Women covering up around me, me feeling like a loser at work, and various other things [update]

This is r/askwomen so I want to offer you my advice as a woman and I don't want you to take offense to anything I say. You gotta relax, man. If you aren't being a creeper, you don't need to worry about people perceiving you that way. If you have possibly maybe kind of sort of engaged in some creepy behavior at work in the past, accept that, own it, and just know that it may be hard to recover with this group. Maybe you WERE staring or came on a little strong more than once, whatever. It happens. BUT, your coworkers aren't the last people you are ever going to meet. I'm sorry that it's awkward for you right now.

I think it would possibly benefit you to read some articles about women's issues and I would be happy to offer you some suggestions. I say that because in this post you managed to call a group of them "bitchy" which just isn't a great thing to say and maybe that's feeding into the creeper vibe and you don't realize it. Also, I am under the impression that you are complaining about some of these women with the other dudes in the office. Just know that information is probably getting back to them somehow and you are probably being set up as the main purveyor of those opinions because you are easy to blame. Even if it's just a tiny bit of that information getting back to them, it is, and the women in your office collectively don't like it. So cut that out, even if it's in solidarity with the other guys, on a human level you gotta just cut that shit out. You'll have so much less to worry about if you know you have said nothing that could be taken out of context.

I want to reiterate the reading articles about women's issues, please do that and then bury yourself in the comments. If you want to know why women are doing what they do, you gotta go straight to the source. Between being catcalled and hit on from a young age, being sexualized since we're little girls we're naturally defensive about our personal space. So it's not YOU exactly it's a lot of things. Sure I adjust my clothes and fidget a lot but there's a lot of other factors at play when I feel "creeped out". Read some women's actual experiences so you'll have a better understanding of what minor things could be perceived as threatening, then you'll know what those triggers are for women and be more self aware. If you can have a little checklist of "I know for a fact that I'm not doing these things" you'll know that you aren't being a weirdo and you can breathe a little easier.

I just think if maybe you understood a little bit more where women are coming from you could maybe relate to your coworkers better and get some confidence to have a real relationship. Confidence and not arrogance is key. How is your tone when you are expressing things? Dude you're also probably better looking than you're giving yourself credit for and if you are ugly, so what? You gotta get over that and shut that negative voice down. BFD if you're ugly, I have lots of ugly friends and I am nice and polite to my ugly coworkers. I'm not a freaking super model or anything close, some would call ME ugly.

I can't imagine that this is truly the worst office on the planet and every single woman hates you. Find yourself a female ally (don't freaking fall in love with her lol). I am sure there is a woman who has been at least, a little bit nice to you. Even if it is just someone who has to be nice to to you just to humor you (HR, your receptionist, your manager, the older lady who treats everyone like her child because her children are your age, whatever) try and actually listen to them and be their friend. Listening and asking good follow up questions is really helpful is building these kinds of friendships. I am a starer too, and a lot of times in conversations I don't know where to look. I find it really helpful to do a small task like making my coffee or occasionally looking back at my computer screen just to break the stare while I am having conversations. If you are truly following along with what they're saying, it's not rude to not be looking directly into someone's eyes while you're talking to them. Don't focus on impressing everyone, try and make that one genuine friend. Then when you truly feel like you have your female ally you can relieve yourself of this "I FEEL LIKE EVERYONE THINKS I AM STARING AT THEM!!" feeling to her. She can be a second set of eyes and maybe give you a heads up on any behavior that could be misconstrued.

I really hope this helps and I am sorry about those PMs, I know that would definitely make me feel bad. I think once you read some of those articles you'll understand how ugly a lot of us women are made to feel regularly, and know that a good portion of us would never be put off by a coworker just because of their looks and that's hopefully not the case with you.

TL;DR Relax, man.

/r/askwomenadvice Thread