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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

couples walking through shops holding hands

317 replies

DosDuchas · 06/06/2015 16:46

Has anyone ever BARGED through the barrier they create and shouted STOP HOLDING HANDS FGS YOU ANNOYING PEOPLE?
( or perhaps something snappier?)

marks and spencer today - it was like british bloody bulldog, especially when the man LEADS the woman through the shops, swerving past racks of clothes, creating a four foot wide barrier

OP posts:
Iliveinalighthousewiththeghost · 07/06/2015 00:01

It's just all for show. I bet before they came out they were tearing lumps out of each other. Very easy for people to make out their lives and relationships are perfect to the unknown outside world.

Philoslothy · 07/06/2015 00:03

DH and I hold hands all the time, we are both very tactile. Nothing to do with us loving each other more than anyone else, it is just the way that we show affection.

In the cinema we often sit holding hands or leaning on each other, we always lounge on the sofa entangled.

'Do couple walk around the kitchen holding hands?'

No, although we often bump and grind.

CloserToFiftyThanTwenty · 07/06/2015 00:05

DH and I find ourselves holding hands if we walk alongside each other in exactly the same way as you find a small hand in yours when you go to cross a road - ie completely naturally, you almost don't think about it and it feels a bit odd if you don't. I assure you there's no show going on and we aren't tearing lumps out of each other behind closed doors

ProvisionallyAnxious · 07/06/2015 00:05

I don't hold hands to show off "our love", and I don't think people are more / less in love if they do or don't hold hands. But me and DH hold hands just because we like it. Nothing to do with other people!

That said, aren't hand holders less of an obstacle than non-hand holding couples? (Who are often not walking as closely together but not leaving a sufficient gap to walk through?) I tend to take advantage of out hand-holding to actively 'steer' DH out of the way if someone is trying to get past, though we're generally speedy walkers so that's fairly rare.

R.e. the choosing her clothes vibe - why is that a problem, OP? Plenty of people make a social occasion out of shopping, and my DH gives a heck of a lot better advice on clothes than any other friend I have...

Philoslothy · 07/06/2015 00:07

My husband often comes along when I am clothes shopping, he can see me from behind!

I don't think we actually choose to hold hands, it just sort of happens.

VelvetRose · 07/06/2015 00:16

I don't do it for show! I am an affectionate person in general and so it's natural for me to be affectionate with my DW too.

VelvetRose · 07/06/2015 00:17

I don't think it says anything one way or another about your relationship. i know some very tactile couples who are actually very unhappy and vice versa.

DancingDinosaur · 07/06/2015 00:29

It's just all for show. I bet before they came out they were tearing lumps out of each other. Very easy for people to make out their lives and relationships are perfect to the unknown outside world.

Why would anyone bother to do that Hmm Sooo, I have an argument with dh so I hold his hand in public just to prove to a bunch of strangers, that may or may not even notice, that our life is perfect Hmm Really Confused Okaay Wink

Philoslothy · 07/06/2015 00:35

It's just all for show. I bet before they came out they were tearing lumps out of each other. Very easy for people to make out their lives and relationships are perfect to the unknown outside world

I am not judging people who are not hand holders but I do find it sad that you look at a couple who appear to be happy and assume that it is all an act. I am sure that most married couples are just happy, we just express it in different ways.

Staywithme · 07/06/2015 00:41

I loved holding my husband's hand and I adored him so meh, if you don't like it. As he got sicker I would link my arm through his to make sure he didn't lose balance. I'd give anything to hold his big, strong, gentle hands again.

HagOtheNorth · 07/06/2015 07:12

My parents hold hands, they always have and they're way too ld to change now.
I don't hold my husband's hand.
It's not really a problem, unless the couples are oblivious to the blockage they may be creating.

CrohnicallyInflexible · 07/06/2015 07:30

If we're somewhere busy and crowded, or if I'm feeling anxious, then I hold DH's hand. And I let him lead me round. Well actually, I sort of hide behind him, so I'm sure we take up less space that if we walked separately!

tilliebob · 07/06/2015 07:38

There's some right miserable twats on this thread. Talk about bitter. Sums up everything I hate about MN recently. Whatever you say someone has to sneer and claim you're lying/pretending/fooling yourself/childish ConfusedConfused

BestIsWest · 07/06/2015 07:39

Oh yes, and we intertwine our fingers in a special way.

blondegirl73 · 07/06/2015 07:52

I don't mind handholding unless it's really busy, but I do get annoyed with couples who go everywhere together. There's a couple I see in the morning - he gets the train before mine, she gets the one after. They leave their house kind of in between times. So every single morning, he has to rush, dragging her along, and she has to hang around the station for ten mins. Baffling.

One of my colleagues won't go home without her husband so if he works late, she does too.

Original poster
DosDuchas · 07/06/2015 07:54

Where I used to Work there was a kind of sister office. When we had staff training together the husband and wife who worked there together used to sit.., together.

Ditto at the gym. Partners train side by side swapping at the same time.

OP posts:
WizardOfToss · 07/06/2015 07:57

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

owlborn · 07/06/2015 08:12

We hold hands after 22 years. And we sometimes snog on the escalator. We're probably super annoying.

noddyholder · 07/06/2015 08:19

You can never know what goes on in a relationship or what it means.

Original poster
DosDuchas · 07/06/2015 08:19

Still with the time you've been married posts.

OP posts:
PoorNeglectedBike · 07/06/2015 08:29

I hate holding hands. They get all clammy. Perhaps it's just we've got disgusting hands

PoorNeglectedBike · 07/06/2015 08:30
PlayingHouse · 07/06/2015 08:33

I don't hold hands because I am a grown up, able to walk down the street by myself and I am no longer 15 and so besotted with dh that I can't bear to spend a minute not touching him.

As for the 'almost humping', that would drive me insane. I read a thread where a dh thought it was perfectly acceptable to dry hump his dw everything she bent over the dishwasher, put laundry in etc. I couldn't live like that.

William is always steering Kate, with a hand in the small of her back, he pushes her along. I cringe everytime I see it.

GlitzAndGigglesx · 07/06/2015 08:36

It's not people being miserable twats it's just really annoying when hand holders think they're invincible so can walk ridiculously slow blocking the pavement expecting people to walk around them

PlumpingThePartTimeMother · 07/06/2015 08:40

I feel slightly silly walking down the street holding hands with DH - I'm 33, he's 41 and it just feels like we're a bit old for public hand holding.

Mind you, I was pretty much surgically attached to boyfriend #1 (aged 22), to the extent that we sat next to each other on the plane and held hands while we slept Grin I may have let my retrospective horror at this influence my current feelings though (he was a right idiot in the end).

I don't mind what other people do but please don't hog the pavement!

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