore at me and said “this isn’t over” before storming out. I am not looking forward to what will happen, and I can’t even complain to my superiors because they’re all good friends with her and when I reported her before they not only said that she’s just quirky and I’ll learn to deal with it, they told her which led to her confronting me before, but in a more whiny and less manic way than today. I’m saving to open my own business and can’t afford to quit this job right now. What do I do?

Tl;dr: Coworker feels entitled to my personal life, has constantly bugged me and today confronted me and swore at me.

Submitted December 30, 2018 at 02:10PM by hewasayoungamerican http://bit.ly/2SvHEHe