I'm fed up - She cries and yelled at me

Hey, I just need to vent a little! Sorry in advance for the long post!

I work in construction as a project assistant (I’m 27F) with a colleague who’s 38F—let’s call her Isa. Before moving to Canada, she was an architect and took a training program in estimation after arriving here. I started as an admin assistant and eventually got promoted to my current role.

Isa has been with the company for 15 months, and I trained her when she started. Even though it’s been over a year, she still asks me super basic questions like it’s her first day.

A bit about Isa:

She never takes responsibility for her mistakes—it’s always someone else’s fault.

She’s very sensitive and cries whenever anyone gives her feedback.

She constantly interrupts when you’re talking.

She doesn’t take the time to fully read emails, which leads to constant misunderstandings.

For months, I’ve tried to push her to figure things out on her own, but she still asks, “How do you know that?” or “How do you do it?” The answer is usually just calling the client, subcontractor, or superintendent... Or read the email!! I get the impression she’s waiting for someone to hand her all the answers.

What happened recently: An admin assistant, Sally(26F), asked me to make sure she’s copied on emails when we open projects. I forgot once, apologized, and that was the end of it. Later, Isa came into my office to ask me something I’ve explained to her a thousand times, so I took the opportunity to remind her to copy Sally as well.

She was in my office when I said this and immediately got defensive, saying we only did that when I wasn’t around. She stormed out of my office, stubbed her toe on the way out, and Sally asked if she was okay. That’s when Isa completely lost it, yelling that she wasn’t mad and that people were making problems for her.

She later sent me long messages on Teams, saying it hurt her feelings that I assumed she was angry. She also came back to my office hours later, raised her voice, started crying, and cut me off whenever I tried to explain my side. HR overheard her yelling twice and asked if I wanted to escalate the issue, but I declined because I didn’t want to make it worse.

Oh, and Isa also told Sally she was going to delete her number and never talk to her outside of work because Sally was “causing her problems.” (She was yelling at her too)

Some background on Isa’s attitude: She once made comments about how it’s unfair that Sally, who’s in accounting, can open projects in the system, while she (as a project assistant) can’t. She’s also developed a reputation in the office—no one wants to work with her because of her behavior. All the project managers always come to me for help instead of her, which is why we now have two interns to help take the load off me.

🥲🥲