I started working weekends in March (I still work weekdays) and the weekend nursing supervisor has been extremely flirtatious towards me. He makes sexually suggestive comments towards me, holds my hand, brushes up against me, rubs my arm, draws smiley faces on my paperwork that I leave at my computer when I am in a patient's room, he has given me his cell phone number and has asked repeatedly why I don't text or call him.
For example I am working on the computer and have my hand on the mouse, he comes up behind me and puts his hand over mine and will then pick up my hand and holds it. He said, "your hands are cold, I can warm you up. Would you like it if I warmed you up?"
One day I offered to help a NA roll a patient in the bed so he could get cleaned up. The supervisor said to me, "you can help me in bed." I said, "I doubt you need help." He said, "you never know, why don't you offer to help me out?"
I was about to use a bladder scanner on a patient and the supervisor took the lubricant, squirted it onto his hand, then rubbed it onto my arm. I was shocked. He said, "I have wanted to put some lubricant on you for a long time." I walked off to get paper towels to clean it up, and he came after me and took the towels and wiped it off my arm.
I was standing at the ER doorway waiting for the ambulance to bring in a patient and he stood beside me and started to tap and rub his foot on my shoe. I said, "Your shoes have sparkles on them. I didn't know you liked sparkles." (I honestly thought he would get offended and stop.) He said, "there's a lot of things you don't know about me. All you have to do is ask. I'd like you to get to know me better."
There are a lot of incidents like this. My coworkers know what's going on and some have said "you just have to know how to take him when he makes comments and he is like that to some nurses." Some have said he has been fired from several jobs because of sexual harassment. Even patients have seen some of this behavior and have said that they think it is wrong (he will come into a patient's room with me to see what I am doing or if I need anything or to just check on me).
I don't want to be rude and I do want it to stop, but I definitely don't want to lose my job. I am seriously afraid to say anything. This is the nursing supervisor, so this is my boss's boss. Part of me thinks I might be overly sensitive and overreacting. I've just never had anyone be like this around me. I have not seen him do this to other nurses. I did hear that he was like this to an ICU nurse years ago, but she no longer works here.
So what do you think? Am I overreacting? Is there anything that I can do? Part of me thinks I just need to deal with it and eventually he will stop.
Do you see that in fact you are in a situation where you are thinking about "making him mad". It is predatory, abusive, and all the other verbs that go with abuse.
Seek out your local women's abuse group. A counselor there can talk at length with you about a plan, and steps to assist you going forward. And hopefully get you to realize that predators who stalk victims have a very specific agenda, and you need to see this to prevent yourself from getting further caught up in this situation, but going forward. He is grooming you, you are his specific target, and this is very, very dangerous.
Protect yourself. No matter how much you love your job, getting caught up in all this is soul sucking, and not worth your sanity or most importantly, your safety.
(My bold.) This is excellent advice. Along with making a plan, a counselor at the shelter can help you role-play how to respond with a clear "NO!"
"Get your uninvited hands off of me!"
"Back off! Get out of my personal space!"
"I've told you before to leave me alone. If you do this again, I will report you to HR."
Please, do not let him catch you alone at your car. Have someone with you. Do you see how easy it would be for him to get into the car with you and abduct you?
OP please protect yourself. This is a scary situation and you need protection.
Call an anonymous compliance number, get a lawyer, call the 800 number in some of the above posts. Most off don't be in any situation alone with him. Talk with security and have them walk you to your car. He is STALKING you and it is not likely to stop unless. You will have to be strong and fearless and start making small changes. Report to police, call the 800 safe number, call an anonymous complaint number.
Maybe your right, but I really don't want it to look like I'm overreacting if I report it. I also think I might lose my job if I tell someone in HR. He's been working at this hospital for years. I have told my charge nurse and other coworker nurses know, and they have all said there's not much that can be done and to just try to avoid him. My charge nurse was the one who told me that he's been fired from other jobs for this stuff. I asked why he was hired with that background and why he's allowed to continue to be here and she said she didn't know. This is a part time job for him- weekends only. I am required to work every other weekend, so that's the only time he's around me. He has a full time job at the VA and asked me to work there. I said I couldn't because I had applied (as a nurse extern) and was turned down. He said he would get me in. I said no. He was a soldier in the army and fought in the Iraq war. He told a story to me and several coworkers about how he wanted to take care of his daughter's boyfriend and he knew no one would figure out what happened to him. Someone said, "wow, I hope I never piss you off." I agreed. I can see how it's easy for some to say that I need to report this, but it's not that easy. Administration knows about him, and others know. It's happened before at this hospital with him and the other nurses no longer work here (I do not know why- their reasons for leaving might not be related to this). I want it to stop but I don't want to lose my job or make him mad. I doubt the hospital would prefer to keep me and fire him. That's why I avoid him and walk away as much as possible. I'm really at a loss and I really don't want to lose my job.
I know how it feels - he's in a position of authority for you and you don't want to rock the boat and risk losing your job. Or make him angry/escalate. I'm sorry, you must feel pretty scared.
I'd like to reinforce that you're not overreacting, and you've done nothing wrong. He sounds pretty off kilter. I do think you should go to HR - what he's doing isn't okay and the fact that most females in your department know this is pretty disturbing to me. He's abusing his authority.
Is there any way you can anonymously report him? As if you were a patient that has witnessed something? That might make you feel more comfortable, though perhaps it won't do much good.
If you don't want to go to HR, I'd at least recommend refusing to work on his weekends anymore.
I'm afraid for you. Please make sure you're safe. These kinds of people aren't just "joking" around. They are testing to see how far they can go.
So far I have only felt concern once- when he came up to me at my car as I was getting ready to go home after work. He only talked to me briefly- asked what my plans were for the night & rest of the week. All the other times I have been in the hospital. I never thought about him thinking there was any type of relationship between us. I don't feel threatened, I just feel uncomfortable when he acts like this. You are right, I do need to be more assertive and let him know he should stop.
This pulled your story straight from very creepy to downright terrifying. He may have been scouting what car you drive so he could follow you outside the hospital. Maybe that sounds extreme, but there was a student a semester behind me in nursing school who did just that with his female classmates. That fear you felt when he followed you to your car? That desire to get away from him when he is touching you without permission? That is you accurately reading his intentions. That is a survival instinct. You need to listen to it.
We don't know where he will draw the line (does he just like to play with nurses who work under him or does he actually attack women?) but we know he doesn't care where yours is. If you choose to continue how you have been and remain passive, your job may not be in jeopardy, but your safety absolutely is.
If you speak up and tell him to STOP, he may not stop (I pretty much 100% guarantee he will tell you you're the one with the problem. He is wrong.) but you will have established that the interactions are unwanted. Do NOT get sassy with him; he will think it's part of the game. You do not need to say please. You do NOT need to explain exactly how he's being a creep. Say "You are making me uncomfortable. Do not touch me." "Do not talk to me that way; it's inappropriate." Then disengage. Do not let him bait you into talking in circles. Get to where other staff members are present.
I saw in another thread that you do not need your nursing income. You are in an extraordinarily good circumstance because finances are not of concern - your livelihood does not depend on tolerating this man's sexual harassment. Take advantage of that. Your concerns then, are making sure he doesn't get to leave a black mark on your nursing employment, and/or getting him out of the hospital so he can't do the same thing to the other women that he is and will be sexually harassing if he continues to get a free pass.
You said you don't want to overreact. There are a lot of nurses who have replied from this thread who have extensive knowledge through personal experience. Heed their wisdom. You are not overreacting.
To create a clearly documented history of not overreacting:
If you have not told him to stop, that is your next step. Since he has been getting away with it, it's possible he won't take you seriously enough to think about changing. If he tries to persuade you you're being too sensitive, stop the conversation and get away from him.
Then mention it to every superior (to you, if not to him) that you've already talked to, again. Take note of their response. You have already done this, so I honestly doubt it will get anyone's attention enough to put a target on your back. If anyone tells you to talk it out with him, tell them you will not have a discussion with him without a witness because you don't feel safe.
Document all of this. Document what he did and when, to the best of your recollection. Document who you told and when, to the best of your recollection. Document who witnessed these interactions. From now on, document on a shift by shift basis so that your memory doesn't get foggy about who, what, when, where, and how.
The people who have already done nothing will probably continue that pattern. That's when you take it a step up. When you go to HR or the company hotline or whoever is his supervisor you tell them what this guy has done, you say that you first tried to address it directly and were unsuccessful. You tell them that you tried to address it through your own management and were unsuccessful, so now you are looking for help to restore a safe working environment. Do this part via e-mail. No sane person would think you are being unreasonable.
Do have you had performance reviews? Are they reasonably good? Have you been warned or disciplined for anything? NOW is the time to establish that you are in good standing with them. If you report him, do it via e-mail and be VERY clear that you are in good standing and fear retaliation because he is in power.
If they do anything to you in the manner of warnings, write-ups, termination, that was not already an established problem before you reported him, that is retaliation. It's illegal, and whistleblowers have specific protections under the Department of Labor. You sue the pants off them and make them think twice before letting another predator run around stalking their female staff members from a position of power. But that may not happen. There may be people who care and will do the right thing. You don't know if you never report, and you'll probably never stop him if you don't report.
If you are dead set against reporting him, get out of that job. Now. At the very least, go PRN and only pick up shifts when he doesn't work. Or find another position - any position - ASAP so that when you leave that hospital, there's no gap on your employment history.
I don't know that this guy is necessarily going to follow intimate abuser patterns like trying to isolate you, but I think people have made some brilliant points about parallels in distorted thinking. You're not short of money, so get a lawyer. If you can't bear the thought of getting a lawyer, at least call a women's shelter. You'll find a lot more women who have survived experiences with men like that, who will tell you again that this is NOT the time to doubt your instincts.
If you document via e-mail, make sure you have a copy on a non-work e-mail account so that you don't lose the record if you sever employment with the hospital. The purpose is not just to document while knowledge is fresh, but to prove that you didn't just up and decide you don't like this guy one day and invent an entire history of harassment that didn't happen.
Report him. Take him to task for his behavior. If the hospital won't take him to task, you take the hospital to task. Stop him from hurting you however you need to, and worry about your job last. If you stand up for yourself, you also have a chance to protect other women from his harassment.
Sorry if this line of thought is a little disjointed; I'm just flabbergasted that this is being tolerated. I want you to be safe, and I also want someone to DO SOMETHING stop him.
I'm so sorry you had to go through this. No one should have to put up with any kind of harassment in order to not lose their job but its the reality of the world that we live in. However, this behavior needs to be put to a stop ASAP. If enough people report him, something will happen. What he is doing already is illegal and wrong. But if he isn't stopped he will assault someone, or cause irreparable damage to another person, both physically and emotionally. If it was me, and I allowed this behavior to continue without doing something and something happened to another person (like sexual assault), I don't know if I could forgive myself for not saying anything.
I agree with everyone else. Report, go to HR and start documenting.
No, you are not in the least bit overreacting. This needs to stop immediately. Be blunt, tell him you are uncomfortable and if it doesn't stop you will be reporting him. Then when he doesn't stop, because I don't think he will, stick to your guns and report him! HR should be all over that as no way does your employer want to be named in a sexual harassment lawsuit. If HR isn't immediately investigating don't be afraid to contact a lawyer. If everything you said is true this definitely is sexual harassment and is most certainly an actionable offense.
I had an instructor who acted this way and it started out as small little things that eventually built into bigger issues. He ended up pinning me against the wall one day stating, "how about I show you what sexual harassment is..." I was fed up. I was loud. And made it very clear that he had absolutely no chance. From then on, he'd see me avoid him and knew I meant it. Administration found out from a couple other students what was going on. He ended up getting fired.
Point being, yours is probably not the only complaint. The more complaints he receives, the worse off he is. He is becoming a HUGE liability to the hospital. And as a nurse, you have jobs waiting for you. I can easily get you into a position where I'm at. You can find a pro-bono attorney for this.
Also, what happened to the use of cell phones to prove this behavior??? I'd have one ready to record every time he came near me. Then bring that ammo to HR so they can't possibly ignore. And if they do... well, social media can be a blessing for you.
Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
Maybe your right, but I really don't want it to look like I'm overreacting if I report it. I also think I might lose my job if I tell someone in HR. He's been working at this hospital for years. I have told my charge nurse and other coworker nurses know, and they have all said there's not much that can be done and to just try to avoid him. My charge nurse was the one who told me that he's been fired from other jobs for this stuff. I asked why he was hired with that background and why he's allowed to continue to be here and she said she didn't know. This is a part time job for him- weekends only. I am required to work every other weekend, so that's the only time he's around me. He has a full time job at the VA and asked me to work there. I said I couldn't because I had applied (as a nurse extern) and was turned down. He said he would get me in. I said no. He was a soldier in the army and fought in the Iraq war. He told a story to me and several coworkers about how he wanted to take care of his daughter's boyfriend and he knew no one would figure out what happened to him. Someone said, "wow, I hope I never piss you off." I agreed. I can see how it's easy for some to say that I need to report this, but it's not that easy. Administration knows about him, and others know. It's happened before at this hospital with him and the other nurses no longer work here (I do not know why- their reasons for leaving might not be related to this). I want it to stop but I don't want to lose my job or make him mad. I doubt the hospital would prefer to keep me and fire him. That's why I avoid him and walk away as much as possible. I'm really at a loss and I really don't want to lose my job.
You may have to choose between keeping your job and getting rid of this predator. It's not fair. It sucks. You shouldn't have to make that choice. But at some point, you are going to have to make a decision whether to report him and risk your job or let him continue to harass you. Right now, you're letting him continue to harass you and it doesn't seem to be making you happy. As others have advised, keep a journal and start looking for another job. Make some decisions about what you want, how far you're willing to go. But make them now, because he won't stop until someone MAKES him stop, and it's only going to get worse.
Specializes in Oncology; medical specialty website.
I want to make it clear that I LOVE my job. I'm concerned that saying anything will jeopardize my job in some way. Other people have witnessed this, but I never kept a journal. I really didn't think it would last this long. I have no desire to get a lawyer.
I have tried avoiding him and I walk away after he says or does something. Yesterday I walked away after he made a comment and he followed me and said "you don't need to be embarrassed around me and you don't have to walk away."
There's no way I can't be under his supervision. He is the boss of all the nurses in the entire hospital (he's the boss of my boss (the nurse manager)). He isn't with me all day, but he sees me many times each day on the weekend days that I work.
I guess I need to be more firm and actually say this is making me uncomfortable. I have preferred the more passive and avoidant approach because I wanted to avoid repercussions from him. I believe he could have me fired if he wanted to.
Specializes in Specializes in L/D, newborn, GYN, LTC, Dialysis.
OP NO job is worth all this. You keep saying you love your job. I can't see how, if this is the crap you have to deal with each day. Others have given better advice than I could right now. The hair on my neck is standing on end. I have been in an abusive situation/relationship and this guy is nuts and a stalker and you may be in grave danger. I would quit before putting up with one more minute of this. But not before I let EVERYONE know I have retained a lawyer and want actions taken on this or I would sue.
You have more than enough cause. GET OUT OF THERE YESTERDAY. It will only escalate and this nut case may hurt you or worse.
Also, what happened to the use of cell phones to prove this behavior??? I'd have one ready to record every time he came near me. Then bring that ammo to HR so they can't possibly ignore. And if they do... well, social media can be a blessing for you.
Good luck. I hope this gives you hope.
She's very concerned about keeping her job. If she uses a mobile phone to record audio or video inside a hospital, she could get fired. If she posts audio or video recorded in the hospital to social media for the purpose of smearing the hospital, she will DEFINITELY get fired. It may ensure he has consequences, but it will damager her as well. The "I quit" cake probably didn't do that one nurse's career any good, no matter how well deserved it was.
I did forget to suggest putting her mobile phone in a pocket on audio record the second she clocks out, and keep it recording until she's safely away from the hospital in her car. YES get a security escort, but... just in case... because like SmilingBluEyes, there are major sirens going off in my head about this situation.
If it were me, I'd start yelling "I SAID DON'T TOUCH ME" every time the sonofabiscuit came near me, IF I even went back to work. I would make it clear to every relevant person that I would not be near him unless another staff member were present, and I would make a ruckus (literally, loudly) if he tried to get me somewhere without a witness. I think giving him a firm and clear "no" looks better for the case (and if she can follow through, MAY make her a less appealing target), BUT there is absolutely no (reasonable) argument in his favor. This is already severe and pervasive sexual harassment (plus possible stalking, which sets off warning bells about further escalation), and management has already been notified and failed to act appropriately. That alone is enough. I would quit without notice (don't give him another chance to follow you home if he hasn't done it yet), and find a way to artfully smooth over the abrupt change in employment in future interviews.
But OP is not me, not any of us here. She is hesitant to be assertive, hesitant to look unreasonable, hesitant to leave what otherwise could be a good job. If she's not ready to simply draw a hard line, I do think we should offer as many tactics and resources as possible for coping with the situation.
OP, above all, please be safe. No job is worth sacrificing your humanity.
Kitiger, RN
1,834 Posts
(My bold.) This is excellent advice. Along with making a plan, a counselor at the shelter can help you role-play how to respond with a clear "NO!"
"Get your uninvited hands off of me!"
"Back off! Get out of my personal space!"
"I've told you before to leave me alone. If you do this again, I will report you to HR."
Please, do not let him catch you alone at your car. Have someone with you. Do you see how easy it would be for him to get into the car with you and abduct you?