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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Close friends and marriage break-up

246 replies

NameChangedForThisIssue · 02/10/2017 15:15

As you can see from my username I've name changed for this as one of the individuals is on MN.

Two weeks ago a very good friend of mine started divorce proceedings. Her H and I are actually very good friends too and I've known for about a year that she wanted out. He had no idea (though I doubt the veracity of that because who in a marriage doesn't know when it's not going well?)

So anyway, her H and I are going to a wedding in Florence in a week's time for another one of our friend's wedding and we've been planning this over Facebook and WhatsApp messages - amongst our messages he'd write about what's going on with his wife and other things.

It would now appear that I am one of the reasons that she wants to divorce him. I introduced them to each other 10+ years ago and tbh there's never been an issue with our friendship. I've had quite a few boyfriends/dates over the years which I always regaled them with and when I was in a relationship we'd often do things as a 4-some so didn't see the issue.

My friend (the wife) now thinks that actually her husband has become too attached to me and has told our other friends that I too are to blame for the downfall of their marriage.

I just don't understand this. It makes fuck-all sense to me. Surely if we had wanted to be together we've had the best part of 10 years to do so - why would I have suddenly fallen in love with her husband in the past few weeks!?

He and I talk most days and as I said we've always been close and confided in each other but I'm not a home-wrecker.

OP posts:
Roomster101 · 04/10/2017 14:40

Roomster101 - since I have asked other posters this - how do non-straight people fit into that equation? Do you not hang out with lesbians? Do you think bisexual people shouldn't have friends at all?

Fit into what equation? I haven't said that anyone shouldn't have friends. I just think people need to respect other people's relationships.

27Feb · 04/10/2017 14:43

Roomster101 - so do you not have close female friends who are married either? You just generally think people shouldn't talk about their relationships except to each other etc?

If so, yes, I see where you're coming from. I don't agree, but I can see your point more clearly. Smile

Roomster101 · 04/10/2017 14:48

Roomster101 so do you not have close female friends who are married either? You just generally think people shouldn't talk about their relationships except to each other etc?

I have close female friends who are married. However, I don't text anyone every day and I don't really discuss my relationship with anyone.

NeedsAsockamnesty · 04/10/2017 15:01

What's wrong with all of these women? What a man and woman can't be friends? Why are women so insecure- my husbands best friends are females. He has been on holiday with them, and confides in them too

I have a great many male friends a few of them I would describe as close friends.
There is no way I would behave in any way towards them that allowed or encouraged a high level of emotional dependency and I also wouldn’t insert myself into their lives as a third wheel

Crescend0 · 04/10/2017 15:01

Papa - no of course it's not just to do with kids, but I think as life gets busier you just don't have time to be in continual or daily communication with friends. I'm doing well if I can meet a friend for coffee once a week Grin. All the men I know these days are married, so we meet up as couples in general and I'd rather talk to their wives tbh. I have girlfriends from years back and we get together when we can. That's it.

27- thankyou and I think your point is interesting actually.

pandarific · 04/10/2017 15:12

NeedsAsockamnesty but the op hasn't inserted themselves in that way. Contact has been regular level up to when the breakup was announced, which was about two weeks ago. Since then contact has been every day, but that's down to him being in a crap place, and the op has been being a supportive friend to her mate going through a marriage breakup.

The issue is that his wife now seems to be blaming op for the actual marriage breakdown which the wife has been wanting to do for the past year. Which is massively unfair on op.

NeedsAsockamnesty · 04/10/2017 15:45

Going to Florence with someone who you know is having marriage strife is fairly inserting.

And we do not know what either party in the marriage has said to each other about the relationship or friendship and neither should we.

Papafran · 04/10/2017 16:06

Going to Florence with someone who you know is having marriage strife is fairly inserting

To be honest, it sounds like the marriage is down the pan. I would 100% go on a nice trip with a friend to cheer myself up. Screw what society thinks is the right way to live your life- you'll just end up miserable in the end, trying to conform and do the right thing. So many marriages break down that you are putting all your eggs in one very flimsy basket if you invest everything in your spouse. Then you end up depressed as hell with no friends when it all goes wrong. Whereas had you maintained a healthy strong friendship group all along, things might be easier. We read about isolated and lonely elderly people all the time. No doubt because of society's warped view that you should not have real friends once you are and adult and once you are married. Oh well.....

NeedsAsockamnesty · 04/10/2017 16:45

I have very strong friendship groups and I do not think that marriage means the end of friendships and I don’t much hold with what society thinks.

I do care what I think about how I conduct myself and I’m perfectly happy to know I have some great secure friendships that do not put peoples spouses nose out of joint

SilverySurfer · 04/10/2017 16:45

scottishdiem
Look. It's easy. There are a whole group of women that cannot cope with their partners bring friends with other women and get all freaked out by it. It's the JCH (jealous, controlling harpy) Gene and nothing can be done about it. Not all women are afflicted by this Gene but it is fairly common.

There are also women whose OH had a close friend of the opposite sex and in due course, either one or both developed strong, non-platonic feelings. I know of two such situations one male and the other female, both broke up their families and got divorced. One pair of friends are now married, the other not.

I personally think its unkind and unhelpful to describe some women as jealous, controlling harpies, especially as some have suffered exactly the situation described above.

By the way, I wondered what you call men who are unhappy with their OH having such a close relationship?

heron98 · 04/10/2017 16:49

I think your friendship with the husband is fine. I have a very close male friend. We message most days, meet up probably once a week. I am in a very happy long term relationship and so is he. Yes, he sometimes moans to me about his OH and I do the same but it's because we are friends and I do the same to my female friends.

5rivers7hills · 04/10/2017 16:58

Regardless, to me it seems quite disrespectful to be constantly texting a male friend if he has a partner and discussing relationship issues seems even worse.

THEY HAVE ONLY BEEN TALKING ABOUT THE RELATIONSHIP AFTER THE WIFE BINNED HIM

and breathe

I think as life gets busier you just don't have time to be in continual or daily communication with friends

I think you do have time to be in daily text communication with friends. Waiting for the kettle to boil, sitting on the train coming home, stiring the risotto, whist watching the news... Lots of time for a few texts.

By the way, I wondered what you call men who are unhappy with their OH having such a close relationship?

Jealous, controlling, dick-faces.

GiantSteps · 04/10/2017 17:03

Going to Florence with someone who you know is having marriage strife is fairly inserting

But that was organised before the wife told her husband she wanted a divorce.

What is inappropriate is that the wife told the OP that she wanted to divorce her husband before she told her husband.

You're in a ratty situation OP not of your own making. If it were me, I'd be retreating from both friends, as they are neither of them in a position to be properly friends to you. They've - unconsciously, I imagine, not deliberately - made you their go-between, and their whipping boy/confidante.

How any poster can make out that you're the problem I do not know. They must be reading a different thread.

It's an impossible situation for you & I hope you're OK.

BewareOfDragons · 04/10/2017 17:10

She's re-writing history.

'That just isn't true.' That is your response if anyone says anything to you.

You haven't done anything wrong.

27Feb · 04/10/2017 17:11

By the way, I wondered what you call men who are unhappy with their OH having such a close relationship?

Honestly, I'd worry that they were isolating their partner for a reason and that the relationship was potentially abusive. I'm trying to give these couples the benefit of the doubt, as this dynamic clearly suits a large number of people here but I wouldn't stay in a relationship where my male partner told me who I could and couldn't talk to and monitored how often. I'd find it suffocating and deeply creepy.

Iwanttobe8stoneagain · 04/10/2017 17:16

Didn't take long for the men and women can't be best mates/emotional affair lot to spring up. Wife if dumping apparently unsuspecting husband wants to blame someone else for emotional shit storm she is unleashing!

littlebird7 · 04/10/2017 17:28

My guess would be that this has been bubbling for years and years, she has quietly seethed about this friendship. In the beginning she probably assumed he would do the right thing and put you on the back burner, then she tried to live with it and that just caused resentment and finally she has had enough. Who could blame her? Who wants to play second fiddle forever.

I am amazed you do not seem to be aware of how damaging this has all been to their marriage, or even remotely sad that ( I would be upset for my friend if she/he was going through the wretched pain of a divorce) and I wonder why you don't describe this in your messages?

MrsJamesAspey · 04/10/2017 17:30

* I'm pretty laid back but if my DH was messaging another woman daily and chronicling the breakdown of his marriage to her then I think I'd be pretty fucking angry.*

Why? Would you also be angry if he was talking to a male friend about it on a daily basis? Can people only have friends of the same sex? I think most people need to talk to someone when their marriage is breaking down, and hopefully they could choose to confide in the right person without having to worry about what sex that person was.

Should a gay person only confide in people of the opposite sex? What about bisexuals? Presumably they shouldn’t confide in anyone Hmm

Papafran · 04/10/2017 17:35

I am amazed you do not seem to be aware of how damaging this has all been to their marriage, or even remotely sad that (I would be upset for my friend if she/he was going through the wretched pain of a divorce) and I wonder why you don't describe this in your messages?

What? Because she didn't drop him like a hot potato as soon as he got married? Would it be as damaging if the OP had a close female friend or is it simply that they are of opposite sex?

I am sure that there are some pretty dubious origins to the myth that men and women can't be friends. Probably created to make women hate one another/isolate married women and to avoid men feeling threatened that another dude might take his prized possession away.

Papafran · 04/10/2017 17:37

What about bisexuals? Presumably they shouldn’t confide in anyone

That's true. I am bi. I have a long and friendless future ahead of me and I am not even married, but surely I need to keep away from both sexes 'out of respect for spouses/partners'. If there are any single people with no plans to get married who want to be my friend, let me know.

NeedsAsockamnesty · 04/10/2017 17:39

But that was organised before the wife told her husband she wanted a divorce

The op knew all was not rosy, and it would be fair to say that someone asking for a divorce in hindsight is usually not the first sign that things may not be perfect, granted at the time it may be unexpected and knock you for six but when you’ve time to think about it it’s not unusual for it to have been a bit obvious well unlessyour relationship is a bit shit to start with normally

pandarific · 04/10/2017 17:43

NeedsAsockamnesty Going to Florence with someone who you know is having marriage strife is fairly inserting

It could be, sure, if it was a random trip off together. But it's the wedding of another mutual friend that the OP, and both husband and wife had been invited to. The wife didn't want to go, but had they both been going, OP would have hung out with both of them, as they are all friends. Normal that she would still hang out with the H, because they're just friends and always have been.

The issue the wife NOW has with the op going alone with the H is unfair on the op. She's perhaps understandably not being the most rational - her marriage is failing, she's lashing out and apportioning blame where it doesn't lay. It's a crappy situation, but 10,000% not the op's fault.

Roomster101 · 04/10/2017 17:56

THEY HAVE ONLY BEEN TALKING ABOUT THE RELATIONSHIP AFTER THE WIFE BINNED HIM

I wouldn't even do it then if I was also friends with the wife as in OP's case.

Papafran · 04/10/2017 18:06

I wouldn't even do it then if I was also friends with the wife as in OP's case

What, out of respect for a woman who has slated the OP behind her back and accused her of being a homewrecker? Screw that.

motherinferior · 04/10/2017 18:09

I’d answer that, Papafran, but you might take it as an overture in your predatory single way.

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