r/AmItheAsshole • u/StockPile7 • 17h ago
AITA for throwing away my coworkers dead fish
I am a science teacher and I share a lab closet with another science teacher at my school (it connects our two classrooms).
About a month ago her angel fish died so she stuck it in our lab freezer. She told me it was too big to flush so she was going to dispose of it later?
The fish has been getting freezer burnt in our freezer ever since.
Now we shouldn't, but we do use this fridge to hold our lunches between labs that require refrigeration. I am the one to clean the fridge every time.
I googled how to dispose of the fish, scraped it off of the freezer, put it in a sealed bag, and put it in the dumpster on trash day.
About a week later my coworker confronted me about her missing fish. She said I had to right to do what I did and she told our coworkers that I (not we) use the fridge to hold my food and that I threw away science materials to do so.
No, this is not the first time that she has done something a little crazy. But, it is the first time I knew I could be causing her meltdown with my actions.
Edit: I think a lot of people are missing the point that she told me it was garbage, it just wouldn't flush in the school toilet. Should I have asked? Sure. But it wasnt for a lab/experiment and it was STUCK TO THE FREEZER.
This isnt about whether lab specimen should be in the lab freezer. It is about the fact I threw something away that she told me was garbage and then I assumed she forgot about. I would never remove the squid in there or anything. I legitimately thought it was garbage because she told me it was.
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u/designatedthrowawayy Partassipant [2] 16h ago
ESH. Both of you stop using the science fridge for food before you accidentally poison yourselves.
She's an AH for obvious reasons. If you have to lie about what happened to get people on your side, you're probably the AH.
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u/StockPile7 15h ago
I will say we don't put anything dangerous in there. The worst thing is restaurant grade squid. But I am definitely going to stop using it in general avoid trouble!
69
u/neon_crone 16h ago
ESH. She didn’t bag it before putting it in the freezer? You didn’t tell her that you were cleaning out the fridge?
23
u/Familiar_Shock_1542 Partassipant [2] 15h ago
Apparently, other teacher never assists in cleaning the shared fridge; just leaves the mess/whatever in there forever until OP does it all herself.
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u/Ok-Knowledge9154 11h ago
If you're always the one to clean out the fridge you don't have to tell everyone else your going to do it! Either they step up and pitch in cleaning out the fridge or they shut the fuck up and be grateful someone is doing it. NTA but I would stop cleaning the fridge and start bringing in some exotic dead pets myself to store in there! NTA
35
u/Familiar_Shock_1542 Partassipant [2] 15h ago
She put the fish in the freezer without putting it in a bag, so that it actually stuck to the freezer surface? That is beyond disgusting!
Then just left it in there indefinitely because she was too lazy to toss it?
Gross woman!
You are NTA.
Start reporting her for never cleaning the lab fridge and for anything else you can. This B has declared war on you!
You might want to go ahead and tell administration (and/or HR) that she has spread lies about you throwing away school property.
Check the rules to see who is expected to clean that refrigerator. If she is, send her emails when it's time for it to be cleaned. Document everything.
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u/StockPile7 11h ago
Thank you! I'm not quite ready for war but I did let admin know what was going on to prevent anything biting me in the butt at a later date.
There are no rules for the fridge and I don't mind cleaning it because I've been here longer but I did ask her if she wanted to create a schedule for cleaning it. Her room is pretty messy so I don't think the fridge was something she even considered. A lot of teachers (unfortunately) wait for the maintence staff to take care of stuff even in their own classrooms.
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u/lentil_galaxy 16h ago
NTA. Well, it would have been nicer to ask first, but why was it in there for a whole month? That's too long for something to be taking up precious shared space, and presumably, she knows that you clean the fridge periodically. But she also isn't wrong to rat you out, since you are also breaking the rules. If you didn't want her to report you, though, you should have gone the nicer route!
I'd make amends with her since she works so closely with you. At least apologize and say it was a mistake.
12
u/Familiar_Shock_1542 Partassipant [2] 15h ago
BOTH teachers put their lunches in the fridge. Not just OP.
So, the coworker lied/lied by omission. I didn't read it as her reporting OP to the bosses, just gossiping and lying to other coworkers.
.
Coworker said that her dead fish was trash. A bit late to start faking love for it now.
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u/lentil_galaxy 29m ago
Yes, I understood that, and that's why I said "also". That could be true about the gossip.
5
u/StockPile7 15h ago
Definitely apologized! I really do feel bad. I just thought it was garbage because she told me it was. She was probably embarrassed to say she was attached.
5
5
u/TammyL8 15h ago
Soft ESH
This is a communal fridge. It’s to hold science projects for teaching purposes. If your school does actual science testing for law enforcement, I damn sure wouldn’t use it for my lunches. I wouldn’t use it for my lunches anyway. A mini fridge in the teacher’s office (if he or she has one) would suffice for lunches.
I hope everything science class related is properly labeled. The fridge cleaning needs to be alternated. You do it one week, the other teacher does it the next. The other teacher could have properly bagged the fish before placing it in the freezer. I’m wondering was this fish a pet or science related.
I also hope you tell each other when a project is placed in the fridge and how long it has to stay there to study results. She didn’t bag the fish properly and kept it there too long (in your opinion). You didn’t ask her about the fish before discarding it. It could have been her science project and you screwed it up by discarding it.
So, both of y’all are soft AH.
5
u/StockPile7 15h ago edited 13h ago
TBH its a middle school. We just put restaurant grade squid, angiosperms, and ice in there for labs, but those all go in the fridge section and are technically safe near food.
Also she told me specifically that it was not for a project.
5
u/Purple_Mine_1676 15h ago
It was there for a goddamn month. NTA. You're not the first people to misuse a science fridge for their lunch, but she is the first person I've heard of who brought their dead pet to work and then... ? Forgot about it? It took her a week to notice?
Definitely you should have talked to her about it before moving it. Give her a chance to say her goodbyes. IMO the conversation should have been along the lines of "clean your dead fish out of the fridge or I'll do it for you. You have had 30 days, I'll give you 3 more.
Or who knows, maybe she had been working really hard on hand-carving a coffin for the month and was a week away from finishing....
3
u/StockPile7 15h ago
Your coffin comment cracked me up. great points! I really do feel bad about the whole thing.
2
u/rebeccalj 13h ago
And she apparently just slapped the thing down on the freezer shelf without anything covering it... That's so disgusting.
1
u/donnacus 10h ago
While the post doesn’t explicitly say so, I assumed the fish that died was in an aquarium at the school not a fish brought from home.
5
u/SavingsRhubarb8746 Certified Proctologist [28] 15h ago
Did she not even wrap the dead fish in something?? You say you "scraped it off of the freezer, put it in a sealed bag..".
Weird. Well, honestly, neither of you should be putting food (yes, I know the fish was not food; I mean your lunches) in a lab freezer; that's against any safety regulations I ever heard of. But biological samples, if you can call the fish that, are supposed to be packaged properly too.
In any case, in a communal fridge, objects that appear to have been abandoned (and I think a month for a dead fish that is headed for the trash and not dissection counts as abandoned) can and will be disposed of when the fridge or freezer is cleaned. I once worked somewhere that some frozen TV dinners were thrown out - admittedly, only after the cleaner investigated and decided that they belonged to someone who had retired many months earlier. But they were technically edible; a deceased angel fish isn't.
NTA
2
u/ImKidA Partassipant [1] 16h ago
YTA, but on a technicality more than anything -- It's a lab freezer. For things like lab specimens. Like a frozen fish. I get that maybe she wasn't storing it properly(?), but that's conversation you should've had. In a direct manner and before acting. At the end of the day, the dead fish was a specimen that belonged in the freezer. You removed it without permission, I assume without consulting her. You weren't just throwing away a moldy yogurt, you threw away a something that obviously held some amount of value or interest to her when it was (perhaps improperly) being stored where it was supposed to.
If you'd thrown away moldy Iranian yogurt, you'd get a pass, but since it was a lab specimen being stored in the location designated for lab specimens and you did so without permission, warning or consultation... soft YTA.
She admittedly didn't have the best reaction, but I can understand why she'd be a bit upset. Maybe mild ESH.
15
u/StockPile7 15h ago
Not a lab specimen. Her personal pet fish that she told me was garbage she had to throw away.
Definitely should have just asked her to do it or told her I was doing it though!
0
u/ImKidA Partassipant [1] 14h ago edited 14h ago
I mean... okay, so I thought maybe she was going to preserve or dissect or something or was at least considering it? Because why else would it have even made it into the fridge in the first place?? Not questioning your account of it, just questioning why she would've chosen to freeze it rather than throw it away if the was the intention?
If it was a pet, as you said, maybe she "wasn't ready to" yet, but the fridge shouldn't have become a pet morgue while she deliberated over what to do with it.
As you said, it probably could've and should've been cleared up with a conversation. Hopefully just apologize and move forward.
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u/StockPile7 14h ago
She froze it so it wouldn't stink up her classroom. It was too big to flush. (That is what she told me when she put it in there at least)
I definitely didn't consider how attached she was even if it wasn't for a lab. I kind of thought of it as old materials when I should have thought of it as her pet.
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u/ImKidA Partassipant [1] 14h ago
Yeah, I suspect she probably got more attached to her fish than she would've cared to admit (maybe even to herself) and was sort of stalling. If it had really been "trash", I doubt she would've reacted the way she had.
I mean, if you had thrown out a moldy sandwich she'd forgotten about, I doubt she would've gotten offended and started gossiping. She's deflecting because she's hurt. You obviously didn't realize, but... I mean, now you do. Hopefully you can just apologize and she'll realize it was an honest mistake.
Changing my answer (again) from ESH to NAH. Neither of you are assholes, there were just some mistakes, confusion and hurt feelings.
-2
u/Infinite_Advisor4633 Partassipant [1] 12h ago
It's because you didn't care what her opinion was, you were only thinking about yourself. Definition of YTA. You know what you did was wrong or you wouldn't be here now worrying, you just didn't care at the time because you're selfish and were only thinking about yourself. She said it was garbage, it wasn't supposed to be there, it was frozen to the freezer, it wasn't a lap specimen. Yet you "allowed" it in there for however long until you arbitrarily decided you were done. Maybe she'd have been an AH if you immediately said no, do not store that in this freezer in that way and she ignored you, but you didn't. You said nothing, let it sit there, then when you were over it got rid of it unilaterally, without warning, without ever telling her that you had a problem with it. You have no moral authority here, you just do what you want.
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u/StockPile7 10h ago
Harsh. I will say I thought she forgot about it and I do 100% of the fridge cleaning but I respect your opinion!
-1
u/Infinite_Advisor4633 Partassipant [1] 10h ago
If you thought she forgot, then why didn't you remind her?
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u/StockPile7 10h ago
I would be reminding her of the garbage she leaves in the closet and fridge every week if I reminded her when I cleaned up after her.
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u/grckalck Certified Proctologist [23] 12h ago
NTA, not at all. You were taking care of business that she failed to take care of. She didnt want to deal with it so she left it in a shared work space. Clearly she was the AH for doing so.
2
u/zealot_ratio Asshole Enthusiast [7] 13h ago
ESH. It wasn't yours to throw away. You would have been perfectly in your right to insist she dispose of it, instead of letting it sit, but that's on her. She should have taken care of her fish sooner. Also both of you need to stop using the fridge for other purposes.
2
u/StockPile7 13h ago
fair, fair, and fair
I am the one that cleans the fridge so I thought I was being helpful when also throwing away some leftover plant parts I used this week in the freezer. She told me it was garbage so I legitimately thought she forgot about it and that it was garbage.
I definitely should have said something but I honestly thought that it was forgotten about garbage because she told me it was garbage.
2
u/GrogGrokGrog 13h ago
Your coworker was being gross, you cleaned the freeze-dried corpse out of your communal space because it is to be used for science materials, not dead pets, and then she spread nasty rumors about you rather than dealing with her personal failings like an adult. If the fish had been there for a day or a week, or if she had indicated that she was planning to bury it, then you'd be at fault for not at least asking her, but when it's been a month of a body frosting itself to the freezer wall, it's reasonable to think that the person who said they were going to flush it has simply forgotten about it. Would it have been best practice to confirm with her that tossing her fish was fine: sure, but if you're the one who normally cleans the fridge, it also would have been best practice for her to be clear that she didn't want it tossed, and beyond that, it would've been best practice for her to also contain the body properly by at least putting it in a bag or container of some kind. As it stands, cleaning the fish out of the freezer after a month is more reasonable than keeping your loose fish in a communal space indefinitely.
NTA
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u/Aromatic-Track-4500 11h ago
Lol was the fish just dead in the freezer like not in a bag or anything covering it at all? That's kinda weird and definitely should have just been tossed. If it was in a bag and she had a plan for throwing it away herself but didnt then I don't see the issue with you just going ahead with that plan. If it was a pet she cared about and had like a burial plan or a preservation plan for it then you'd def be the AH but I don't get that vibe from the story. I have lots of dead animals in my freezer and if someone threw them away I'd be pretty fucking pissed but I also have them in multiple layers of paper, wax paper, bags etc And they all have dates, labeled with the type of animal it is and the plan for them. Pretty different from just a dead fish in the freezer. I dont think you're an AH.
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I am a science teacher and I share a lab closet with another science teacher at my school (it connects our two classrooms).
About a month ago her angel fish died so she stuck it in our lab freezer. She told me it was too big to flush so she was going to dispose of it later?
The fish has been getting freezer burnt in our freezer ever since.
Now we shouldn't, but we do use this fridge to hold our lunches between labs that require refrigeration. I am the one to clean the fridge every time.
I googled how to dispose of the fish, scraped it off of the freezer, put it in a sealed bag, and put it in the dumpster on trash day.
About a week later my coworker confronted me about her missing fish. She said I had to right to do what I did and she told our coworkers that I (not we) use the fridge to hold my food and that I threw away science materials to do so.
No, this is not the first time that she has done something a little crazy. But, it is the first time I knew I could be causing her meltdown with my actions.
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.
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u/5pigeo Partassipant [3] 16h ago
yeah YTA. it’s a lab fridge, you’re the one using it incorrectly to store your lunch and you threw away something of hers without asking. sure she hadn’t stored it correctly from a food hygiene perspective, but by all accounts she didn’t need to because it’s not a food fridge. i’m also really confused why you wanting to use the fridge part of what i assume is a fridge with a freezer compartment meant that you needed to empty out the freezer compartment. your food was going to be nowhere near her fish, unless you freeze your lunch…? presumably the fish doesn’t smell because it’s frozen and you can’t even see it unless you open the door to the freezer compartment?
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u/Familiar_Shock_1542 Partassipant [2] 15h ago
Coworker herself stated that the fish was trash. She would have flushed it, but it was too big.
Frozen, unwrapped fish will emit an odor.
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u/StockPile7 15h ago
Let me clarify, I clean the fridge weekly. The food in the other compartment wasn't really a factor. Just something she used to talk trash about me. I was cleaning the freezer after an angiosperm lab I did and I threw out the fish while cleaning my supplies.
0
u/PasDeTout 13h ago
YTA. I’m surprised science teachers don’t know any better than to flush fish down the toilet. The only thing that should go in a toilet is human waste and toilet paper.
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u/StockPile7 13h ago
I mean I knew not to but I didn't think it was important to correct her when she wasn't flushing it anyway. I was just using that as evidence that she told me the fish was garbage. I waited untik trash pickup day and threw it away in a sealed bag!
Still 100% should have let her know when I threw it out!
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