Female colleague on business trip

[JadeFeather]

DH left last week for a 2 week business trip abroad. Just found out that his female colleague (that he’s very close to) is joining him today (Saturday) so it would seem that they would be spending the weekend together. He’s now saying she’s leaving tomorrow to go on to the next destination where they have a meeting. Seems a bit odd for her to stop over on a Saturday... if it was a weekday they could have had meetings to attend. DH mentioned previously that his bosses were asking whether it was necessary for her to be at the meeting and he apparently said no. So it seems like the idea for her to go came from either her or from him.
I don’t know if I’m just being paranoid. The reason I’m worried is because I found out that he had previously told her about some personal issues I was having that were impacting on our marriage. I felt that this was a betrayal of my trust and if I ever wanted to discuss anything personal about him with a friend I would check with him first. There have also been various trust issues very early on in our relationship but he keeps reassuring me that he’s matured since then.
AIBU?

Check his pockets for condoms!

I so wish you could phone the 'client' posing as a PA/secretary and asking them to confirm what time they're meeting Mr JadeFeather on Sat evening?... Shame it's the weekend really.

Do you know where they're dining??

@keeponworking

I guess that's one way to destroy the relationship for good!

I wouldn't consider a work related dinner with a client at the weekend as odd. It really depends on their industry. It was commonplace in my sector.
But the 'female perspective' is nonsense and tbh an insult to your intelligence.

Meh, it’s the sort of thing I’d probably do, break up a flight, have a weekend with a colleague I got on well with, attend a networking dinner I fancied going to rather than either a weekend on my own or travel at rhe last min. I get on well with my colleagues who are predominantly Male, they tell me personal stuff. and I’d be bemused if anyone’s wife thought I wanted to shag em. You should see them. 😂

Have you any reason to suspect she wishes to shag your husband? The fact you find him attractives really doesn’t mean every other woman does. The fact he told her personal stuff doesn’t mean she would consider shagging him either.

I also find shagging your colleagues not something the vast majority of professional women wish to do.

The thing is you could be totally bonkers, probably more than likely. But you won’t know and you can’t control what countries and events this woman goes to.

Why is he “very close” to this colleague?

Given his previous huge betrayal and breach of your privacy with this OW it’s even worse that he’s meeting her overseas at the weekend.

If he's opening up to her about your problems then they are probably shagging. Men don't share intimacies with women they aren't bedding or want to bed

Many men and women will be able to tell you that just isn't true. Men and women CAN be friends. I'm no less a friend to my male friend up north because I have bloody ovaries, for God's sake. We'd no more 'bed' each other than we would a sodding penguin.

OP, I hear your concerns, and you sound sensible and clear-headed (though understandably worried). Because of various things you mention, there's obviously an underlying trust issue.

I don't travel for work anymore, but my friend does, around five times a month, and often does a stopover in a city if she knows someone there or wants to work/shop.

I hope it's all above board. You don't sound as though you'd lose your shit over your DH having a female friend, but you obviously need to feel assured that's it, and no more.

It might be extremely uncommon to you and in my own workplace I’ve never heard of such a thing happening but DH has at various points told me about three senior people in his office who are married and sleeping with colleagues.

How in God's name would making a phone call 'end a relationship for good'?! She's suspicious already, something feels off.

She probably can't do it anyway, it's just a half-suggestion (and I'm quite sure OP is entirely capable of making up her own mind what she wants to do about it, whether she wants to gather evidence or not in any case!).

She can’t phone the client ffs. What is this JAMES bond school for deranged women?

And op simply because some folks shag in the office doesn’t mean this woman wants to sleep with your husband. More likely she just wants go to to the networking dinner.

If it was a man would you have the same reaction? I hate how women are perceived differently in thr workplace. If they want to go to a dinner or do something as normal as this then they must want to shag your husband. Utter bs.

It sounds like sunk cost fallacy in your relationship Jade. You've invested years of your life in this man and you have recounted on here some pretty significant reason why he has broken trust.

Trying to search for precedent in whether other people's DHs extend their business trips is not a measure of how truthful your DH is being in this latest in a string of other dalliance and untrustworthy goings on. It won't get any better based on his track record. It's a case of If it sounds like a duck and walks like a duck.. etc

I don’t have an issue with him having female friends. In fact after I felt he had betrayed my trust I just asked him not to discuss personal matters about me with her again which he agreed to. I just don’t want to be a mug if there is something dodgy going on.

@mimibunz

Yep. Pro tip for the wannabe cheaters - if someone complains to you about their partner, you can have sex with that person.

Speaking to a female friend about relationship issues or one’s wife’s personal business is a huge breach of trust IMO and certainly risking emotional affair territory.

@Bluntness100

She can’t phone the client ffs. What is this JAMES bond school for deranged women?

Glad there is at least one other sane person here.

I also find shagging your colleagues not something the vast majority of professional women wish to do

Agree. Despite the comments about women practically waiting to be 'bedded' , most are surprisingly capable of not shagging someone else's husband.

Not aimed at you, OP.

Men don't share intimacies with women they aren't bedding or want to bed
Of course they do if they're friends.
It sounds more like she fancied a trip at the company's expense or is trying to promote her own career. Don't assume that every man is after an affair just because some posters on Mumsnet insist it's so.

Speaking to a female friend about relationship issues or one’s wife’s personal business is a huge breach of trust IMO and certainly risking emotional affair territory

And what if it was a male colleague? That he was good friends with? Is it the same if she told her friend about his issues because she wanted to talk about it?

It's odd that your DH keeps telling you things that would make you feel destabilised eg her boss doesn't understand why she is coming to the meeting; he has married colleagues who cheat.
In the context of the trust issues within your relationship, he's constantly sowing seeds of distrust. It's emotionally abusive. He's trying to force you into a constant state of low-level panic whilst subtly hinting you need to keep doing a 'pick-me dance' to keep him.
Regardless of what is or isn't going on with the female colleague, I think you need to seriously consider why you are with someone who seems to take pleasure in making you unhappy and unsettled.

Men don't share intimacies with women they aren't bedding or want to bed

Of course they do, I’ve one male colleague who likes to use me as a sounding board about his relationship woes. I’ve known him twenty years and the thought of shagging one another would be at once both nauseating and funny.

I’m guessing you just don’t have any male friends so can’t imagine it.

There are some women, I am one of them, who find male relationships easier than female. I never considered having a relationship with my male colleagues, they were mates and people who supported me. My daughter, who has ADHD and is slightly on the spectrum, has always preferred males to females as friends. Even as an adult her best friend is a male. She has just started her first relationship at 18, she has never had a physical or romantic relationship with her male friends. My son has always preferred female company, again in a non-romantic way. He is a sensitive young man who has never enjoyed or understood the macho male culture. In the OH’s shoes I would be wary of jumping to conclusions but her OH is ignoring her feelings about this woman, which is unhelpful if she has spelled out her reasons for this.

The reason I was given for sharing the issues with her (and not even with his best friend) is that he wanted a “female perspective”. Hmm ok
What's weird about that? Women have strange ideas about stuff that men don't (on account of the fact that men go for simple thinking while women overthink everything!) so if you're a man trying to get your head round your wife's point of view it makes more sense to ask a woman's opinion than your best male mate who will probably say 'dunno, sounds crazy to me mate, have another beer'

It's emotionally abusive. He's trying to force you into a constant state of low-level panic whilst subtly hinting you need to keep doing a 'pick-me dance' to keep him

Congratulations on the most ridiculously dramatic post of the day. Husband is honest about a work trip, poster turns it into planned emotional abuse.😂

It's odd that your DH keeps telling you things that would make you feel destabilised eg her boss doesn't understand why she is coming to the meeting; he has married colleagues who cheat.
In the context of the trust issues within your relationship, he's constantly sowing seeds of distrust. It's emotionally abusive. He's trying to force you into a constant state of low-level panic whilst subtly hinting you need to keep doing a 'pick-me dance' to keep him.
Or maybe he's just discussing his work life with HIS WIFE! FFS, the only emotional abuse is some of the bollocks that people on here come out with as they try to stuff up someone else's marriage!

Speaking to a female friend about relationship issues or one’s wife’s personal business is a huge breach of trust IMO and certainly risking emotional affair territory

What if the female friend is a committed relationship with, or married to another woman? If she's in her 80's?

Same? Or is just straight women of a 'certain age' that this rule applies to?

While the OP's husband may or may not be planning on pursuing this colleague, this blanket distrust of women does no one any favours.