My DH is an oversharer

Yeh that would annoy me too especially if he shared something that happened to me that you may not have wanted others to know. Thankfully my husband is as private as I am.

My H told a ton of people I hardly knew the date of my planned C-section, plus a load of information about my health during pregnancy. I was inundated with messages from people, including a message from one of his friends asking “what time is the baby being extracted then?”

I cannot tell you how furious I was. It was a disgusting message, overly familiar and utterly fucking intrusive. I ignored all of them and asked what the actual fuck he thought he was playing at. He had no reason beyond not realising that my medical history and health is no one’s business but mine. I may have pointed out to him that he was a fucking nobody during my pregnancy and birth and after what he’d done, he was lucky to be in the room.

For an intelligent and seemingly emotionally aware man, he became insanely people-pleasing around my pregnancies. I’m not sure I’ve forgiven him for it to be honest.

Are you a southerner and he's a northerner?

I agree dont say as much. My neighbour loves info then you ask how all with you. Good thanks. !! I used give too much info they tell ya nothing lol

Tell him to stop sharing stuff about the business. That's really important.
Word of mouth is important in business. If he starts saying you've had supply chain issues or employees have let you down or whatever, friends are less likely to recommend you to other friends. Word soon gets round. "Yeah, I wouldn't go to them, they've been having issues with the supply chain so it might take ages to get your order"

(I would totally talk about the kids having nits though. That's not oversharing, it's a good example of where it's good to share - despair, tips, humour, all of it!)

I just think that socially we should be listening more to what our friends have been up to rather than hammering on about what tough and difficult lives we are leading.

Ah well this can be more awkward, if they're aware you've had tough times and they haven't. It's another reason I tend to end up listening more because the last thing I want to do is talk about how well things are going when my friends are struggling. I'll talk about some struggles I'm having to try to even things up, but I think it's insensitive for instance for me to talk about being so busy with work when I know they can't get much work and it's not going well. People generally tend to talk about their problems more don't you think, than things going well.

@4GWiFi I know what you mean.

I am an oversharer (have ADHD if that's relevant), but strangely at the same time can be quite a private person.

I've had many situations like the ones you describe, where I would ask the other person how they are, and they would tell me everything is going well with their life, but would then ask details about mine. Because I naturally am quite open, I ended up telling them a lot. But I realised after many years of these types of one sided interactions that I always felt quite uncomfortable afterwards. It almost felt like the other people were (unconsciously) using me a a way to feel superior about their lives, as I would maybe tell them about challenges or problems that I was going through, and they would apparently never have any problems, so they could feel that their life was better than mine.

Now I am much more discerning about who i open up to. I like to have deeper conversations where there is openness and honesty, as to me that's when you can be real friends who genuinely care about each other, rather than just pretending that everything is always fine.

So if I am with people who never open up to me, I don't open up to them, and our interaction/ friendship remains on the superficial level.

And if I'm with a friend and we both are open and vulnerable (which is a gradual process), then it can be a deeper friendship.

So I think for me, it's discerning who to share and be open with.

But you describe in your OP them being asked and saying ‘Fine thanks’ before turning the conversation back onto DH. I mean, do you have any reason to think they’re desperately aggrieved at not having the opportunity to regale the company with exactly what happened at work on Tuesday when Barbara found out that Nigel had fiddled his expenses?

But it is incredibly boring for the listener to sit through a one-sided monologue of someone else’s topic of choice, and not have any input. Both boring and bad-mannered. It is not a discussion if the person speaking never stops to listen.

Then this definitely sounds like a friends problem rather than DH. You say you’ve known them for years, but you don’t, actually, know them at all. They don’t trust you, and they don’t want to share anything important about themselves and their lives. I think it’s probably time to put them into the “acquaintances” bucket and treat them accordingly, whilst focussing on making new friendships with actual substance, or developing ones you currently have.

It doesn’t sound like you need to worry about DH “hogging” the conversation, because these people are actively making sure with their “yeah, we’re fine, tell us all about you” that him doing so means they get to say little.

People bond over real stories where they show their vulnerability, not over “business is good”. Of course sensitive information should be shared thoughtfully, but speeding tickets don’t fall in the category.

Do you prefer superficial relationships where no one ever shares anything that makes them look any less than perfect? Sometimes we forget that being human is a LOT more interesting and relatable than being perfect. Speaking from experience.

This was what I meant to quote! 🙄
This is my take on it… Sounds boring & one-sided. A true conversation flows both ways. There are people in our circle that I don’t really converse with anymore though, due to their constant monologues

This…

We have friends like this. The DH of the couple is… financially insecure? Materialistic? Competitive?
Eg a few years back I bought a new car (quite expensive and high technology, weren’t many on the road at the time tbh) He was then overheard by another mutual friend talking at some brief acquaintance all about said car model, it’s features, and how he was going to buy it (never happened). Etc. It’s so tedious and so transparent.

If I’ve been to Tenerife, he’s been to Elevenerife, and every conversation requires a lengthy monologue on his opinion on the matter

We try not to see them anymore…

It sounds more like he's telling juicy drama that OP wants to keep schtum about.

My DH is like this. After he told several virtual strangers the details about my breast lump and the lurid details of his colonoscopy I have told him, again, to pack it in. I don’t know why he has this compulsion or why he considers it appropriate. His sister says she’s even been told in the past when he changes his pants ffs!

I think I’d find it quite difficult to maintain a proper friendship with friends like the ones you describe. How can you ever build a real bond, have shared experiences, demonstrate mutual care and support, develop love for each other etc with people who are always just “fine”, “same old same old”, and don’t appear to trust you enough with the important details of their lives to want to share them, or ask for your advice or support with their problems?

I wouldn’t say your DH is oversharing. Perhaps he could be a bit more circumspect about sharing particular details about the business if those details being public could genuinely harm your business, but talking about your life and your worries and letting your friends in is what friendship is all about - otherwise, what you have are fair weather acquaintances, fun to hang out with from time to time, rather than meaningful relationships in your life.

And maybe that’s your actual problem, rather than your DH: you know that your friends are not actually meaningful relationships, because they don’t share anything of themselves with you; and therefore it feels like sharing yourselves can do “more harm than good.” Genuine friendship shouldn’t feel like that.

Can I ask - the stories, are they ones where you have reflected and realised you/he/both of you made bad decisions (such as his speeding) and you are worried people will think less of you?

I’m not clear either.

Do you mean he’s telling really boring stories with far too much trivial detail?

Telling someone you got a speeding fine is not over sharing.

Telling someone you have a boil on your left arse cheek that your partner squoze for you, that's over sharing.