Friend brought her husband to long planned dinner with old friends 🙄

[Wofflewaffle]

Went to have dinner out with three old friends tonight. It’s taken a year to find a date that we are all available, we’ve all got lots to talk about, really looking forward to it and… 30 minutes before we are due to meet one of them texts to say that her husband will be joining us!!!

she’s got form for this. I’ve often gone to meet with her and she’ll have brought some random acquaintance along with her. Or I go to her house for tea, and her neighbour will be there too. Or we’ll go en famille to her country house - and when we get there another family / some cousins / the neighbours will also have been invited.

i hate it. It changes the dynamic completely. Tonight it changed from the expected girly catch up to talking about very bland stuff, because we didn’t want to get into anything personal with her husband there. I didn’t make a fuss at the time, and he left after we’d eaten so we had about an hour of proper catching up, but I feel very cheated. I didn’t say anything at the time because her husband is also friends with us, as a family friend. He’s perfectly nice - just not tonight!

i just can’t understand why she thinks this is ok - nor why her husband would even want to join us!

How strange. I doubt my partner could think of anything worse than to come out with me and my friends!

My friend did this with her husband. Theatre trip, old school friends, 3 of us. Great!
She asked a school mam friend and her husband! When it was supposed to be a bit of an old friend reunion. I asked why is husband coming and she said “we always go to theatre together”…
I didn’t go in the end, took the shine off it.
The mad thing is, all she does is slag him off, and talk about how useless he is. It’s very strange

😂 when I told DH the look of horror on his face was quite funny

Yep, as soon as her husband left she started moaning about how she needs / wants to do things for herself and on her own, how she’s fed up being just a wife and mother for so long. She says this often but I’m afraid this time we all just looked at her like wtf🤷‍♀️

Dd's mate has gone to watch the World Cup with her bf and 2 other couples..they are travelling around from game to game with flights/hotel changes.
Apparently 1 couple decided their dc would also enjoy it and turned up at the airport with...

A 2 year old.
No childcare issue they had planned to take it all along just didn't tell anyone.
Some people just assume their plan is the right one..
Some entitled people..

She told you her reasons - she has a lot of social obligations and likes bringing people together. It’s her preference. I wouldt like it either but she is who she is

I agree, it’s only common sense and polite to let people know who/how many have been invited to things.
OP, as you’ve talked to her about this before and she ‘didn’t get it’, I don’t know what you can do apart from spell out every time that it’s ’the four of us, no partners, other friends or kids’ etc.
Have any of the rest of the group tried to talk to her?

I tend to wonder about the men who seem perfectly ok with turning up to a girls/women only lunch or whatever and feel fine about being there. Do they never say, actually, it's not my thing and I'll be the only bloke, you go and enjoy yourself with your friends.

Are they henpecked, are they secretly thrilled to be a lone male at a female only group or some other odd reason.

Stay at home, you're not wanted!

I have a similar friend. She even brought the poor bloke along when we went to a dinner and event for international women's day. He just sort of sits there and looks bored.

OMG

That is bloody appalling. All those little kids in the crowds seem to do is wear ear defenders and look bored. Some of these games last over 2.5 hours with extra time and penalties, and there’s all the queuing … and the heat …

Crazy.

Make sure your friend is OK, because I've seen controlling relationships start this way (with partner insising on accompanying them everywhere)!

This is deranged. Did anybody say anything to her?

You just need to be clear that it is a girly get-together. I am not sure it is cultural - if anything, I expect it would be more culturally appropriate for men to sit such girly get-togethers out.

I think the husband is weird too for going along with this. Why would he want to be the only husband with a group of his wife’s female friends. Both odd.

I hope you say something later if you have not done so already.

Though someone who will not go anywhere without their partner, or wife or husband is a bad sign in my opinion. When the relationship ends, even if it is when older and death does them part, it will be much much harder for them.

“30 minutes before we are due to meet one of them texts to say that her husband will be joining us”

then you should’ve immediately replied “just the girls tonight, please. Looking forward to catching up just us!” or similar where it was very clear that no one else was welcome.

30 minutes before we are due to meet one of them texts to say that her husband will be joining us!!!

so why didn’t any of you respond with “no, don’t bring John tonight please, he’s welcome another time, but not this evening”?

I used to know someone like this. Met her through work. She would always use any opportunity to invite her DP along to any work meet-ups where it was only supposed to be staff and no-one else had brought partners. To make it worse he was a complete gannet and would hoover up any spare food at any meals out, never waiting to see if anyone else wanted seconds, I've never seen anyone who could shovel down so much food so quickly. She was particularly adept at getting him included to any work dinners where someone was unable to attend at the last minute, before anyone else had the chance to bring along their husband she had already claimed the free spot and free meal for the gannet.

I agreed with you until this post. I see absolutely nothing wrong with this & I would have enjoyed it even more. There is a difference between expecting a girls only gathering & appearing possessive of every social situation involving couples where you are only happy if it is close friends. It then becomes a clique where nobody else is welcome.

Surely you need to have booked tickets for the theatre, you can’t just unexpectedly bring extra people .

Yes, I never understand this. Why don't people speak up?.

Yes, I don't get it. My DH wouldn't want to join in!

Yes I should have. I don’t think either of the other two would, it was my suggestion to meet originally then she booked the resto as she knows the owner, so it kind of became ‘her’ invite. Stupid I know.

i hate using the word ‘girls’ to refer to grown women, but I could have got round that.

I thought at least it would be a poster OF a door!

So this has happened before but you’ve never said anything. Use your words