Pathetic problem...

[Flavia]

I just spent friday at a business luncheon meeting with a woman who I thought was my friend and was an employee of a health related charity I’d been doing a ton of work for in the last two years. She was fired by the organization last summer, but I had stayed in contact with her, as had several others from the organization. I could tell from a weird question she asked me- and a strange conversation she had in the car with me after the luncheon, that she had started a rumor to someone else in the organization, who I don’t know at all, that was suggesting that the reason I was such a passionate volunteer for them, was because I was in pursuit of a doctor who worked there, and was doing all the work to try and get closer to him. I could see through what she was saying and said something fairly vague, so she didn’t see that she upset me or that I knew she wasn’t to be trusted. The doctor she thinks I am pursuing is my husband’s doctor, who has basically cured my husband of an incurable cancer, and I do revere him. He is on the Board of this organization. I do volunteer for the organization out of gratitude to him, but have never seen him there or talked to him about my involvement with it... The “friend” was actually the one who told the doctor’s wife that their best volunteer was a grateful family member of her husband’s patient. I’m not sure what to do. I suspect I should do nothing. I do have sort of a guilty conscience, because I do worship my husband’s doctor, and his good opinion is very important to me. But my interest is not sexual or romantic, and the only way I have acted on this is to support this organization he started. So its kind of a true rumor, but totally misleading, and I’m not sure what to do now. I am doing a lot for the organization, and that now feels like it confirms the (slimy) rumor.

[PookiePants]

There's nothing you can really do except just ignore it. Your future actions will speak for themselves and sooner or later, the rumors will die down.

[Ronni_W]

No, no. Do NOT let your former friend's anger and disappointment at being fired get you believing wrong things about yourself!

 

Whether or not she started the rumour, it is NOT true at all. It is absolutely false. Don't allow an incorrect idea, spread by a resentful hag, to generate within you a "guilty conscience".

 

Continue to do your good and charitable works. Be absolutely upfront about your gratitude to this man, and your reasons for choosing to contribute your time and energy to this particular cause. There is NOTHING to be ashamed or afraid of, in how you've explained it here.

 

If you ever need to, simply say that you have no idea why she felt compelled to turn your honest and genuine gratitude and admiration into something sinister. Others will get that she's just pi$$ed about being fired, and will be able to see from your honesty and commitment to the cause that there's nothing but malice behind her words.

 

I agree with you to not trust this person. Just withdraw your company from her, carefully and gracefully.

[Trialbyfire]

This makes no sense. Why would she do this, when you and the revered doctor, had nothing to do with her getting fired?

 

I could see her spewing malice at the organization, or the person who fired her but why you two? You, for certain, were a part of her support network, in that you kept in touch, after she was fired.

[Green]

Just tell your husband about this, as far as every one else you have nothing to explain, in fact if you dont want to talk about how this upset you to your husband, you dont even need to do that. just thought it might make u feel better

[Flavia]

She has always been a gossip, and I'd listened to her in the past for insight into the organization I'd been volunteering for. Many of her conversations had included "Don't tell anyone I told you this..."

 

My sense in the car was that she had passed off something as a fact to the other person in the organization, and was asking me leading questions to see if what she had passed off as fact, was true.

 

I hadn't thought about it before, but she may resent that I am still working hard for an organization that fired her.

[Ronni_W]

I hadn't thought about it before, but she may resent that I am still working hard for an organization that fired her.

Or she, herself, has a crush on the good doctor. Or she is resentful that he holds you in high regard ... Or a dozen other possibilities that we can't even imagine. Perhaps, even, you are not the only one she is targeting.

 

I wouldn't be too concerned about her reasons and issues -- just make sure that you do stand up for your own reputation should you ever be called upon to do so. "No, that is not true about me," ought to do it. In my own experience with gossip, the more we defend ourselves against specifics, the guiltier we appear to be. Now I just say, "Anyone who knows ME, also knows that is just plain cr@p!"

 

On the other side, and since you mentioned it, maybe there is a need to make (inner) peace with the fact that in the past you've used her gossip for your own ends, and to decide not resort to that in the future?

[Trialbyfire]

While you're probably right about this woman, there is a possibility you might be wrong, that she spread the rumour. It's possible she heard the rumour and is only parroting gossip back, as is her want. Why not keep an open mind in the interim, find out who the others in the organization, she's still in contact with, and draw your conclusions after you've got some proof?

[Flavia]

Thank you all... yes, the irony of having benefited from listening to her gossip and now being a possible victim of it is not lost on me.

 

This is basically the first time I've been on committees as a volunteer in a non-profit, and the dynamics are new to me. Some of

 

And there are two other times in my life where I was grossly misunderstood in a situation, with no format to clear the air or declare my innocence, so the feels like a familiar anxiety.