It’s not just romantic relationships that require boundaries—they’re vital at work, too. When everyone treats each other with respect in the workplace, you can focus on your job. But if someone lacks self-awareness and they’re blind to personal boundaries, it can make your day-to-day life hell and genuinely scare you.
Inspired by u/GreasyTobey, the folks at r/AskReddit spilled the tea about the creepiest things they’ve heard and seen at work, both from colleagues and clients. We’ve collected some of their most disturbing stories to share with you. Read on to check them out. Meanwhile, if you have any creepy work stories of your own, feel free to share them in the comments.
#1
More unsettling than creepy TBH. I was checking the voicemail at the dialysis clinic when I opened one morning because sometimes our patients will leave us a message the night before if they know they're going to be late or miss treatment. Sweet elderly patient had left a message that said "I'm sorry ladies, I won't make it tomorrow morning. I'm going to see Hazel." Hazel was his wife who passed away 4 years earlier. I immediately called house- no answer. Called his son that was listed as an emergency contact and he tells me he was just about to call us to let us know his father passed away in the night.
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#2
#3
When dealing with someone behaving inappropriately at work, communication is everything. Unless the other person suddenly becomes extremely self-aware, the odds are that they’ll continue doing what they’ve been doing. That is unless someone calls them out for their behavior.
You can start things off very simply. Very calmly tell your problematic colleague that you don’t appreciate them doing something the next time they overstep your boundaries. By all means, be assertive, but don’t sound accusatory or judgmental. Make your boundaries very clear.
If your coworker is reasonable at all, they’ll change their behavior after you bring up the problem. Some folks have an issue with self-awareness. They don’t understand how their actions impact the people around them.
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#6
Others, however… well, if they’re narcissistic enough, they won’t ever admit that they’re wrong. They’ll continue causing chaos and acting creepy because they want to. In that case, it’s probably best to escalate things. Document some examples of their behavior and go talk to human resources, your supervisor, or your boss. Maybe they can help put an end to the toxicity.
Meanwhile, you might feel uncomfortable being anywhere near that coworker. You might want to consider sitting further away from them. Or, if things are seriously bad, you might even want to consider transferring to another department altogether. Though, if that’s the case, it’s an indication that there’s an issue with the entire workplace environment. Looking for another job might be your best way forward. Though, if you have the time and money, you can always seek legal help. There’s no excuse for harassment at work.
#7
I had a patient tell me in graphic detail about how they attempted to sexually assault my co-worker who was on night shift the previous night. He had cornered her in a small med room but she was able to get out luckily. The detail which he went into, the tone, and the way he spoke just made every fibre of my being stand on edge. He said he was going to do it again that night and "They were meant to be together. He would take them both away the next night." Lots of details I don't want to repeat. Everything he told me he was not joking in any way. Management hadn't done a single thing about the attempted assualt the previous night and he was in my care that day. Spoke with his Attending and got him to the right care floor he needed. Our med/cardiac wasn't the right spot for that. I strongly feel that if I hadn't he would have [SAed] her or worse. I've never felt that way before. I imgagine that is our innate primal fear. My whole body was just screaming with anxiety, danger warnings going off. I'll never forget the way he made me feel when he spoke about it. I'm just happy he wasn't able to hurt anyone.
#8
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#9
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At the end of the day, it’s up to you what your boundaries are, how you communicate them, and how you enforce them. It’s also up to you to decide whether you still want to stay at the company if the problematic individual gets spoken to, reassigned, or fired.
However, in some cases, keep more of an open mind about the importance of having crystal-clear communication about your boundaries. Some individuals aren’t ignoring subtle social norms because they’re ‘creeps.’ As The New York Times Magazine points out, some people can struggle with social cues and behavioral norms because they have autism spectrum disorder. Other folks might be extremely socially awkward. And yet, this is not a blank check to do whatever you want.
“Once the rules have been carefully explained, however, it’s infantilizing to use the condition as an excuse for harmful behavior. It isn’t hard to understand a rule that, say, forbids a supervisor from making sexual or romantic overtures to junior staff members. An adult man on the autism spectrum is an adult man; the spectrum isn’t a certificate of sainthood,” Kwame Anthony Appiah writes.
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#12
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What is the creepiest thing you've ever seen, heard, or experienced in the workplace, Pandas? Have you ever had to deal with a colleague who completely ignores common sense and thinks boundaries are optional? How did you handle the situation? Let us know in the comment section, at the bottom of this post.
#13
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#27
Was training a new guy. We were driving by a middle school and he says “man the way these girls dress these days makes it so tempting…” I’m like. “Uhhhh. You mean young adult women, right?” Trying to see if I misheard him or something and that he wasn’t implying [SA] and of teenaged children. He didn’t help his case by saying that girls in his day didn’t dress like that to school. I told my boss but since it was a he said, he said, they just agreed to not put him with me anymore since he made me uncomfortable. He ended up creeping everyone out but they let him go due to not being able to perform the required tasks in a timely manner. Now he’s a school bus driver ?.
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#32
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#35
His dad had gotten all of his paperwork with his will out of his safe, watered the house plants, put money for each of his utility payments in labeled envelopes, put on his best suit, shined his dress shoes, left a message for us at the clinic, left a message for his choir director letting him know he wouldn't need a ride to practice in two days, then he sat down in his recliner and died. (As far as I know and according to his family he didn't do or take anything to expedite his exit, he just went to sleep in that recliner).I worked as a patient care technician in a hospital. And I was giving a bath to an aphasiac patient (totally coherent, but can’t speak due to a stroke some 10 years back). My badge got caught in her hair as I leaned over her. She all of a sudden said “Ow.” This woman hasn’t spoken since her stroke, so we were both very surprised. I looked at her with my mouth open, dumb in astonishment. She was just as shocked, but she knew the message she wanted to get out.
“I want to die,” she said quickly like she’s been wanting to say it for a long time. She looked directly into my eyes.
“What?” I asked idiotically.
“Let me die,” she repeated as clear as the first time.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
There was a long pause and I saw her face shift to a disappointed frown. She wasn’t going to speak again.I told the nurse and charge nurse. Then I got busy and soon my shift was over.
I came back the next day, and her room was filled with flowers, “Feel better” balloons, and a bunch of family. Her husband was sitting on her bed flipping through a photo album and showing pictures of when they were young to the family. I could tell by her face how angry she was. She would not look at them. And I realized that the husband and this family have medical power of attorney over her, so they decide if she lives or not. And they won’t listen to her. I look around the room: her IV, her feeding tube, her oxygen. All there to help her live because they want her to.
She’s done, but they won’t let her go. And she’s trapped inside her head wanting to rest and be done with the hospital, be done with her long suffering. Totally coherent but unable to decide anything for herself because we can’t hear her.
I think of that often and it’s a nightmare scenario for me. So scary.I’m a teacher that works at the school that I went to. I’ve ran into a few creeps at other schools (and reported who I’ve needed to; students, please talk to trusted adults and we can and will get things done) but the creepiest one I’ve heard came from the creep’s own mouth and was from a teacher that started when I was a junior.
I was talking to him in the hallway. He was a liked teacher when I went there and was still there when I came back. I brought up the valedictorian from my class.
Him: “Yeah, she was nice. None of you knew I was even with her back then.”
Me: “…what?”
Him: “oh yeah. She was a cutie patootie. Much hotter than the senior girls today.”
I reported that s**t faster than a gunslinger. Would you believe that one of the senior girls immediately came forward.
F****r probably doesn’t like prison. Good. And I can’t hear “cutie patootie” without feeling nauseous anymore.When I was an apprentice a man walked into the shop asking for a tattoo of “something” on his upper thigh. He kept staring at me while talking to the artist. He ended up going on this whole thing about how he needed the tattoo because he was being sent to jail soon for sexually touching a kid and wanted to get a tattoo on his upper thigh so he can say he never touched her because she couldn’t say he had a tattoo.
He left and we reported him to the police. The next day they came down to take a statement from everyone that was present.“I got your number out of the Rolodex, I’m gonna text you later” -asst manager at my first fast food job when I was 14.
“Hey, I remember you said your favorite ice cream was half baked, I’m in your driveway with 2 spoons. I pulled your address and phone number from the system” -older guy I worked with at the IRS.
“Wanna know why I only hire tiny girls under 21? There easier to convince to get in my truck” - franchise owner at a Little Caesars.
“Look in the cup with my name on it in the souvenir section. There’s a present for you” - middle aged manager at a surf shop on the beach when I was 16 (It was a thong, perfume and a pack of condoms).I interviewed this younger girl/woman (likely fresh out of high school) for a job at Spencer's. Asked her to share a leadership experience of hers. She described being one of many counselors at a Christian summer camp. And one night, they went into the campers' bunks masked with guns and brought them out one by one, saying things like "this is what happens when you don't believe in God!" She smiled through the whole thing, and I had to do everything I could to hide my absolute horror.
She did not get the job. I really hope she found her way out of whatever cult she'd been a part of, fr.I worked as a lifeguard when I was a teenager. One of my coworkers said verbatim, “the term [SA] gets thrown around way too much. If a girl gets drunk at a party and passes out, and some guy f***s her, that’s her fault.” Never spoke to him again after that.My ex boss said to the girl i was partnered with “if i got to train her. Shed be barefoot and pregnant with in 1 week. Id train her till she cried. Till she begged. Till she bled.”.“I wasn’t following her to hurt her, I just wanted to know where she lived”.“Make the kid in the corner shut up.” ~ old lady at 3 am as she points to the empty corner.
There was no kid.
She passed not long after.
Honestly this kinda thing happens a lot. You start seeing ghosts… I’m putting the crash cart in front of your door."If my girlfriend got pregnant, I'd kick her in the belly until she miscarried" - one of the apprentice chefs was telling the other kitchen hand when I came out of the fridge.Here is mine. Working on an ambulance 5150 call. Everything is going well till he starts talking to himself. I ask him about a cool demon tattoo. He says that the demon is the one he is talking to. “He wants me to [end your life] before we get to the hospital. But I keep telling him that you seem like a good guy just wanting to help people and he still wants me to [end your life]”."She's going be fine as hell when she's older"
He was talking about our manager's 12 yr old daughter.
His weird a*s didn't last much longer there.An extensive love letter was written by a coworker addressed to me, a particular line of interest was "I want to die together with you."
This came from a girl who [SAed] me and followed me home after work one night, which made it all the more terrifying. She was the daughter of the head of HR though so she saw no repercussions. I did, however, get written up for unprofessional conduct after yelling at her when she grabbed my crotch one too many times.
Had to call the police on her a few times to get her to lay off, and thankfully I don't work there anymore.I was an auto tech at a dealership and I was in the service advisor booth talking to one of the writers. A car pulled in and the woman happened to be yawning. Suddenly I heard “that’s right, open your mouth wide. I’ve got something to fill it”. I looked at the writer and said “do you realize that is my wife?”. I’ve never seen a 6’2” guy shrink so fast in my life. All he did the rest of the day was apologize, every time I saw him.Manager commented on my daughters friends a*s. She was 15 at the time. He also talked about how he could tell which women want to be [SAed].
I was a woman working in automotive and it was so fun trying to explain to the guys there why more women don’t work in automotive /s they treat us like we have to put up with their s**t or just leave. Aaaand I left.I told a manager I’d forgotten to do something & he sent me a reply saying “that’s okay because you’re going to repay me by…? *wink emoji*”. He’s a 55 year old man & im 25.I worked at a grocery store when I was 18. My dad had just died suddenly and it was my first day back at work after the funeral. This weird guy (co worker)would always go out of his way to talk to me ( I was in charge of self checkout). So he’s like “I heard your dad died” I said “yeah”. Then he tells me this sick story about how he used to work at a funeral home and would put the dead body’s in sexual positions?!?! I walked away and told my supervisor that it was inappropriate. Idk disturbing ETA: I feel like I should mention the fact that the “ manager” decided I talk to much, prior to this conversation with coworker, so I was essentially “ banned” from talking with my coworkers but this dude would make a point of always coming over to where I was, just to say stupid s**t to me.“I’m not a bad person! Just let me show you.!” Yelled the twitchy guy who tried
to shut the door to my leasing agents office. The four guys who re-opened that door a split second later let him know we didn’t believe him. The background check after his rental application that found 28 convictions for sex crimes and the current pending charges said that he was not a nice
guy at all.
Scared the c**p out of all of us and creeped us out, especially when we realized he was one of more than 30 REGISTERED sex offenders living in a 3 block radius.First day at a new job: "I could stab you right now and nobody would find your body until the end of the day." All of this while stabbing his work cart with a screwdriver.
Dude got passed up for a promotion and was asked to train the new guy in the same conversation with the boss. He didn't get any better over the years I worked with him. He ended up getting fired for comments like this.Coworker asked if my 16 year old sister was a virgin.I worked with an old guy maybe mid to late 50s, who was generally creepy. One day he was talking about his 15year old step daughters "tits" and how they were "so big he didnt know where to put his hands when he hugged her"...When I was 22 I was working in a bar and had tables to take care of too. Guy before he left grabbed my arm (after many drinks, gave me $100 tip) said ‘ I would love to drink your bath water, and would be honored if I choked on it’
Worked at a culinary school a few years later and a coworker in a different part of the school said ‘Your eyes are so beautiful I want to rip them out and store them in a mason jar on my desk to look at when I’m feeling down’
Those were probably the oddest/creepiest ones from work. Lots of stories about men approaching me with creepy things outside of work too ?.I’m a male that works in dental and it’s astonishing how many old guys say to me “I wish you were a hot young blonde girl instead.”.Working a slow shift at a restaurant so the other servers and I were watching some celeb news show.
They had a segment about Sandra Bullock and how she worked at an ice cream shop as a teen and that she was robbed at gunpoint by someone who was never caught.
Another server, who was the golden boy was marveling and said, “Damn, what if you were the guy who got to say he robbed Sandra Bullock at gunpoint.”
Everyone just looked at him in shock, to which he responded.
“I’ll bet he regrets that he didn’t make her take off her clothes. “.*me, a 17 yr old making a coffee behind a bar* *somewhat 70 yr old looking man staring me down* "Are you a minor?, I sure hope not!".Not at the job but after I quit, one of my managers (both male) made it a point to let me know I was originally hired bc the managers wanted eye candy while at work. but they were pleasantly surprised by me, and that's why they tried so hard to keep me and not lose me to another restaurant.Said before the company potluck: “you know you can [take out] someone by putting eye drops in their food”.Directed towards me, one of our guys on his smoke break said, “you don’t look like you run fast.”
In the moment I laughed but as soon as I stepped inside our building I had the biggest wtf moment of the year. He was a lean dude, teeth missing the rest orange and brown, with clothes on that a dude with a machete would be wearing in a horror movie. I hadn’t even been there two weeks.
He was a cool guy for the rest of the interactions I’ve had with him. Never chased me. He just had weird sense of humor.Open casket funeral, family gathered and someone seemed out of sorts. She was dressed casually and just kind of meandering about. I observed her for a while, she made her way to the casket and appeared to be giving the deceased some reverence. She then had to pass by me to leave and she was clearly inebriated and said to me as she was leaving "I just wanted to see a dead body.". Gave me the drunk girl grin and staggered off.
She just staggered into a funeral off the street, who does that? (Funeral Director).Nothing was said, but I went out for drinks and one of my co-workers refused to let go during a hug. Straight out of Anchorman 2.I had a customer come in and ask what the youngest age was for someone to work there. My boss said that the minimum age requirement was 16. The guy then asked whether or not it mattered if they looked mature enough, or that they could pass for 16. My boss said no. He mentioned his granddaughter was 12, but could pass for being older. He smirked after, as if to receive approval and agreement from us about his granddaughter. My coworkers and I all exchanged faces of disgust and horror after he left.My first job when I was in high school. Worked as a clerk for a drycleaners and it was some 60-80 year old woman that had a horrible attitude every time she came in. This day she said she liked my facial hair, had that been all I'd have been fine with it. But the tone in which she said it and the look in her eye as well as the smile she gave me when she did this made my skin crawl. I went home and shaved it off after work.
