Volunteering got complicated …..

Try reading the OP. The OW has been treating the OP badly since the affair came out. She is completely in the wrong.

And while we are at it, yes the husband is the one who has betrayed the OP, but the other woman is not some innocent party either. Her behaviour has been abhorrent too, and unprofessional.

I’m fully with you OP, but ultimately you did threaten her and act like a bully, even though she’s hardly an innocent party herself.

Definitely highlight during the meeting not just the affair but her behaviour to you, to the point that others have noticed it, and how she’s made your position untenable as a result.

And if you want to stop volunteering and the charity closes, well it’s the charity’s fault for sanctioning you when her complaint was obviously driven by malice. And as much as you don’t want people to know your business, I would let everyone know what her and your DH have been up to so that no one can blame you.

The thing is, if you had a problem with her behaviour you should have approached the charity

This way you've threatened her in that if she attends the meeting you will do something to her - I.e report her PLUS you'd divulge details of her personal life to the charity (which has nothing to do with them) just to embarrass her or make her look bad.

So you have threatened her and it makes you look like a bully

Yes, what you’ve just described is a threat. You should have gone down the official route at the time.

However, you didn’t and that’s that. I wouldn’t put yourself in a position to be sanctioned by a panel - you’re a volunteer, so just stop volunteering. If this has a negative impact on the charity, that’s unfortunate, but they were aware of this possibility when they decided on the disciplinary route and will hopefully have made plans in anticipation.

Also, LTB.

OP you did wrong because your solution with this person was not to find a way to work together, but to stop her contributing to the charity by excluding her from meetings.

You should have raised this as an issue with someone senior rather than act as if you had a right to exclude her from meetings etc.

Her behaviour might have been wrong, but you didn't handle it correctly. That's the issue.

Why the fuck are you still referring to the man who cheated on you for 6 years as your 'D'H?

Also, what you did wrong was communicate with her at all. It was clearly never going to end well, so you should have just put in an official complaint about her behaviour towards you.

Regardless of the sanction outcome I want to stop volunteering, but this could lead to the charity closure, so my DH says I should carry on.

Why are you listening to the man who spent 6 years betraying you? If you want to stop volunteering, stop volunteering, and your piece of shit husband can feel guilty about the closure of the charity.

You handled this badly and you did threaten her. There is no excuse for that. If her behaviour was unacceptable then you should have simply raised that with your management with examples. Instead you contacted here and told her not to attend a meeting or else you would report her - that was a threat meant to intimidate her. As far as the organisation goes the affair is irrelevant - neither of you have the right to act inappropriately towards the other or to use the organisation to grind your personal axes.

That. It's bizarre that you don't understand that you threatened her @MellowTiger . When you say to someone 'if you don't do what I ask, I will (carry out negative or damaging action)' that's a threat. And threatening a colleague is going to result in sanctions.

You were 100% wrong, and lost the high road completely. You've now made her the victim instead of you.

You need to have another serious conversation with your husband. If your marriage is going to continue, you both have to step away from any contact with OW, even tangentially. You have tried to carry on with you both working with this charity and it clearly won’t work with her still involved in the organisation.

So even though it might lead to the charity closing down, a condition of your marriage surviving has to be you both stop volunteering there.

He’s already proven himself to be untrustworthy so this is a reasonable thing for you to ask him to do to prove he’s serious about fixing the damage he caused to your marriage.

I think people are really over-complicating this Op, and some are being quite unkind to you (as usual in AIBU).
I think the only mistake you made was that you did not deal with her more quickly. When this meeting was arranged, that was the time to go to someone senior in the charity and explain why you were not prepared to attend the meeting if she went. Armed with evidence of how she has been rude to you to present if necessary, but not with evidence of the affair. However, unless you used aggressive language when you asked her not to attend, you weren't bullying and it could be considered to be a reasonable request.

Now - you are a volunteer and they want to put you through a procedure that could result in 'sanctions' as if you were an employee. Stuff that. What sanctions might they apply? Did you get a proper chance to present your evidence to the investigating person and ask them to speak to witnesses? In any case -
Save them all some time. Email a post holder in the charity and ask to meet with them to discuss your decision to ask the woman not to attend the meeting. Be robust and clear in what you say. You refute the accusation of bullying and are disappointed that, considering your long and dedicated service to the charity, nobody approached you to discuss the allegations straight away. State that, as a volunteer, you are not prepared to spend a lot of time preparing documentation for your response and attending a panel meeting, which you would find very stressful. If the charity really would fold if you left they will have no choice but to do the sensible thing and talk to you.

If they refuse then I'd resign with little or no notice, attaching any evidence you have that her personal animosity towards you was affecting your ability to carry out your role. You are a VOLUNTEER, they can't hold you to a notice period. If a charity folds because one volunteer leaves then it was only a matter of time before it went under anyway.

Oh and for goodness sake dump your bloody husband. And any time he tries to tell you how to behave in this situation, or trys to guilt trip about the charity, or in fact tries to influence you over anything - tell him to stop talking, nothing he says is of any interest to you any more.

You threatened her that if she dared to attend the meeting and continued to communicate with you in a manner you didn’t like, you would share details of her private life with others. You can’t bring a personal matter in a professional setting like that. That’s what you did wrong.

From the charity's perspective someone has complained and they need to investigate

From OW perspective - well I'd say your husband has likely badmouthed you to her - fairly standard stuff. She knows she's due a complaint so takes the first shot.

For you, you ask what you did wrong.
I'd say tolerating these bastards and being naive in thinking you could mediate.

Every body else in the situation is looking after themselves and their needs. You need to do the same.

Work out whether that means laying it all out to a panel or walking away.

Of course you have to leave the charity. You can’t make OW leave and she’s clearly happy to make to the situation awkward and vexatious so you need to remove yourself from the situation.

im genuinely confused as to why your DH is involved in your decision making? He should be quiet as the reason you are in this situation is due to his nonsense.

6 years is a lot of lying OP

I'd go to the panel meeting and ask them exactly what you are accused of. What threat have you made?
It wouldn't surprise me if the people involved in the investigation/panel have not thought this through clearly at all. They might have responded to the emotion of OW saying "she threatened me" without asking what the nature of the threat was.
I have been in a similar situation (not OW territory) with charity volunteers where one accused the other of "threats" but it turned out that it was the complainant who had been harassing the complainee with daily emails demanding information about imagined conversations. The "threat" was to report them for harrassment if they didn't stop.
If your panel are reasonable and you are able to explain calmly and clearly what has happened, this might backfire on OW and work out well for you.
If not, you're better off out of it anyway.

As I said, I agree she should have handled this differently.

I am simply pointing out that HelenB's framing was just making shit up and not based on what the OP had told us.

Edited to correct who had framed things unreasonably

I wouldn't be listening to anything the husband says here, but on the actual question (and not all the other stuff) it comes down to "She put in a complaint saying I had threatened her, which has now been upheld and I now have to be interviewed to be sanctioned.
I feel this is really unfair AIBU?"

The answer to that is yes YABU. You handled this badly and you did threaten her. There is no excuse for that. If her behaviour was unacceptable then you should have simply raised that with your management with examples. Instead you contacted here and told her not to attend a meeting or else you would report her - that was a threat meant to intimidate her. As far as the organisation goes the affair is irrelevant - neither of you have the right to act inappropriately towards the other or to use the organisation to grind your personal axes.

I want someone to explain what I did wrong here.
Someone did. You just didn't like it.

You need to separate out your personal life from your professional life, and if you can't do that then you need to make the appropriate decision about continuation of your volunteer role, which is nothing to do with your husband.

What were the exact words to OW in this message? Maybe you thought your message was clear that the alternative was to report her but maybe to a third party it wasn't. None of us know the wording.

She wouldn't be reporting her for having an affair. Jeez the lack of comprehension on MN is shocking.

She would be complaining that the woman is bullying and harassing her as witnessed by others and with written evidence

The disclosure of the affair would be relevant only in that it givens context for why the other woman is bullying the OP.

The OP at no point threatened the OW. She asked that she not attend the meeting as this would derail things and there was no reason for the OW to be there.

She told the OW that if she did attend she would see that as a continuation of harassing behaviour and she would have to disclose the situation to the charity to detail the reasons for the OW behaviour

Really? It takes 2 to tango and the OW is equally responsible!

So you volunteer for a charity and your role is so key it would collapse without you. Your dh (also a volunteer) had an affair with another volunteer.
He ended it , she then started being “off” with you in on line meetings so blatantly that other people noticed. You feared she would repeat /escalate at an in person event you asked her not to go or you would report it (presumably using charity’s dignity at work/anti bullying policy). She got a preemptive compliant in and you were found to be “guilty”. And now you have to receive your punishment by being humiliated in public.

I don't understand how her complaint was upheld if it was investigated properly. Was it? Did you give the full context of the events leading to your request? I would say that you should have reported her for bullying you rather than trying to deal with it yourself but that would have meant exposing your dh and her’s affair and your personal life which is understandable. But it has backfired on you now so I would be appealing the decision, putting in a counter complaint and refusing to accept this sanction.

I would resign anyway and be seriously considering if my marriage has a future.

It’s not her fault she was conducting an affair with a colleagues husband?

Why does she want to attend a meeting she doesn’t need to be at? Most people would have the decency to avoid OP as much as possible.
OP walk away from the charity, they, like your husband, are treating you like dirt.

You say others within the organisation have commented on her inappropriate manner with you.

You should lodge a complaint against her for bullying.

You could use this and the evidence of other people's witness as a reason why you sent a polite letter not threatening her but pointing out that she needed to back off you otherwise you'd have to disclose the issue.

She had forced the issue by complaining about you so you now have been forced to lodge a complaint about her bullying. And that she has used the charity to attack you

You can show that you did not threaten her. You asked her to not derail the meeting by attending as she had no reason to be there other than to continue harassing you. You did not threaten her. You merely explained that if she did not stop harassing you you would have no option but to disclose the situation as that is the root of her bullying. And now you face been forced to do this

You can turn this whole thing around OP

Honestly stop volunteering and leave dh! You deserve better.

This!

If you want to be treated fairly you need to give the charity all of the information. They are being asked to manage a volunteer conflict situation where they don’t know all the facts. Give them all the gory details. Don’t imagine they don’t know anything, there will be gossip and people will have seen your DH and the OW together. But give them the evidence to confirm the situation.

Think though, what you want out of this. Clearly you can’t all carry on volunteering for the charity. The fact that neither of them have done the decent thing and stepped down is the biggest, reddest flag. In your shoes I would be resigning but I would be making very clear my reasons for doing so.

Why are you putting yourself through this? You’re a volunteer, and your husband has been cheating on you for six years.

Leave the charity and your husband. If you have certain skills, I’m sure another charity will jump at the chance to have you in their organisation. I know you said that the charity may fold if if you leave, but that’s not your problem. No one is irreplaceable, to put it bluntly.