Woman Gets Reprimanded At Work After Co-Worker Hounds Her About Her Brother's Death
Nobody is entitled to another person's worst day.
Antonio Guillem / Shutterstock A woman coping with the tragic death of her brother was repeatedly hounded by her co-worker who wanted to know all of the details surrounding her brother's passing.
Despite the woman's initial refusal, her co-worker was persistent and continuously demanded to know. After a week of inappropriate questions, the woman snapped at her co-worker — yet only one of them got called into the manager’s office for a stern talking to.
The woman was reprimanded at work after she lashed out at her co-worker who continuously asked her for details about her brother's recent passing.
It is difficult enough to return to work after the loss of a loved one. It is even more difficult when your colleagues refuse to respect your privacy and give you the space to heal by demanding to know personal details surrounding the death of your loved one.
When Sara, known as @worstlittlewidow_sara on TikTok, landed a new job six months after the sudden death of her little brother, one of her co-workers took a particular interest in the gruesome death.
According to Sara, her younger brother died from hypothermia and exposure. “His baby girl was found, and his wife was found but he wasn’t so lucky,” she shared.
After her brother’s story made the news, one of Sara’s new co-workers began asking invasive questions about his death.
“She’s reading the articles, she’s watching the clips, and she has questions for me,” Sara said. “She needs to know how my brother’s body was found.”
Throughout the next week, Sara’s co-worker repeatedly asked her the same question, which she made clear she was uncomfortable answering.
"It's about a week of me dodging her, giving her the silent treatment, and just avoiding the question and then one night I just lost it," she revealed. “I blurted out, ‘It’s because the coyotes left a [expletive] blood trail!’”
Despite her co-worker’s repeated refusal to respect Sara’s boundaries and privacy, Sara was the one reprimanded by her boss after her co-worker reported that she made her “uncomfortable.” She claimed that Sara’s statement was “too graphic” for work.
Most people online extended their sympathies to Sara, both for her brother’s death and for the way she was treated at work.
“I am so sorry. She had no right. No one is entitled to your life story,” one TikTok user commented. “I’m so sorry for the loss of your brother," another user wrote. "That’s so traumatic and I hate that she disregarded any common decency and disrespected your privacy.”
As humans, when we see a graphic story on the news, it's normal to be curious and wonder about the how, when and why. However, it's innaproriate and unkind to ask those questions to the family members of a deceased person or demand that they share that information with you.
Now, Sara hopes that her co-worker and others think before asking people such invasive details about their greatest tragedies.
“You are not entitled to someone’s worst day,” she said in another video. “Some little stranger coming up and being morbidly fascinated by the thing that is currently destroying you is really in poor taste.”
The grief of losing a loved one already affects a person in their day-to-day life. Let’s not make it any worse by forcing them to relive it and share the gory information surrounding the death.
Instead of being reprimanded for snapping at her co-worker, Sara deserved space and understanding. Her co-worker, on the other hand, should have been the one to be called into the office and scolded for inappropriate behavior at work.
Megan Quinn is a writer at YourTango who covers entertainment and news, self, love, and relationships.