I’m an 18-year-old girl and my holiday job is at a restaurant.
I’m the only girl who works there, all my colleagues are men who are older than me. One of my colleagues who I think is around 25/26 has been making me very uncomfortable recently.
When I first started working there he would get very close to me physically and ask me if I had a boyfriend. I told him I did, even though I do not because I thought it would make him leave me alone.
Every time I work he asks me if I and my boyfriend have broken up yet. Every time I tell him we have not. During my last shift, he snuck up on me from behind while I was chopping food and touched me. Later that day he started reaching toward my face, and I told him to stop then backed away.
He kept reaching until I was backed into a wall and touched my face and started messing with my hair then told me I was so pretty. I was clearly uncomfortable and trying to get away from him. He asked me how old I was a few days ago, and when I told him I was 18, he said there’s no way I’m 18, that I look 15, which made me very uncomfortable since he clearly likes me so the fact that he thinks I look like a 15-year-old child and likes me anyway is really gross.
He texts me sometimes when I’m not working asking me to come by the restaurant, and I always just say no I’m busy so I will see you during my next shift, and then he will say something along the lines of “I’m counting the minutes until then”.
The reason I would like some opinions on if this is sexual harassment is that I worry I am overreacting due to my past experiences. When I was 15 I was groomed and almost “taken” by a man in his 20s who also worked at a restaurant.
He used to bring me by the restaurant a lot and the way my colleagues behaves honestly reminds me a lot of what happened when I was younger and is bringing up a lot of past memories.
I really don’t know what to do in this situation. I don’t want to report my colleague if it is sexual harassment because I already have to go to court against the man who did it to me when i was 15 and am dealing with that, so i cant handle another report right now.
Would really appreciate some opinions on this. Thanks.