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AIBU?

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Original poster

"Well of course I was going to tell BF"

721 replies

WarwickDavisAsPlates · 06/04/2017 09:08

I originally wrote quite a long post detailing the entire situation and how this came up but it got too long.

So basically what I want to know is: if a friend told you something and said "but please don't tell anyone" would you think that included your OH?

OP posts:
AcrossthePond55 · 07/04/2017 18:51

I don't get this 'I tell my spouse everything'. I certainly don't, why should I? Of course I tell him everything that affects him or us. But if a friend confided in me in secret about something that did not affect him or us, why on earth should I tell him? Why would he want to know about X's troubled child or Y's confession of a drink problem? And I'd expect DH to show the same discretion and trust with his own friend's confidences.

My BFF and my DH's BFF are married to each other. Their marriage is a train wreck. DH and I have agreed that we will NOT tell each other things that they tell us in confidence. The exception to this would be threats of violence or plans to empty bank accounts.

Sallystyle · 07/04/2017 18:53

For people who tell their husbands and partners: Are you ok your friends husbands, wives and partners knowing your secrets too?

As a teller under exceptional circumstances I actually am happy for my friend's husbands to know my 'secrets'. I don't really do secrets and I can't think of one thing I have told my friends that I wouldn't want their husband to know about.

That's just my personality. I am an open book and wouldn't care at all if my friend's husband knew that I was having an intimate medical problem or problems in my marriage for example.

If a secret is that big that I couldn't stand my friend's to share with their husband I wouldn't be telling anyone other than dh or my mum anyway.

BertrandRussell · 07/04/2017 18:55

"t would be different because a non married couple have not taken vows that unite them "until death""
Grin well, when you've been together as long as dp and I have you can take the moral high ground. Well, you could-if you weren't a promise breaker.........

Elphame · 07/04/2017 19:06

No I wouldn't tell my partner, neither will I let on that I know something that I'm not telling. After 30 years in financial services keeping confidences is something I do without thinking about it.

I'm also very good at feigning shock and surprise when the secret breaks so no one knows I already knew.

kateandme · 07/04/2017 19:08

dpends what it is,will it hurt oh.do you need support with it.
ive once said the "been told something but cant tell you and need support still" he totally understood.and just held me.but then when it did come out at least he new there was "something" so didn't feel so lied to.
but if your going to tell you need to tell you friend as some things people really cant have shared so your best friend needs to be able to know this.she really might not be able to stand it being shared.

2rebecca · 07/04/2017 19:13

We're married and made no until death vows. Vows are very varied these days. Some people are stuck in the 1950s.
I suspect I wouldn't divulge private stuff to people who don't value privacy.
Many of my close friends have been around for longer than my husband and at my age you don't make close friends easily so I value the ones I have.
I am quite a private person though, largely because I know that most people are fairly self centred and not that bothered about hearing about other people's lives and some people worry a lot and have difficulty separating their problems from other people's problems and over empathise. You can see that on here with people fussing for updates on threads and saying they are thinking a lot about a total stranger.
If I'm going something in confidence to a friend I want them to be like me and listen and offer helpful advice and then go home chat to their husband about something else and be glad that I felt able to confide in them but not stew on it and turn it in to their problem.

IHeartDodo · 07/04/2017 19:19

Not read everything but I'm aghast at how many of you would tell your partners your friends' secrets!!!
If a friend told me something and said "don't tell anyone" I would assume that included him! Unless it was something silly / they were joking.
I would only tell my partner if I was sure they were ok with it (like I'd asked if I could).
ESPECIALLY not anything to do with mental health / sex / anything illegal / personal things about people he knows.

eg. My boss told me she was pregnant, and said "I'm not telling people at work yet". So I told my partner because a) he's not at my work and doesn't know them, and b) the first time she was pregnant she specifically said I could tell him, so it's the same.

I'm going to start being a lot more careful when I tell people things!

MrsC45 · 07/04/2017 19:22

I would tell OH, unless the friend asked me not too and OH would do visa versa, but the confidence would never go any further.

MrsC45 · 07/04/2017 19:24

But if it was something personal re sex, mental health, or something that would embarrass my friend then I wouldn't tell!

Adnerb95 · 07/04/2017 19:26

friends would know that we (me and DH) have no secrets but if I thought they might not realise then I would tell them and check it was OK.
If they weren't I would have to consider very carefully whether I went on to hear whatever it was that someone wanted to tell me.

LettuceMash · 07/04/2017 19:27

Oh definitely. I tell DH everything.

ithakabythesea · 07/04/2017 19:34

If I was told a secret, I wouldn't share it with DH - we are 2 separate people, it is not my place to share other people's secrets with him. Nor would he expect or want me to. I am shocked how many would tell their DH.

If you have to tell your DH then you must warn the secret teller in advance- 'before you tell me, you have to know I share everything with my DH' - then they can decide whether to proceed on that basis.

Papafran · 07/04/2017 19:35

I have read a lot of this thread, but not all of it. Couple of points:

1 The people who say their DH doesn't listen/care. So why the HELL do you tell them then? They aren't interested and they aren't hearing what you are saying. So you are basically just doing it for gossip or to make yourself seem more important.

2 The people who go on about how they are each other's 'other half' would clearly be totally incapable of holding any jobs where confidentiality is a requirement: lawyer, doctor, nurse, counsellor etc. Which is a relief because most of them sound like idiots anyway. But gossiping about your friends' personal problems is as much to do with your DH as the fact that you had to deal with an abuse-victim in your counselling job. I.e. nothing.

The only time I can understand it is if the secret is putting serious emotional strain on the person, ie if a friend is dying as was discussed upthread. Then I could understand. However, nattering away to someone who is not even listening to you about your mate's marital problems is crass as fuck. It's not 'sharing'- it's being a massive twat.

Lovelymess · 07/04/2017 19:36

It depends what it was

TabascoToastie · 07/04/2017 19:49

I'm sorry but the 'let it all hang out, I tell everyone everything, I posted on Facebook when I shat myself in Boots' crowd sound pretty hard work. I don't understand the mentality of those who need to broadcast every tiny thing. And really not being able to cope with the "burden" of knowing a friend is having issues with incontinence is hardly emotionally mature.

It's really interesting to me that the people on this thread (including the OP) who are so strongly pro secrets
That's the whole point. You perceive anything you don't actively tell others as being "a secret." I do not. The fact I had a sandwich for lunch is not a secret but it would never occur to me to share it because it's so boring. The fact my friend wets herself is not a secret but I wouldn't share it with people she barely knows because it's no one's business and it would humiliate her.

If you think of your husband as a random stranger, no wonder the concept of sharing things with him is alien to you. Good god, what a sad life.
Are you being deliberately disingenuous? The post you're quoting was referring to friend's husband as "random stranger" not their own husband! And yes it's not unusual to not know friends' spouses, my closest and oldest friend moved to New Zealand and married a man there so I've never had the opportunity to meet him.

Adding to the pretty hilarious ignoring yet again of substantive points. I'll add "joined at the hip" and "semi-human" to the insult pile.
Well "semi-human" no but "joined at the hip" is pretty mild compared to calling rape victims childish attention-seeking drama queens.

pollymere · 07/04/2017 19:50

I always tell people that I don't keep secrets from my oh, so not to tell me if they don't want me to tell him. Sometimes they like his viewpoint too. Some have said, yes they've assumed that. None have ever not told me.

Clandestino · 07/04/2017 19:55

I wouldn't unless it's someone he totally doesn't know. Men love gossiping.

KitKats28 · 07/04/2017 20:00

I've been nodding to all of BarbarianMum's and Photograph's posts.

Maybe I'm just not like other people, but I can't imagine having to "process" something a friend told me. Maybe I'm just a heartless cow, or maybe it's just that I don't encourage those sorts of confidences.

I would never purposely "not tell" my husband, but I generally only tell him stuff if I think he would be interested. My friends know that I would quite likely mention it in passing to DH, so if they didn't want him to know something, they wouldn't tell me. Having said that, my friends know they can absolutely trust me not to pass on anything they tell me to anyone else.

What I can't stand is people who tell me stuff and swear me to secrecy, and then I hear the same story from the five other people they've "sworn to secrecy". Attention whoring in the extreme. 🙄

aforandromeda · 07/04/2017 20:04

If I was asked to keep something secret from DH I would feel uncomfortable

Even if it was absolutely nothing at all to do with him, and couldn't affect him in any way?

aforandromeda · 07/04/2017 20:15

We don't keep secrets from one another
But it's not your secret. It's somebody else's secret.

I really don't understand all this not keeping secrets from your partner malarkey when it's actually not your secret it's a secret somebody else told you about themselves and cannot and does not affect your partner in any way.

ArriettyClock1 · 07/04/2017 20:16

I would always tell my dh.

This 'don't tell anyone' scenario happens quite often! We always blab to each other though.

AmeliaLion · 07/04/2017 20:17

One of my closest friends tells her DH everything. I knew this about her without having to ask. I tell her some stuff, but not everything. She would probably say I tell her everything - but I really don't. I don't care if he isn't really listening, or doesn't count because I rarely see him. There are some things about me I don't want him to know. That means I can't share them with her, and she has no idea they exist because I can't be arsed with getting in to a discussion about why I don't want her DH to know.

BertrandRussell · 07/04/2017 21:21

"This 'don't tell anyone' scenario happens quite often! We always blab to each other though."

Ick.

2rebecca · 07/04/2017 21:27

I find the don't tell anyone scenario happens hardly ever, probably because my friends are like me and just keep a lot of stuff to themselves or talk to their husbands.
Don't tell anyone then means it. If I intended to blab I'd tell them.
It sounds as though some people have lots of pseudosecrets and just like drama that they tell to friends who they know will just tell their husbands.

Lamaitresse · 07/04/2017 21:45

It would depend what it was... But if someone told me a secret and asked me not to tell anyone then I absolutely would not tell dh. We share an awful lot, but it wouldn't be my secret to tell.
Recently my SIL's IVF worked, and I was the first person she told after she did the test at 4 weeks. My dh (her brother) didn't find out until she told the rest of the family together a few weeks later. I almost burst with excitement, and kept having to bite my tongue, but it was her news to tell, and not mine.
I'm surprised by the amount of posters that would automatically share secrets with their dp's - don't you feel bad telling someone (anyone) if you've been asked not to?

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