'My coworker harasses me about my masculinity and DM’d my wife. AITA?' UPDATED

"My coworker harasses me about my masculinity and DM’d my wife. AITA?"

I’m currently dealing with a work situation that I (28M) need advice on Before work I go to the gym about every other day. I’m hardly shredded but I’ve gone enough that you can see my muscles when I come into work in short sleeves. I wouldn’t describe myself as a gym bro or a gym rat, I really just go for my overall health.

Anyways, I work in an office with maybe 25-30 people that work there. We mainly do business to business sales and supply (not really relevant to the story). Anyway, I get to work one day wearing a polo and a couple of girls and guys in the office were asking me if I had been working out recently and I told them that I had.

It wasn’t flirtatious or anything like that I think they were just giving me a friendly compliment, plus I’m married but as we’re discussing me working out, my coworker Gary (40sM) walks in. Gary is…a lot. He's one of those guys who constantly talks about how much he benches, his "gains," and generally just tries to project this super intense, alpha male image. Which is annoying but none of my business really.

This is where the problem starts. Someone asked me what my max bench was. I told them honestly, and Gary, who was lurking nearby, scoffed. Loudly. He then proceeded to tell me, in front of like five other coworkers, that my number (170) was "pathetic" and that I clearly wasn't a "real man" or an "alpha."

He then went on a tirade about how men need to be strong and dominate, etc., etc. It was super uncomfortable. I tried to just laugh it off and change the subject, but it didn't work. Since then, it's gotten worse.

Every single day, Gary makes some kind of comment. If I'm getting coffee, he'll ask if I'm "strong enough to lift the pot." If I'm walking to my desk, he'll flex and ask if I'm "inspired yet to hit the weights like a real man.”

I've tried ignoring him, giving him short answers, even politely telling him to knock it off. Nothing works. He just laughs and says I need to "grow a thicker skin."

Then, this is where I start to lose my s#$t a little. My wife (27F) texted me a screenshot yesterday. It was a DM from GARY. It was a picture of him flexing in the mirror with some ridiculous caption about being a "true alpha" and how "real women" know what's up. (Summarizing but you get the sentiment). He'd somehow found her on social media and sent her this unsolicited picture and message.

I was beyond furious. I wanted to march over to his desk and punch him, but I knew that would only make things worse. I'm starting to dread coming to work. It's constant, it's demeaning, it's making me feel genuinely small and uncomfortable, and now he's involving my wife. Am I overreacting to this?

Is this just typical "guy banter" that I'm not getting? Should I just suck it up and ignore him, or is this actually something worth addressing with HR? I feel like if I tell HR it might just add fuel to the fire. But if I come down to his level and respond violently, I’ll lose my job.

Update: I’m going to take this to HR tomorrow, thank you guys for letting me know the severity of this.

Editor's Note: Here's a transcript of the DM Gary sent:

Gary: Hey Wife: Do I know you? Gary: I work with [redacted] if your're looking for a real man let me know. He wouldn't know what to do woth you. No idea how you're with such a weak man.

redacted picture of topless Gary

The internet did not hold back one bit.

Embarrassed-Cap2234 wrote:

HR should’ve been involved a long time ago. Be advised he will pursue the wife angle more aggressively than ever.

OP responded:

That’s my concern is that it’ll just make him want to escalate things further.

sallyskull4 wrote:

That’s a reasonable fear, but once you report it to HR (explain everything to them as you did here), you can continue to report any retaliation or additional incidents. He is harassing you and creating hostile work environment.

HR’s job is to protect the company from being sued by you by intervening in your coworker’s behavior. Just keep documenting everything because if HR doesn’t effectively do it’s job, you will have a case for a lawsuit. Obviously the hope is that it won’t come to that. Good luck!

OP responded:

I think you’re right. I think I’ve just let his whole thing about calling me weak get to my head. I’m just not into violence and I feel like that’s what he’s trying to provoke.

money_leopard_995 wrote:

I feel for you because the guy sounds like a first class dbag. I’m a gym guy and men like him give all of us a bad name. He sounds like he has self confidence issues and is picking on you because he thinks you’re an easy target. Contacting your wife though is totally unacceptable. She should block him immediately after stating if he contacts her again she is calling the authorities.

Guys like him need to understand the boundaries and realize they are non negotiable. Good for you for handling it so well. You are much more mature and sensible than I would be. Next time he says something ask him if he has enough game to get his own woman or has to try and steal others. Loser.

Two days later, OP shared an update.

Just wanted to update everybody after my last post. I ended up going to HR. I honestly didn’t think HR would do much because Gary is a good employee in terms of performance but surprisingly they took my complaint very seriously and were in disbelief when I showed them the screen shot of the DM he sent to my wife.

The next day, Gary was not at the office so I wasn’t sure if they had fired him or if he was just on a suspension at first but our boss told us to let his clients know that he was out for the day if they call the office. So I assumed that meant he got suspended. He was back this morning. Usually he greets me with some kind of smart remark but today he was really quiet and seemed to be avoiding eye contact with me.

When I went to grab some coffee out of the break room a little after that he came in there and asked if we could talk for a second. He proceeded to tell me that HR laid into him big time and they told him that if he pulled anything like that again, it would result in termination.

He then proceeded to apologize to me for everything and said that as pathetic as it sounds he was just upset that nobody ever compliments him on going to the gym despite how much time he spends in the gym in his free time. He said it hurt that people acknowledged me when going to the gym wasn’t as big of a deal for me as it was for him.

He then asked for my forgiveness. I honestly felt kind of bad for him in that moment, it was really kinda pathetic but he did seem sorry so I told him I accepted his apology but if he ever messages my wife on anything again, he’ll have a lot more to worry about than an HR complaint.

He again apologized. I don’t know if this situation is fully resolved given it’s only been a half day but Gary has been quiet and not at all like himself.

We’ll see if this lasts but his apology felt genuine so hopefully this is the last update I’ll have to give on this situation. Thank you to everybody that encouraged me to go to HR. There was a lot of people that pointed out that Gary must be dealing with a lot of insecurities and I think they were right.

There’s a few things I want to address that were questions in my last post:

How did Gary have my wife’s info? He found her instagram, a lot of people thought he somehow got her number which wasn’t the case.

Is this a made up story? No, if you look at my comment history you will see a screenshot of the Instagram DM’s commented on my last post. It’s so cartoonish that it sounds like fiction but believe me, this is what people who buy into the red pill bull shit are like, you’ll probably encounter your own Gary at some point if you haven’t already

Do I really only bench 170? When I said I benched 170, I meant that bench four sets of 12 at 170. I’ve never done a single rep max.

Does Gary have a wife? No, from my understanding, Gary is divorced and has been single for a while.

The comments kept coming.

Long_Bison1 wrote:

Any update on your wife's reaction to the DM and aftermath?

OP responded:

She didn’t respond to the DM, just sent the screenshot to me. She thinks Gary is a weirdo and doesn’t think he’ll be getting any woman anytime soon, let alone somebody else’s wife.

OneAcrewood wrote:

Really glad you went to HR and they apparently took it seriously. Asshat’s like Gary need to be called out for this kind of crap and there is certainly no place for it at work. And him contacting your wife…almost unforgivable. It sounds like the warning for HR landed solidly. You were the bigger person to accept his apology. Hopefully he has learned a life-changing lesson.

Accomplished_Leave506 wrote:

"Alpha" males are always the weakest most pathetic men. They're desperate to prove they're not losers. Not surprised in the slightest that he was upset at people complimenting you and not him.

That was my first thought on reading the original post. Real men don't need to run around telling everyone they're real men. Everybody just knows. Only little boys have to run around telling people they're a big strong man.