Carina K

Couple of years ago, I was working as a car-cleaner for a BMW Dealer in a small town in county Wexford. I had been working for them for four months when a manager started to call me “Honey”. I found it rather inappropriate in a work place, I asked him to call me by my name.

Soon, an arrogant, stuck-up person (another manager) showed up, and started to explain that (and I quote) “…in this country ladies are called like Hon, Sweetheart or whatever men want to call them…”, so he started to call me “Darling”.
From that day on, this manager visited me regularly at work. He simply brought to my knowledge that it would have been much better for me to become his “Friend with benefits”, if I had wanted to keep my -otherwise- underpaid and hard physical job. I relied on this income as I was married and had a family.

I just wanted to work, earn money and spend it on my family. I didn`t want any trouble. They were extremely happy with my work, so I calmed down a bit when a 20-year-old girl arrived to the company (I was 39) to participate in a 9-month Internship as a receptionist, and this manager had found another amusement for himself in the person of that girl.
(Literally, they spent the whole day together, the company supplied them with enough TIME, CAR and FUEL to travel to the next town where the girl lived so that they could have sex instead of being at work.
However, this company REFUSED to pay me 35c raise on my minimum-wage FOR MY WORK!!!
Apparently, this manager`s private activities was considered much more profitable for the company than my actual WORK – which is ridiculous and, I`d say, a crying shame)

The only thing I wasn`t happy with was that when this girl went on holiday this manager came and started the harassment over again as he needed someone for sex. As I could observe it, he was literally “bathing” in the fame of being a “fashionable womanizer”.
He literally could bother anyone UNPUNISHED as he was completely a beneficiary of nepotism at the company we worked for. Being famous for having more than one “Friend with benefits” simultaneously was his REAL enjoyment, rather than actually having sex with them. (And, he was a married man. I`m sure, no one envied his wife.)

He often came and pretended in front of my colleagues that I was one of his “Friends with benefits”. I was warned for the second time not to fall out with that manager, so to save my job AND ONLY TO SAVE MY JOB!!! I slept with him for the second time.

When his girlfriend returned from holiday, he dumped me saying that he couldn`t sleep with me after work anymore as I was dirty from work, and he wouldn`t take DIRTY WOMEN doing FILTHY jobs.

As he has never been famous for his discretion, the whole company had been informed that I got dumped. (I was convinced that saying such a thing to me made him satisfied for his being rejected previously.)

I tried to notify the head of the company about the humiliation and harassment but he then started to send me texts like (and I quote) “… Don`t f…ck with me, I am warning you, this is the last you`ll hear of me so remember this: don`t be slagging me off or you will be sorry!… I`m f…cking warning you don`t f…ck with me. … Let`s get one thing clear, you don`t want to f…ck with me!…”

If you ask me, the guy must have been an emotional cripple. At a moment he came and said I was “priceless”, then he saw another girl, and texted me that I needed to “f…ck off” and delete his number, then when he got left without any date for the evening, he texted me requiring to “form a friendship” again – “with benefits”, of course, and then the next day he started all over again.
He was a complete DEAD END, that you had only one choice with: turn around and leave.
And, he was a shame in other aspects too such as he was wearing suit and tie, I mean, I expected a little more sophisticated manner from someone in his profession (Finance & Insurance).

I couldn`t take the harassment and humiliation anymore as he and the whole company objectified me as his spare sex-toy, grabbed and thrown away, so after two months of being ashamed I quit my job.

The most interesting part of it is that my reputation has been ruined, I couldn`t get a job ever since I left. I think this is also a form of rape when someone is blackmailed with their job. The most disgusting thing was how this company was covering his sexual harassment in every possible way. I have always known that eventually I would have been fired, if I hadn`t quit.

This guy had spent two years stalking me after I left. I wonder what he was about to say…
There had been a saying in town that “I was his obsession” as he couldn`t take his failure when I refused him. I didn`t. What I refused was being his toy, a blackmailed woman, and a public laughing stock in a small town like this – as he often publicised his “fresh adventures”.

I wasn`t born here. I came here from another country to start a new life, and I haven`t done anything to deserve the hatred I receive now from men here. I am so sorry but around 40 I seem to be unable to be afraid of men`s threats anymore. I got over it – in the age.

Nowadays, I don`t react to any comments of men, – not even nice ones.
They hate me because although I lost my job, I kept my marriage.