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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think it's not ok for a female colleague to texting my husband?

262 replies

WhereIsMyShaow · 15/02/2014 02:41

My dh works in a large company and is the assistant manager of a small team (10ish people), and he has been signed off sick all week as he has tonsillitis.

One of the women on the team sent him a photo of a box of doughnuts saying- look what you're missing out on.

And then saying how much she misses him in work and that it's so quiet without him and he needs to hurry back etc.

Aibu to not like this?

OP posts:
sadbodyblue · 15/02/2014 12:12

yes need more info.

CaptainTripps · 15/02/2014 12:16

Are you lot MAD? OP is well within reason to be slightly hmmmm about this text. That person is slightly overstepping a mark.

I am the least jealous person ever and this would make me feel somewhat uncomfortable!

He needs to 'hurry back'? Wtaf?

ItsAFuckingVase · 15/02/2014 12:24

Haha! No not at all. It was a bit tongue in cheek at how bloody dramatic some people are being over a friendly text from a colleague.

Gruntfuttock · 15/02/2014 12:26

TiggyCBE "I bet they hide in the stationery cupboard, get naked, and rub each other with doughnuts."

Yeah, there is a lot of that about in offices, (well, there was in my young dayWink) .

OP YABVU.

ENormaSnob · 15/02/2014 12:26

Yanbu

I am really good mates with quite a few of my colleagues (all female) and i think a missing you, hurry back text is inappropriate.

Dh works with his dad and i dont even think he'd send that tbh.

JulietBravoJuliet · 15/02/2014 12:27

I read threads like this and get worried because there's a couple of blokes at work that I regularly exchange these sort of texts with. They're both married, I'm a single woman. I hope their wives aren't thinking there's something dodgy going on!! I've never even given it a thought tbh; I don't fancy either of them in the slightest! They are mates, the same as some of my female colleagues are mates, and, as such, we send jokey texts and wind each other up as we do in person at work. I think I even put an "x" at the end sometimes! Shock

zipfork · 15/02/2014 12:28

Texting isn't automatically wrong, it is just another kind of interaction, but all interactions can sometimes betray people's underlying feelings - face to face it's things like tone of voice, frequency of talking, choices of topic, visiting someone else's desk more often than you need to for fairly tenuous reasons, having lots of private in-jokes. Sometimes it's dead obvious when two colleagues have become very close friends, borderline something more.

I agree though that it's beyond anyone's control - if a person is going to have a workplace affair they will. That's not the same thing as not caring whether or not they do, though, or the same thing as being able to switch off any internal alarm bells if you see interactions that seem to be drifting that way.

chipshop · 15/02/2014 12:28

The messages you've described sound absolutely fine to me. But if you're worried talk to your DH so he can reassure you. DP sends far more intimate messages to a colleague of his, it's all above board and we recently went to her wedding. But if their relationship upset me he'd stop.

And I go away for weeks at a time for work with various male colleagues, always just me and one bloke, so it's pretty full on. I have become really good mates with some of them. It's normal.

GimmeDaBoobehz · 15/02/2014 12:33

I personally wouldn't have a problem with it.

My partner doesn't have a lot of female friends, probably due to his hobbies not being what most females we know would be into (skiing, sky diving, bungee jumping, gym stuff, computers). However if he had a text from a work colleague saying she missed him being at work and it was just that I'd think that's OK as long as she isn't notorious for being inappropriate and even then if she was I would blame her for being inappropriate not him.

However if it had loads and loads of x's on it or if it was really obviously flirty like, 'I bet you can't wait to see me especially babe :)' or something like that, then I would be annoyed. But again I think I'd be annoyed with her not him. Because my partner isn't the flirty type.

Just talk to him about it.

I8toys · 15/02/2014 13:03

I wouldn't like it - it is slightly overstepping the mark. Its also how he responds to it - talk to him about it.

I recently experienced this type of "friendship" changing into something that came completely out of the blue. Married man worked with for years, he has 3 kids and I know his wife. I am happily married with 2 kids. I moved company and he then followed. We had a flirty banter but he took it too far and he told me he felt more. It came out of left field. I had no idea. I have completely closed the relationship down. I am not a flirty person at all and could not manipulate any situation if I tried. I would just worry that he could be having an innocent conversation with this lady but she is seeing something more.

bragmatic · 15/02/2014 13:05

Would it bother me? No.

Would I think it odd and inappropriate? Yes.

I8toys · 15/02/2014 13:08

I realise I just contradicted myself - meant friendly banter - not flirty!!

AlpacaLypse · 15/02/2014 13:15

op I'd feel uncomfortable too.

livelablove · 15/02/2014 13:21

Bit late in the thread I know but I think the doughnuts would be fine plus a jokey comment. I don't mind dh having female work friends, but I wouldn't like the hurry back, missing you that much. I would give the benefit of the doubt I know some people use this kind of language with all their friends and might say the same to another female colleague.

AmIthatWintry · 15/02/2014 13:23

Fuck it. Not only do I regularly text males colleagues, but I also "banter" on twitter with them.

Three are married, one in a LTR. I am single

Hell's teeth, one of them did some work in my house - while I was there

Another one we go for lunch regularly.

I don't fancy any of them, they are my friends who so happen to be male.

I - and they - would be mightily pissed off if their OHs kicked up a fuss.

LyingWitchInTheWardrobe2726 · 15/02/2014 13:30

This is a difficult one; it could be something or it could be nothing.

OP doesn't know what this relationship actually is. Only her husband and his colleague know that. The words themselves don't tell anything but the meaning behind the typing of them and the meaning for the recipient in reading them, mean everything. They may be totally innocuous or may be the prelude to something happening between the two of them.

OP... Do you feel uneasy for a particular reason?

HighlanderMam · 15/02/2014 13:40

< waves to AlpacaLypse >

Grin
Feminine · 15/02/2014 14:32

I wouldn't send a text like that to a married/in a relationship work mate.

It is about respect.

Respecting that maybe their partner wouldn't like it.

Anyway, such a dull boring silly text about cake! why bother? Confused

sadbodyblue · 15/02/2014 14:46

interestingly the posters saying they send texts like this and it's all innocent and ok are actually single! and have said so.

so pardon me but you have absolutely no idea how the op feels do you?

Wantsunshine · 15/02/2014 14:49

I'm married and tex male work mates. I am sure my husband doesn't have an issue with it. I don't fancy any of them most are married too.

OddBoots · 15/02/2014 14:49

It's not as simple as respect though, I would be far more offended if someone felt they couldn't send a friendly text to my husband because they thought I might get jealous. To be thought of as a jealous type would be an insult.

themaltesefalcon · 15/02/2014 15:04

You are being controlling and weird, OP.

Harmless stuff.

themaltesefalcon · 15/02/2014 15:07

I am the least jealous person ever and this would make me feel somewhat uncomfortable!

Your self-assessment is inaccurate, Cap'n.

PiperRose · 15/02/2014 15:15

sadbodyblue I am in an LTR, my dp would have absolutely no problem if I received this from a male colleague or if I sent it to a male colleague .

sadbodyblue · 15/02/2014 15:16

interesting.

it's all in the context of each situation really, the parties involved and past form I would say.

I wouldn't send flirty texts to another woman's dh really as would see that as childish and potentially trouble making.

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