There's a busybody in my class whom I will refer to as Nosy. I am not jealous of her, and I'm not being catty. What concerns me is her tendency to gossip and tattle. In nursing school, this could equal expulsion.
There's a saying, "Keep your friends close and her enemies closer." I'm not sure which is safer, as this human tabloid has proven that even if she considers you a friend, she will spread shit around because she loves drama and being the Barbara Walters of gossip. She's not overtly malicious, I think it's because she's only 19 and still acts like she's in the microcosm of high school. She's popular in high school terms, and always needs to be surrounded by admirers. A lot of people are aware that she's nosy and gossipy, but flock to her because she's smart. I'm smart too and get better grades than her, but I keep to myself and don't spend all my time trying to get all social information possible. In fact, she once asked me how I get such good grades. I was tempted to say, "Instead of gossiping all the time, I actually study."
Last semester, Nosy and I were in clinical together. I got a bad vibe of her from the beginning due to her constant need to know EVERYTHING that is going on, even if was none of her business. She was a vast wealth of social information. This could be useful, like learning about things that people who had already taken the course. However, she'd also talk about people and complain about how unfair things were. The first and pretty much only time she every tried to gossip with me, "If she talks about others with you, then she'll talk about you."
One day, the bitch showed how dangerous she could be. I made a mistake in clinical, and the clinical instructor asked me to stay after class, and was kinda cranky for the rest of the day. Nosy was all over it. She asked, "What happened? Was it you?" I played dumb, hoping that she'd lose interest. I changed the subject by commenting that clinical was boring and uneventful because everyone was sleeping. That only made it worse. She spread it around, trying to dig into my business through other social contacts.
How do I know that it was her spreading it around? Because suddenly 3 different people in the group came up to me asking if it was true that I had gotten in trouble for falling asleep in class. In the gossip game of telephone (the game in which a bunch of people whisper a message in each others' ears ad see how much it gets distorted), she had asssumed that I had fallen asleep during clinical, and spread it around. In addition to the trouble that I had already gotten into, I had to sort that one out with the clinical instructor. It risked my enrollment in nursing school. I managed to get off with a slap on the wrist, but I have to make doubly sure that I never make a mistake again or I will have more of a risk of getting booted.
I confronted her, and of course she denied everything despite the overwhelming evidence. I told her overall to stay out of my business and stay in her own. She doesn't like being reminded that her shit stinks. I noticed that a lot of people who had previously been friendly with me were suddenly giving me the cold shoulder or even brushoff comments. How immature.
Like I said, I don't care if she doesn't like me, or if she's going to get others not to like me. I'm just scared shitless that she could cause further trouble with my education. I mean, if she treats her friends like that (not that I ever considered her a friend), I'd hate to see how she treats her enemies.
We're in lecture together, but not clinical, so things have been nonthreatening. However, there's 3 semesters left, and if I'm stuck in clinical with her again, I'm going to have to develop eyes on the back of my head.
Any advice?



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