AIBU? Male work colleague

What could he report you for? What line have you crossed? Sounds like he was just fed up of hearing about your worries.

OP you lost me at PTSD.

Perhaps you should speak to someone who has spent time in a warzone seeing dreadful things and being injured and who REALLY has PTSD. Maybe that will put things into perspective a bit.

Disgraceful.

OP, you've said you're going to deal with your anxiety and that's a great plan. There are a couple of other things you should do too.

1. Apologise to your colleague - and mean it. So not 'I'm sorry for going on but I'm so worried...'. Instead, simply 'I'm sorry for going on.'
2. Set some boundaries to your relationship. Flirting (your words not mine) at work is never a great idea but especially when you're both married. And you need to be very careful what you say on work channels.
3. Remember that first and foremost you are colleagues.

Morning OP. He’s not going to report you because there’s nothing to report you for. It was a conversation between friends/colleagues.
The worst scenario is that he was bored of the conversation.
Enjoy your weekend. It’s all fine.

You seem very self-involved.

Told more than once "no, this won't involve HR" you keep banging on about it instead of switching to feeling concerned about driving away your friend.

Get a grip! How many people on this thread have told you that he WON’T report you to HR? Basically, everyone - so why do you keep saying it? It’s that repeated questioning that has done his head in! You just keep asking the same question and ignoring the answers.

See your GP and get support with your anxiety; stop using this man at work as your own personal therapist; stop texting him; listen to what people are saying to you when you’re hyped up with anxiety like this!

You’ve got into a repetitive pattern, repeating the same crap over and over. This isn’t helping you. Only you can make yourself stop! You are creating all this stress for yourself: you can stop it.

Exactly this!

Lots of people have anxiety but they manage to not put it onto other people.

Just stop oversharing.
Write it down in a journal or talk to ChatGPT, so you’re not inflicting your issues on to others and you can learn to think more rationally.

Anxiety is energy that has no where to go.
So as you’ve mentioned walking/running is great for anxiety as is getting a good nights sleep.

Glad you're feeling better @mumlearningtorun . Good luck at the Dr's and hopefully your workmate will message back soon?

Don't message him any more though.

Do you have ocd? I have and I used to get into spirals of needing reassurance no matter how ridiculous it was and going over and over things and asking the same things again and again. I read a book on cognitive behavioural therapy about how to break those loops and it actually helped. I think the crux of it was basically before seeking reassurance wait 10 minutes and see if you still need to. Theres obviously more than that but that's the basic principle. Im sorry to derail the thread, I just saw a lot of what I used to do in how you were talking. Glad you feel better this morning. Anxiety sucks x

Calm down dear !!!
He won't be a friend much longer if you disregard HIS wishes about your redundancy worries.

You sound a lot calmer OP after your latest update. I think I can see now where all this anxiety and catastrophising is coming from. You have a really fantastic goal to aim for and you are doing it for a great cause too. That should be your focus - your family and love for your DC not some skeezy fella at work that ‘banters’ about your ethnicity. You deserve better than that in a friend.

OP, my youngest had a lot of health problems when she was born and I developed postnatal anxiety that peaked when she was around 2-3 years old. I tried all sorts of therapy but in the end the only thing that helped was medication.

Have you tried anti anxiety medication? You don’t have to live like this.

All I've gathered from this is that you have no idea what HR actually do. I work in HR and have far more important things to deal with than refereeing squabbles between two grown ups who have a non-work relationship. My response would be a professional version of "if you don't want someone moaning to you, stop dicking about chatting to them when you should be working, and do some bloody work", before moving onto the next insane "issue" someone has flung at me. HR is not a therapist.

He won't report you but your incessant chatter is irritating to him.
Find a way to internalise your worries.
Other people don't need to know.

Pretend you have masking taped your own mouth. Write your worries into a private journal in large letters with fine black texta.
Colour in your worries. Make the pages bright and beautiful.
Bring some fruit to share.
Think about animal documentaries or gardens.
You need to flood yourself with positivity.

Not read everything but he's not your safe space, he's a person. A person paid to work with you , and not as your therapist. I think you need to remember that no matter how friendly he is and how helpful he has been in the past, people aren't spaces, they are people with feelings, limits and boundaries. He will also have his own worries. And you haven't been respecting that.

I do think that you need to see your GP about your anxiety though for your own sanity more than anything.

PTSD. Really?

What could he report you to hr for? I get the potential redundancy is stressful but you need to try and hold it together. If you went over things with him as much as you have on this thread I can see why he got annoyed and asked you to stop

OP, I think the whole of this thread will be ‘reporting you to HR ‘ if you don’t get a grip!

You are not the only person to have ever been anxious. With the way the world is probably 90% of posters have had to deal with anxiety.

Apparently, you have a husband. So why does he not get a
mention as a resource to support you.

I have never seen a real
poster ignore the many, many
helpful replies you have received and them say “but but he
might report me to HR..”

HR is not the bogey man
and you need to do
some serious work on yourself.

Give the guy space. If his comment was around the tike the sulking started leave him to it....because friends do bit need to pressure for a unwanted relationship..
The bigger picture is hes misunderstood it to move to somethibg you do not desire so whats hr fear do you have...and who cares!

The guy probably has his own worries and issues for him not you to fix as well as only taking on some much of your anxiety
He cant act like a adult so leave him to it.
Then perhaps consider a medication to help calm the anxiety so you are relaxed it shouldnt be a problem to adjust abd alter while resignations happen.
Awful experience but you will move on to another job and maybe more stable co workers.
Men are strange!

You are only thinking about yourself and not about how he feels or who he is. That's really boring and miserable for him. Give him some distance until you can handle yourself rather than imposing yourself.

PTSD really dear?

You are not harrassing him, he just doesn't want to talk about sensitive work stuff like redundancies that is all. The truth is men find it very hard to just be friends with women. He probably likes you or he wouldn't bother unless he considers you a senior work connection with potential; given that you are a PA that seems unlikely. For your own good, just cool the friendship off a bit.

To be fair while the OP seems very high maintenance as a friend and draining I wouldn’t say that this friend is “majorly backing off”. He hasn’t responded to her texts in a day and a half, which I don’t think that is especially unusual if he has any kind of life. He may be just busy or a bored with it.

OP I think that you need to recognise that you are spiralling and use strategies to calm down and get perspective. You haven’t done anything HR worthy. People get made redundant all the time. You will get another job and move on. Life is just like that. Most people have been made redundant more than once.